"So the Unselect Committee of political HACKS refuses to play any of the many positive witnesses and statements, refuses to talk of the Election Fraud and Irregularities that took place on a massive scale, and decided to use a documentary maker from Fake News ABC to spin only negative footage. Our Country is in such trouble!"
– Donald Trump criticizing the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 attack soon after the panel's first televised hearing on Truth Social, the social network he created after he was banned from Twitter in the wake of the January 6 riot over fears he would use the platform to incite more violence
Trump was making reference to former ABC News television executive James Goldston, who was brought in by the panel to help them produce televised hearings that are being broadcast live on all major news networks except Fox News.
Before the hearing began, Trump attacked the House Committee investigating the attack while repeating his long dismissed claims of voter fraud in a series of Truth Social posts, including describing the panel as an "Unselect Committee of political Thugs."
(Ewan Palmer. “Donald Trump Reacts to First Jan. 6 Hearing—'Such Trouble.'” Newsweek. June 10, 2022.)
I have little doubt that Donald Trump will run for president in 2024. Advisers to Trump say the ex-president is eager to jump back into electoral politics as a candidate in the 2024 election and could announce a third presidential run this summer. Sources close to Trump told NBC they’d been asked to block off 4 July – Independence Day – as a possible announcement date.
(Andrew Feinberg. “Trump may announce 2024 run next month, report says.” Yahoo News. June06, 2022.)
He will run despite Chairman and Representative Bennie Thompson's description of January 6 as a "culmination of an attempted coup" that was Trump's "last stand" and his "most desperate chance" to halt the transfer of power to Joe Biden following the 2020 Election.
He will run despite Republican Vice Chair Liz Cheney's report that the crowd of Trump's supporters, which included far-right extremists, stormed the Capitol on January 6 because they were "motivated" by the former president's false election fraud claims and assertion he was the rightful president.
He will run despite his Attorney General Bill Barr telling investigators in his on-camera deposition that he told Trump his allegations of election fraud were "bullshit."
He will run despite Ivanka Trump, his daughter and a former senior adviser in his White House, saying she accepted what Barr had to say. "I respect Attorney General Barr," she was shown saying, "so I accepted what he was saying."
He will run despite his Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley saying Vice President Mike Pence was being direct and wanting the military's help at the Capitol. Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, Milley said, wanted instead to shape a "narrative" that Trump was in control. Milley said that wreaked of "politics, politics, politics," and it was a "red flag.”
He will run despite his lawyer Alex Cannon affirming there was no evidence of widespread election fraud or the election being stolen.
He will run despite being “really angry” at advisers who told him he needed to be “doing something more" to quell the riot. And, aware of the rioters' chants to “hang Mike Pence,” he responded with this sentiment: quote, “Maybe our supporters have the right idea,” Mike Pence, quote, “deserves it."
He will run despite Proud Boys and Oath Keepers on camera saying they went to the Capitol that day because they believed that's what Trump wanted done, they felt he'd asked them to do it and that after Trump's "Stand back and stand by" remark in a debate, membership tripled.
(Domenico Montanaro. “New revelations and 3 other takeaways from the first Jan. 6 committee hearing.” NPR. June 10, 2022.)
Despite all of that, Donald Trump is still a danger to American democracy.
But, House Republicans are casting Thursday’s prime-time hearing by the committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol as a media production aimed at smearing former President Trump.
The effort by Republicans to push back at the hearing started days before that hearing was carried live by the major networks and news networks – with the notable exception of Fox News Channel, which aired its regular programming.
The GOP is arguing the
effort is just meant to distract voters from inflation and crime, two
issues that Republicans expect to be a big part of their effort to
win back the House and Senate this fall.
“They are scrambling to
change the headlines, praying that the nation will focus on their
partisan witch hunt instead of our pocketbooks. It will not work,”
House Republican Conference Chairwoman Elise Stefanik (N.Y.) said in
a Wednesday press conference.
Stefanik, who replaced Rep. Liz Cheney (Wyo.) – one of two Republicans on the Jan. 6 panel – as conference chair, called it a “smear campaign against President Donald Trump.”
Republicans have long countered the committee’s work by pointing to security failures at the Capitol that day and accusing Pelosi of not doing enough to keep the campus secure.
They have not wanted to focus on Trump’s involvement in the rioting.
And, speaking of Fox, Sean Hannity had a surprising analysis of Thursday’s primetime hearing hosted by the select committee investigating January 6 after it ended.
The longtime ally of
Donald Trump declared during his show that the former president came
out of the event looking “good”.
That’s despite lawmakers on the panel stating clearly that the ex-president had done nothing during the attack to deploy law enforcement backup to the Hill.
"This is now about a security failure of incredible magnitude and they don't even seem to want to talk about it. The one person that looks good is Donald Trump,” said Hannity during a discussion with right-wing journalist John Solomon.
(John Bowden. “Sean Hannity wildly claims Jan 6 hearing makes Trump ‘look good’ as his own texts cited in evidence. Independent. MSN. June 10, 2022.)
Truth Reveals the Crime
No president or former president should be allowed to float unaccountably above the law. Nor should he be able to avoid his ties to the white supremacy that stormed the Capitol.
No president should oversee and and coordinate a sophisticated seven-part plan to overturn the presidential election and prevent the transfer of power. He encouraged and endorsed the insurrection, and then refused to call off.
But, as the nation relives the tragedy of the January 6 insurrection, one very ugly fact remains paramount in establishing the future of American democracy …
The vast majority of Republicans still believe the election was stolen, and that number has stayed steady since the attempted coup.
A Reuters/Ipsos survey (June 9, 2022) revealed about two-thirds of Republicans believe the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Trump, a persistent view even though state and federal judges dismissed more than 50 lawsuits brought by Trump and his allies challenging the election while reviews and audits found no evidence of widespread fraud.
(Jason Lange. “Half of U.S. Republicans believe the left led Jan. 6 violence: Reuters/Ipsos poll.” Reuters. June 09, 2022.)
And, just as disturbing …
More than half of U.S. Republicans believe the false claim that left-wing protesters led the Jan. 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol riot to try to make then-President Donald Trump look bad.
Perhaps most alarming …
55% of the Republicans polled said they believed the riot was led by violent left-wing protesters, nearly all of the 840 people arrested following the attack have been Trump supporters, according to U.S. prosecutors, and FBI Director Christopher Wray has said there was no evidence leftist extremists disguised themselves as Trump supporters during the attack.
The poll found 58% of Republicans said they believed most of the protesters were peaceful and law-abiding, even though four people died on the day of the attack, at least 140 police were assaulted, and one Capitol Police officer who fought against the rioters died the next day.
(Jason Lange. “Half of U.S. Republicans believe the left led Jan. 6 violence: Reuters/Ipsos poll.” Reuters. June 09, 2022.)
What has a political party become when it continues to deny the truth? Would it be too presumptuous to accuse them of complicity in the attack? Before you accuse me of being radical in my suggestion, I will ask you: What will it take to restore integrity to politics and bring those accountable for the riot to justice? By a sizable majority, Republicans continue to be in denial of what happened in Washington, D.C. On January 6, 2022. The evidence is clear, yet they refuse to accept the testimony of those both close to Trump and those who experienced what has been described as the “war zone” on the Capitol grounds.
And, make no mistake, the nightmare is far from being over. Donald Trump will run again, the GOP will give him the nomination again, and together, they will twist and turn the bloody instrument of their revenge into the heart of our democracy. Dark days loom as division reigns. I can see the sea of Trump flags and hear the “Make America great again!” chorus approaching once more.
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