Bill Stepien, the last president of former President Donald Trump’s campaign, hears Trump speak at his campaign headquarters in Arlington, Virginia, on November 3, 2020.ANNA MONEYMAKER / The New York Times News Service
With no key witnesses, the House committee investigating the January 6 Capitol riot opened its hearing Monday after a revolting delay when former Donald Trump campaign director Bill Stepien abruptly withdrew to declare, citing a family emergency.
The committee was told that Stepien’s wife was in the party, according to panel chairman Rep. Benny Thompson, D-Miss. Audience start time was delayed while changes were being made.
Stepien is a key witness as the panel delves into what he calls the “big lie,” the false claims of the defeated Republican president of election fraud that spurred his efforts to cancel the 2020 election and sparked a crowd of his supporters to besiege the United States Capitol.
Instead of Stepien’s live testimony, the panel showed his pre-recorded interview with the panel, behind closed doors, about what the campaign team was telling Trump when he lost the 2020 presidential election. Trump had long since been summoned to appear at the public hearing and it was unclear if he would have been a cooperative witness.
Monday’s hearing featured other live witnesses, including Chris Stirewalt, a former Fox News Channel political editor who testified on election night that Biden was winning Arizona.
President Thompson opened the hearing by saying that Trump “betrayed the confidence of the American people” and “tried to stay in office when people rejected him.”
Committee members say they have uncovered enough evidence for the Justice Department to consider an unprecedented criminal charge against the former president.
Thompson, D-Miss., And Vice President Liz Cheney R-Wyo. peak audience time.
For the past year, the committee has been investigating the most violent attack on the Capitol since the 1812 war to make sure this assault never happens again. Lawmakers hope to show that Trump’s effort to overturn Joe Biden’s election victory posed a serious threat to democracy.
Stepien, who is still close to Trump, oversaw the “conversion” of Trump’s presidential campaign into a “Stop the Robbery” effort, according to a citation issued by the committee last fall. He had to face questions about what those in Trump’s inner circle told the president about the election results. Stepien is now one of the top campaign advisers to Trump-backed House candidate Harriet Hageman, who is challenging Cheney in the Wyoming Republican primary.
Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich suggested Sunday that the committee’s decision to call Stepien was politically motivated.
The committee must also hear the testimony of Chris Stirewalt, a former Fox News Channel political editor who was heavily involved in election night coverage who maintained his decision to declare Arizona a Biden winner. He wrote about his experiences later in an opinion piece and could be asked about Trump’s actions while Fox New claimed Biden won.
A second group of witnesses to testify on Monday was to be made up of election officials, investigators and experts who are likely to discuss Trump’s response to the election, including dozens of failed lawsuits, and how his actions diverged from North American law. Americans.
Among those witnesses is former U.S. attorney in Atlanta, BJay Pak, who abruptly resigned after Trump pressured Georgia state officials to overturn his presidential defeat. Trump wanted to dismiss Pak as disloyal, but Pak withdrew after Trump’s call for Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” enough votes to overturn Biden’s victory was made public. in the state.
The panel will also hear former Philadelphia City Commissioner Al Schmidt, the only Republican on the election board and who faced criticism when Biden’s state election was called, and noted Washington attorney and election lawyer Benjamin Ginsberg.
While pondering another career in the White House, Trump insists the committee’s investigation is a “witch hunt.” Last week he said that January 6 “represented the largest movement in the history of our country.”
Nine people were killed in the riot and its aftermath, including a Trump supporter who was shot dead by police. More than 800 people have been arrested during the siege, and members of two extremist groups have been charged with few sedition charges for their role in leading the charge at the Capitol.
At its high-level hearing, the committee explained how its aides and trusted officials at the highest levels of government told Trump over and over that there was no electoral fraud on a scale that could have changed. the result. But Trump pursued his false claims about the election and signaled to supporters in Washington on Jan. 6 to nullify Biden’s victory, as Congress was willing to certify the results of the Electoral College.
Additional evidence will be presented this week at hearings focusing on Trump’s decision to ignore the election result and the failed court cases against him.
Monday’s hearing also referred to the millions of dollars the Trump team contributed to fundraising before Jan. 6, according to a committee aide who insisted on anonymity to discuss the details.
The committee said most of the interviewees in the investigation volunteered, although some wanted the citations to appear in public.
Lawmakers indicated that perhaps his most important audience throughout the hearings may be Attorney General Merrick Garland, who must decide whether his department can and should prosecute Trump. They left no doubt as to their own opinion as to whether the evidence is sufficient to continue.
“Once the evidence is accumulated by the Department of Justice, it has to make a decision on whether it can prove to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt the guilt of the president or anyone else,” said MP Adam Schiff , D-Calif., Member of the panel. . “But they have to investigate if there’s credible evidence, which I think is.”
Rep. Jamie Raskin, a D-Md. .
“I think he knows, his staff knows it, U.S. lawyers know what’s at stake here,” Raskin said.
No president or former president has ever been charged. Garland has not said whether he would be willing to prosecute.
A hearing in Congress on the attack on the U.S. Capitol by supporters of Donald Trump trying to undo his 2020 election defeat presented a testimony Thursday showing that his close allies, including his daughter Ivanka, denied her false allegations of election fraud.
Reuters
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