Here are four key takeaways from the hearing:
A Trump Tweet mobilized the crowd for Jan. 6
In the early hours of December 19, 2020, Mr. Trump posted a tweet calling on his supporters to come to Washington on January 6. “Big protest in DC Jan 6th,” Mr Trump tweeted. “Be there, it’ll be wild!” The panel showed how the tweet served as a rallying cry for Mr Trump’s supporters — including extremist organizations and right-wing media commentators. They immediately began to gather support, both within far-right groups such as the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys and among ordinary citizens who believed Mr Trump’s lies about the election. And in many cases, the online commentary that followed what Mr. Trump’s supporters heard as a call to arms was steeped in talk of violence. “We’re only going to be saved by millions of Americans moving into Washington, occupying the entire region, if necessary, storming the Capitol directly,” Matt Bracken, a right-wing commentator, said in a video clip posted shortly after Mr Trump’s tweet. and the committee played on Tuesday. “We know the rules of engagement. If you have enough people, you can push any kind of fence or wall.” Once the crowd came to Washington, as Tuesday’s testimony showed, Mr. Trump’s supporters continued to take their cues from him. “I was hanging on every word he was saying,” said one supporter, Stephen Ayres, who pleaded guilty to misdemeanor disorderly conduct and disorderly conduct for his role in the Capitol attack. Mr. Ayers said he had not planned to rush to Capitol Hill, but decided to do so after hearing Mr. Trump address the crowd at the Ellipse, near the White House. “Well, basically, you know, the president, you know, he got everybody up, he told everybody to get down, so basically we were going along with what he said,” Mr. Ayers said. Mr Ayers said he was angry because he was convinced the election had been stolen and something had to be done to right that wrong. He said the crowd believed Mr Trump was going to meet them at the Capitol.
Key revelations from the January 6 hearings
“I think everybody thought it was going to go down,” Mr Ayers said. “You know, he said in his speech, you know, like he’s going to be there with us. I mean, I believed it.”
New evidence showed plans to move to Capitol Hill
The committee presented new evidence showing that Mr. Trump and his allies had more far-reaching plans than previously known for him and his supporters to go to Capitol Hill on Jan. 6. Documents obtained by the committee showed that a tweet had been drafted for Mr Trump – which he saw – calling for his supporters to march on the Capitol after his speech. “Making a big speech at 10:00 A.M. on Jan. 6 south of the White House,” the draft tweet said. “Please come early. A crowd is expected. March to the Capitol afterwards. Stop the stealing!!” The tweet was never sent, but the committee suggested it was just one piece of evidence showing that, in the days before Jan. 6, Mr. Trump and his allies had discussed plans to go to the Capitol grounds after the rally. in Ellipse. The committee showed a text message received by a Trump ally, Michael J. Liddell, the head of the My Pillow company, from a Jan. 4 rally organizer, at which the organizer said a second tent was to be set up at the Supreme Court, across from the east front of the Capitol. Rally organizer Kylie Kremer wrote: “It can’t get past the second stage because people will try to set up another one and sabotage it. He might as well not come out for the march because I’ll be in trouble with the national park service and all the agencies, but the POTUS will just “out of the blue” ask for it. Other text messages sent at the time indicated that right-wing activists also believed Mr Trump would accompany them as they gathered at the Capitol. “Trump is supposed to order us to the capitol at the end of his speech, but we’ll see,” said Ali Alexander, who led the Stop Theft campaign. The committee also cited testimony from White House photographer Shealah Craighead, who was present at a rally in the Oval Office on the evening of Jan. 5 when Mr. Trump and some of his aides could hear a crowd of supporters chanting was concentrated nearby. Ms. Craighead testified that Mr. Trump was saying, “We have to go up to the Capitol. What is the best route to the Capitol?”
An epic clash in the oval office
Four days after states voted in the Electoral College, effectively ending all legal challenges to Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s victory, a group of Mr. Trump’s outside advisers entered the West Wing to meet with Mr. Trump in the Oval Office. The advisers — including the lawyer Sidney Powell and Michael T. Flynn, the retired general who had briefly served as Mr. Trump’s national security adviser — came armed with drafts of executive orders they wanted Mr. Trump to sign, the which would be used by the Department of Defense to seize voting machines to try to prove baseless allegations of voter fraud. Shortly after the meeting began, White House counsel Pat A. Cipollone — who did not believe the election was rigged and was pushing for Mr. Trump to concede — found out and rushed to the Oval Office so quickly that Ms. Powell said he set a “new land speed record.” “I opened the door and I walked in and I saw General Flynn, I saw Sidney Powell sitting there — I was not happy to see the people in the Oval Office,” Mr. Cipollone said in videotaped testimony he gave to the committee recently. Friday, excerpts of which were played at Tuesday’s hearing. Mr. Cipollone testified that he approached one of the counselors he did not know and asked his identity. It turned out to be Overstock.com founder Patrick Byrne. “I don’t think any of these people gave the president good advice,” Mr. Cipollone said. “There’s a way to claim elections that happen all the time, but the idea that the federal government could come in and take over voting machines? No — I don’t see why I have to tell you why it’s a bad idea,” Mr. Cipollone testified. “It’s a terrible idea.” In the hours that followed, a meeting was seen as one of the most contentious of Mr Trump’s presidency, as Mr Cipollone and other White House lawyers, including Eric Herschmann, confronted Ms Powell, Mr Flynn and Ms. Bern. “At times, there were people shouting at each other, hurling insults at each other. It wasn’t just people sitting on a couch and chatting,” said Derek Lyons, who was then White House staff secretary. Ms. Powell testified that she thought Mr. Trump had appointed her as special counsel to investigate allegations of voter fraud. But testimony played to the committee revealed that Mr. Cipollone strongly opposed such a move and effectively killed her by refusing to do the paperwork required for such an appointment. After all the fighting between outside advisers and White House lawyers, Mr. Trump refused to go through with the plan to use the military or other federal agencies to seize the voting machines. Hours later, he would take to Twitter to post his appeal to his supporters to come to Washington on January 6.
More warnings against witness tampering
As she did at the end of the previous hearing two weeks ago, Representative Liz Cheney, the committee’s vice chair, warned against witness tampering in her closing statement — and this time her message was aimed squarely at Mr. Trump. Ms Cheney said a witness – whom she declined to identify except to say the person’s testimony had not yet been made public – had received a call in the past two weeks from Mr Trump. The witness, Ms. Cheney said, received the call after the latest hearing, in which Cassidy Hutchinson, a former West Wing aide, testified incriminatingly about Mr. Trump. Ms. Cheney said the witness refused to accept or answer Mr. Trump’s call. But the witness told his lawyer, who alerted the commission. The committee then forwarded the information to the Justice Department, which on Tuesday declined to comment. “Let me say one more time, we will take any attempt to influence testimony very seriously,” Ms. Cheney said. After Ms. Hutchinson’s public testimony on June 28, the committee revealed efforts by Trump allies to reach a witness, who turned out to be Ms. Hutchinson. On Tuesday, a spokesman for Mr. Trump said on Twitter that Ms. Cheney was peddling “innuendo and lies,” but did not immediately say whether Mr. Trump had tried to contact a witness. Zach Montague contributed reporting.
