The House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol launched a number of batches of transcripts from interviews with key staffers and allies of former President Donald Trump.
The transcripts had been launched because the committee wound down its work on the finish of the 117th Congress, earlier than Republicans formally take management of the House on Tuesday. The interviews, performed over the previous 12 months and a half, had been a part of the investigation into the Jan. 6 assault and Trump’s position within the day’s occasions.
In their final public listening to, held on Dec. 19, the committee voted to refer to the Justice Department doable legal costs towards Trump and legal professional John Eastman.
Here are some key particulars from the transcripts that had been launched:
John Eastman takes the fifth
Eastman, who wrote the controversial memo that proposed that former Vice President Mike Pence had the authority to delay and even reject the certification of state electors, exercised his Fifth Amendment proper towards self-incrimination at nearly each main query.
When Eastman was requested why he had written within the two-page memo that seven states had transmitted twin slates of electors regardless of indicating to The New York Times that there we no certifications of alternate electors, he took the Fifth. He additionally took the Fifth when requested if he disagreed with former Attorney General Bill Barr’s remark that Trump’s election claims had been “bullsh**,” and when requested about feedback he made on Jan. 6.
Eastman additionally pleaded the Fifth when requested if he had suggestions to stop Jan. 6 from occurring once more.
Hope Hicks says “we all look like domestic terrorists now”
Text messages from Trump’s communications director Hope Hicks, considered one of his most loyal aides, had been launched by the choose committee on Monday.
In one alternate with Julie Radford, Ivanka Trump’s chief of employees, Hicks wrote, “In one day he ended every future opportunity that doesn’t include speaking engagements at the local proud boys chapter. And all of us that didn’t have jobs lined up will be perpetually unemployed. I’m so mad and upset … We all look like domestic terrorists now.”
Radford responded, “oh yes, I’ve been crying for an hour.”
Hicks then wrote, “She has no idea this made us all unemployable … Like untouchable … God I’m so f***** mad.”
Ginni Thomas: “I regret the tone and content” of texts with Meadows
Virginia Thomas, the spouse of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, attended the rally on the Ellipse on Jan. 6, 2021 earlier than the Capitol was breached. She additionally exchanged texts with Trump chief of employees Mark Meadows encouraging him to pursue each effort to overturn the election.
Committee vice chair Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., requested her if she regretted sending the texts, or simply that the texts grew to become public.
“I regret the tone and content of these texts,” Thomas stated. “And other than that, it was an emotional time, and I was texting with a friend who I had known a long time. So I really find my language imprudent and my choices of sending the context of these emails unfortunate.”
Kellyanne Conway texted Melania Trump on Jan. 6 as a result of Trump has a “fear” of her
Trump 2016 marketing campaign supervisor and former high adviser Kellyanne Conway resigned in the summertime of 2020 however remained near the Trump household. Conway informed the committee that she was making an attempt to get by way of to Trump on Jan. 6, contacting Hicks and Trump aide Nick Luna, amongst others. Conway stated she additionally texted Melania Trump.
“I texted her, please — something to the effect of, you know, please talk to him, because I know he listens to her,” Conway stated. “He reserves — he listens to many of us, but he reserves fear for one person, Melania Trump.”
Conway stated the primary girl did not reply as a result of she did not have her telephone that day.
Stephanie Grisham: Trump would by no means go to the Capitol as a result of he’s “afraid of people”
Melania Trump’s former chief of employees Stephanie Grisham, who additionally served as a White House aide, informed the committee that Melania Trump misplaced her “independent streak” within the last weeks of the administration.
Grisham additionally stated that Trump and chief of employees Mark Meadows tried to fireplace the usher on the White House after Election Day as a result of he was making ready for the transition for then-President-elect Joe Biden to maneuver in.
At one other level, Grisham stated that Trump wouldn’t have walked to the Capitol on Jan. 6 as a result of he’s “afraid of people.”
Cassidy Hutchinson: “They will ruin my life”
Cassidy Hutchinson, an aide to Meadows, gave blockbuster public testimony at a House Jan. 6 committee listening to on June 28. In an interview with the committee in September, she stated she could not afford a lawyer and was frightened about discovering a professional bono legal professional.
“I wanted to be able to do this on my own, and I didn’t want to feel like I was using an attorney in Trump world where I’d potentially have to be responding to their interests as well,” Hutchinson stated.
Former White House legal professional Eric Herschmann linked Hutchinson with Alex Cannon, she stated. Cannon informed Hutchinson that “they” had a lawyer for her, however didn’t disclose who could be paying for it. Hutchinson met with Stefan Passantino, who represented her for her first two interviews with the committee. In a February assembly, Hutchinson testified that Passantino informed her they’d “downplay” her position on the White House and on Jan. 6.
Hutchinson stated she was uncomfortable with the association however felt she had no different selection, telling the committee that she stated to her mom, “I am completely indebted to these people … they will ruin my life, Mom, if I do anything they don’t want me to.”
Hutchinson stated Passantino informed her to maintain her solutions “short” and stated that saying “I don’t recall” is an “entirely acceptable” response as a result of “they don’t know that you recall some of these things.” She informed the committee that testifying with him as her lawyer was “felt like (she) had Trump looking over (her) shoulder.”
“I knew in some fashion it would get back to him if I said anything that he would find disloyal. And the prospect of that genuinely scared me. You know, I’d seen this world ruin people’s lives or try to ruin people’s careers. I’d seen how vicious they can be,” Hutchinson stated.
She additionally informed the committee that Passantino additionally talked about job alternatives and labored to attach her with different folks on getting a job, saying, “We’re gonna get you taken care of. We want to keep you in the family.”
[Need to add that Passantino has said that he told her to tell the truth, etc., which I believe was his statement.]