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Takeaways From Latest Jan. 6 Hearing: Election Officials Felt Trump’s Pressure

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Taking a step back in time to reexamine the pressure former President Donald Trump exerted in order to overturn the 2020 election results, the Jan. 6 Committee heard testimonies from those who endured terrifying and deadly threats originating from those efforts Tuesday.

Looking to show that Trump’s pushes and false claims ultimately led to the domestic terrorism events at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, a number of officials from tightly contested battleground states in the election were examined, including one — Wandrea ArShaye “Shaye” Moss, a former Georgia election worker — who Trump accused of committing voter fraud, along with her mother.

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The surveillance footage and accused actions were debunked, but that didn’t stop Moss from being thrown into the fire by conservatives and Trump supporters. The impact from the events clearly affected Moss, whose emotions were evident in the Cannon Caucus Room.

“There were a lot of threats wishing death upon me,” Moss recounted. Moss’s Black skin color also factored into those threats, with one saying to “be thankful it’s 2020 and not 1920.” “A lot of them were racist. A lot of them were just hateful,” she said. Some protesters even attempted to make a citizen’s arrest on Moss’ grandmother.

“It’s turned my life upside down. I no longer give out my business card. I don’t want anyone knowing my name. I don’t go to the grocery store at all. I haven’t been anywhere at all.”

Another official, Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers (R), testified he was subjected to constant protesting and smearing outside his home, with one man weilding a pistol. Though supporting Trump in a reelection bid, Bowers explained he did “not want to be a winner by cheating.”

Bowers claimed he was asked by Trump and his attorney, Rudy Giuliani, to find evidence that illegal immigrants and dead people had voted in the 2020 election, along with decertifying Arizona’s electoral votes and replace them with Trump voters.

Biden won Arizona by just .4% (1,672,143 votes). Though Bowers asked to see this evidence of fraud, Trump and Giuliani never presented anything more than just “theories.”

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Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) made similar statements to Bowers, saying Trump asked him during a phone call to “give him a break” and find 11,780 votes, enough to help him win by one vote in the state he lost by .3%.

The audio of the phone call was played for the committee, with Trump threatening to Raffensperger that those investigating voter fraud and found to be dishonest by claiming falsehood could face criminal behavior.

“You can’t let that happen, that’s a big risk to you. All of this stuff is very dangerous.”

Raffensperger detailed his intensive investigating of potential fraud, examining one of the 4.9 million total votes after another. “The numbers don’t lie. At the end of the day, President Trump came up short,” he said.

In terms of audience viewing, the American public may not be fully invested in the developments, which could spell trouble for Democrats hoping to use the hearings to sway voters in the upcoming midterms. The first hearing on June 9, treated to a primetime spot, peaked at 20 million viewers.

However, that number has since dropped as hearings take place during the daytime. 23% of voters said they saw, read, or heard a lot about the hearings on June 13 and 16, down 7% from the June 9 hearing.

Biden Orders Release Of Trump White House Visitor Logs To Jan. 6 Committee

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President Joe Biden has ordered the release of Trump White House visitor logs to the House committee conducting investigations into the riot of Jan. 6, 2021, once again rejecting former President Donald Trump’s claims of executive privilege.

In a letter sent to the National Archives Wednesday, White House counsel Dana Remus stated that Biden has given the agency instructions to hand the logs — which show all White House visitor information on the day of Jan. 6 — over to the committee.

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Remus explained that Biden came to the decision that an assertion of executive privilege is “not in the best interests of the United States, and therefore is not justified,” and that the majority of entries that the former President exercised executive privilege over would be publicly released under current policy.

“As practice under that policy demonstrates, preserving the confidentiality of this type of record generally is not necessary to protect long-term institutional interests of the Executive Branch.”

Remus added that the Biden administration regularly discloses visitors logs on a monthly basis, with exceptions, as did the Obama administration. The National Archives had given the documents to the current administration in late January, afterwhich Trump blocked the visitor logs from public view.

The letter states that “in light of the urgency of the Select Committee’s need for the information,” the documents are to be given 15 days after Trump is notified, “unless prohibited by court order.” It’s currently not known how detailed the logs are, or what use they will be to the committee.

As CNN detailed, the logs are made up of information of visitors who made an appointment to the White House, but the extent of which they can reveal the inner workings of the House are limited. Anyone without a permanent pass must provide personal information along with details of the visit, processed by Secret Service.

However, there are loopholes for how information can become unknown and eschewed. If the visitor additionally meets with other officials or enters another building than the one they were originally visiting, that wouldn’t show up on the logs. Meanwhile, if a visitor doesn’t appear at the scheduled time — or at all — the visitor and entry would still be recorded for the original date and time.

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The Associated Press notes that Trump had been extremely precautious with documentations during his presidency. He took some administration records to his Mar-A-Lago Resort in Florida, alarming historians and archivists.

According to AP, Trump and his officials could also face additional legal trouble if there is any evidence of White House documents — which are protected by the Presidential Records Act established in 1978 — being tampered or mishandled. Depending on the actions, prison sentences can range from three to five years.

When turned over the to committee, the logs will not be made public, and no timeline has been given for when they will be made public. Instead, Resmus noted they will be initially declared as “national-security sensitive” (NSS) or “otherwise-highly sensitive,” (OHS). Personal information  — such as birth dates and social security numbers — will be redacted, while the committee cannot share any of the documentation without prior consultation.

January 6th House Committee Has ‘Firsthand’ Knowledge Of What Trump Was Doing During Capitol Riot 

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The House select committee investigating the January 6th Capitol Hill insurrection has information from multiple sources regarding what former president Donald Trump was doing at the time of the riot. 

A source close to the investigation recently spoke to the media and revealed that there are “a collection of people with relevant information” when it comes to what Trump was doing throughout the insurrection. 

Keith Kellogg, former vice president Mike Pence’s national security adviser, who was also with Trump throughout the riot, was one of the individuals who gave a deposition. Kellogg refused to comment to the media regarding what he testified, as he was sworn under oath. 

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The committee also has text messages and other documents that reveal what Trump was doing during the insurrection. Some of the messages discussed came from Trump’s former chief of staff Mark Meadows, who the House voted to refer to the Justice Department for criminal contempt of Congress after he failed to appear for a deposition. 

Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson and Vice Chairwoman Liz Cheney discussed how the information they gathered works to prove that Trump did nothing to stop the violence during the riot, which they view as a “dereliction of duty.” 

“We have significant testimony that leads us to believe that the White House had been told to do something. We want to verify all of it so that when we produce our report and when we have the hearings, the public will have an opportunity to see for themselves. The only thing I can say, it’s highly unusual for anyone in charge of anything to watch what’s going on and do nothing.”

Cheney discussed how the panel has “firsthand knowledge” that Trump’s daughter, and then senior adviser, Ivanka Trump asked her father to intervene during the riot. 

“We know his daughter — we have firsthand testimony that his daughter Ivanka went in at least twice to ask him to ‘please stop this violence,” Cheney said. 

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“Any man who would not do so, any man who would provoke a violent assault on the Capitol to stop the counting of electoral votes, any man who would watch television as police officers were being beaten, as his supporters were invading the Capitol of the United States, is clearly unfit for future office, clearly can never be anywhere near the Oval Office ever again,” Cheney added.

The House select committee also revealed text messages from Donald Trump Jr. to Meadows that were sent during the riot, in which Trump Jr. stated that his father needed to “condemn” the insurrection as it was occurring. 

“‘He’s got to condemn this sh*t ASAP. The Capitol Police tweet is not enough,'” Trump Jr. wrote in one message to Meadows.

“He could have simply walked a few feet to the White House briefing room. He could have gone immediately on live television and asked his supporters to stop what was happening, asked them to go home. He failed to do that, at the same time the violent assault was happening, he is watching television, and he is also calling one senator urging delay of the electoral vote,” Cheney exclaimed.

Committee members are ideally going to present more of their work and findings to the public as the year progresses and the investigation continues. Public hearings that will outline the story of what really happened on January 6th have yet to be scheduled, but will be occurring later this year.

January 6th Committee Reveals New Text Messages From Former Chief Of Staff Mark Meadows

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The House select committee investigating the January 6th attack against the US Capitol recently released new text messages that were obtained from former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows. The text messages were sent to him in the days leading up to the insurrection as well as while the Capitol was under attack. 

Committee members read the messages on the House floor this Tuesday during the debate over whether a criminal contempt of Congress against Meadows should be given to the Justice Department or not. 

One of the messages included in the readings was from a Georgia government official to Meadows while former president Donald Trump was on the phone with Georgia’s secretary of state, during which Trump was urging him to “find” votes for Trump. Other discussions relating to Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election were also included. 

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Representative Zoe Lofgren read a text message from an unnamed Georgia government official to Meadows that was sent during the same phone call. The message read: “Need to end this call, I don’t think this will be productive for much longer,” referring to the call between Trump and Georgia’s secretary of state.

Representative Adam Schiff read a text message from an unknown number that applauded the potential appointment of Jeffrey Clark to be acting attorney general while Trump was attempting to get the Justice Department to support his false claims of election fraud. 

“I heard Jeff Clark is getting put in on Monday. That’s amazing. It will make a lot of patriots happy, and I’m personally so proud that you are at the tip of the spear, and I could call you a friend,” the text to Meadows read.

“Mr. Meadows received numerous text messages, which he has produced without any privilege claim, imploring that Mr. Trump take specific action we all know his duty required. Indeed, some of those text messages, madam speaker, came from members in the chamber right now,” said Republican Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, one of two Republicans on the select committee. 

The select committee approved its resolution holding Meadows in contempt on Monday. The panel also revealed that Meadows had voluntarily provided text messages that he received on January 6th, including those from Fox News personalities, lawmakers, and Donald Trump Jr. 

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While some republicans spoke out against the committee for pursuing contempt charges against Meadows, they responded by stating that Meadows was flouting the law by refusing to show up for testimony about material he has already turned over to them. 

The text messages used throughout the hearing emphasized the argument that there were plenty of topics that the committee could ask Meadows that would not be covered by executive privilege. 

One of these text messages from Meadows to an unspecified member of Congress inquired about whether or not former vice president Mike Pence could overturn Electoral College results; this text was sent three days before the insurrection. 

In another text message from November 4, 2020, the day after the election, a member suggested to Meadows an “aggressive strategy for Republican-led state legislatures to just send their own electors to Congress and let the Supreme Court decide who won the election.”

Another text message from a member to Meadows underscored how the “committee has not received everything from the former White House chief of staff. Please check your signal,” the January 5 message said.

The committee will be making a decision within a week when to release the names of all the individuals involved in the text messages with the former chief of staff.

White House Officially Labels January 6th Capitol Riot As ‘Domestic Terrorist Attack’

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The White House released an official report this week that labelled the January 6th Capitol riot as a “domestic terrorist attack” in a document that went on to endorse the removal of all “extremist content” from the internet. 

The Biden Administration released the report this Monday, which also called for improved cooperation between the federal government and private internet companies. The report also instructs the US Justice Department to review whether or not a new anti-domestic terrorism law needs to be requested or now. 

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“Domestic terrorist attacks in the United States also have been committed frequently by those opposing our government institutions. In 1995, in the largest single act of domestic terrorism in U.S. history, an anti–government violent extremist detonated a bomb at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people – including 19 children – and injuring hundreds of others,” the report says.

“In 2016, an anti-authority violent extremist ambushed, shot, and killed five police officers in Dallas. In 2017, a lone gunman wounded four people at a congressional baseball practice. And just months ago, on January 6, 2021, Americans witnessed an unprecedented attack against a core institution of our democracy: the U.S. Congress.”

Biden initially requested this report be written up during his first week in office; which was just days after the riot that left around 440 individuals facing criminal charges. Four Trump supporters also died due to medical emergencies during the riot and one Capitol Police officer died due to a stroke while he was fighting off the violent crowd. 

The document states that the US supports the Christchurch Call to Action to Eliminate Terrorist and Violent Extremist Content Online, which works to block content available online, and was created after the 2019 massacre of 51 individuals at a mosque in New Zealand. 

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“[T]he United States endorses the Christchurch Call to Action to Eliminate Terrorist and Violent Extremist Content Online. We applaud language in the Christchurch Call emphasizing the importance of tackling the very real threat posed by online terrorist content while respecting human rights and freedom of expression,” the new document says.

The report also places great emphasis on the fact that private-internet companies need to be held accountable and be more strict when it comes to monitoring content on their platforms. 

“Recruiting and mobilizing individuals to domestic terrorism occurs in many settings, both in-person and online. These activities are increasingly happening on Internet-based communications platforms, including social media, online gaming platforms, file-upload sites, and end-to-end encrypted chat platforms, even as those products and services frequently offer other important benefits,” the White House document says.

“The widespread availability of domestic terrorist recruitment material online is a national security threat whose front lines are overwhelmingly private-sector online platforms, and we are committed to informing more effectively the escalating efforts by those platforms to secure those front lines.”

“[W]e must ask the question of whether legislative reforms could meaningfully and materially increase our ability to protect Americans from acts of domestic terrorism while simultaneously guarding against potential abuse of overreach. New criminal laws, in particular, should be sought only after careful consideration of whether and how they are needed to assist the government in tackling complex, multifaceted challenges like the one posed by domestic terrorism and only while ensuring the protection of civil rights and civil liberties,” the document said.