Cassidy Hutchinson made one thing very clear in her testimony.
Were it not for civil servants, lawyers, and longtime federal employees, former President Trump would have made Jan. 6 far, far worse.
Hutchinson described in detail her time in the White House as Chief of Staff Mark Meadows’ point person, including multiple instances leading up to and on Jan. 6 when Trump wanted to get closer to the violent action of the day.
It was part of a pattern where officials would block or dissuade Trump from acting on his natural impulses. Sometimes, that took the form of pushing Trump to act when he would not. Hutchinson described the efforts, for example, to have Trump denounce the violence in a video.
The main instance that Hutchinson covered, however, concerns Trump’s attempt to attend the insurrection that he ended up egging on from afar.
It began in the days before Jan. 6, Hutchinson said, recounting a Jan. 3 conversation with White House Counsel Pat Cipollone.
Cipollone, Hutchinson said, knew that Meadows had mentioned Trump “going up to the Capitol on Jan. 6.”
“Mr. Cipollone said something to the effect of, ‘please make sure we don’t go up to the Capitol. Keep in touch with me,” Hutchinson recalled. “We’re going to get charged with every crime imaginable if we make that movement happen.”
Cipollone, Hutchinson said, worked to persuade Trump and those around him not to let the walk go forward.
He listed a set of crimes that Trump and others might commit if he went forward with the plan to go to the Capitol: inciting a riot, obstruction of justice, defrauding the electoral count.
During Trump’s speech on the Ellipse itself, others found themselves in the position of trying — and failing — to contain the President.
Eric Herschmann, another White House lawyer, purportedly warned Hutchinson that Trump would be exposing himself to “legal concerns” if he used “fight” language and phrases during the speech.
That concern was not heeded. Neither was advice that he not mention in the speech the idea of marching on the Capitol with his supporters.
That, in turn, incensed Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), who purportedly told Hutchinson to get it under control.
“You told me this whole week you aren’t coming up here. Why would you lie to me?” Hutchinson recalled McCarthy saying.
She replied that she hadn’t lied; that the plan was still to stop Trump from going to the Capitol.
“And he said, ‘well, he just said it on stage, Cassidy,'” Hutchinson recalled McCarthy saying. “‘Figure it out. Don’t come up here.'”
In the end, Hutchinson said, it fell not to political appointees like Meadows or to high-powered attorneys like Herschmann and Cipollone to restrain Trump, but rather to Bobby Engel, a Secret Service Special Agent in his security detail.
As Trump drove in a Secret Service SUV away from the Ellipse, Hutchinson was told by Secret Service agents that Trump grabbed at Engel, who was driving, in a failed bid to gain control of the steering wheel.
“I’m the f-ing president, take me up to the Capitol now,” Trump said, per Hutchinson’s testimony, while grabbing for the steering wheel.
“Sir, we have to go back to the West Wing,” Engel replied, according to Hutchinson.
Trump then lunged at Engel, Hutchinson said.
She added that the agent who told her the story “motioned toward his clavicle” when describing where Trump was grabbing.
Fascists, at heart, are fascists. Autocrats, at heart, are fascists. Insurrectionists, at heart, are insurrectionists. Trump is all three, and worse. His instincts are purely criminal, unpatriotic, illegal, and unconstitutional. He is a stain on this nation.
A few years ago we visited the Churchill War rooms museum in London. It really made you think about how fragile the UK was. Today’s hearing reminded me of that
The net is that Skanky, First Daughter-Wife Iwanker, First Escort Melaria, Self Fellatio Czar Cuck Kushner, Coke-addled Failson Skanky Jr. and Kimberly Gargoyle did not have the cojones to march with their supporters. They are not just traitors but spineless cowards. People drove out with AR-15s, glocks, weapons of mass destruction, explosive devices, and ammunition from all across the country, climbed trees and passed on magnetometers to overthrow the government for them. Gargoyle even got $60K for screaming without walking the walk.
Skanky should have proved his military bonafides to pro-war, pro-coup and pro-Putin conservative extremists how much he had learned in that expensive military boarding school and as commander-in-chief of Putin’s nethers. Skanky and the entire family should have brought their own military-grade weapons, rope, zipties, toilet paper, and clean underwear and walked with the armed mob that was invading the Capitol to hang the Vice President and prevented him from doing his constitutional duties.
Skanky should not have trusted the Bobby Engel and the Secret Service and taken the limo. Even Pence and Mother who are not that smart or conservative knew better. They did not trust the Secret Service that was going to take them to Andrews Airforce Base stockade. The crime family failed their insurrection.
Bobby Engel had a duty to follow the effing traitor’s instructions. Engel should be fired for insubordination.
TFG was going to go to Capital with the weapons aimed at Senate, Congress and Capitol police. Obvious intent, criminal through and Through. And Cippalone hasn’t agreed to testify???
A 26 year old female staff member had the courage. Not Pence, not McReynolds, not Jordan, Not McCarthy……….not one single cabinet member. Criminals all!
That 74 million of our ‘adult’ citizens voted for the bastard is a stain on our nation as well, given how he had ‘ruled’ for four years. No excuse.