Jan. 6 hearing takeaways: Rioter regret, a push to seize voting machines, Trump called witness

WASHINGTON – At a rancorous Oval Office meeting Dec. 18, 2020, President Donald Trump’s outside advisers hurled insults at White House staffers who fought efforts to overturn the election four days after the Electoral College voted for President-elect Joe Biden.

Trump’s personal lawyers, Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani, and retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn were verbally attacking staffers including then-White House counsel Pat Cipollone, according to testimony Tuesday before the House committee investigating the Capitol attack on Jan. 6, 2021.

“I remember the three of them were really sort of forcefully attacking me verbally," Cipollone said.

The meeting was one of the most dramatic confrontations chronicled in the series of House hearings about how Trump pressured former Vice President Mike Pence, Justice Department officials and state officials to overturn the 2020 election.

Other takeaways include:

• A meeting Dec. 16, 2020, at the Trump International Hotel a few blocks from the White House featuring Powell and Flynn led to a draft executive order for the Defense Department to seize voting machines and name Powell a special counsel to investigate.
• Trump’s tweet Dec. 19, 2020 – hours after the Oval Office meeting – spurred his supporters to change their protest plans and aim for Jan. 6, 2021, when Congress would certify the Electoral College count.
• Trump’s tweet also generated widespread interest. A Twitter employee said he would have been kicked off the platform if not for his position of power.

Verbal fight in Oval Office

The confrontational Oval Office meeting pitted Powell, Giuliani and Flynn against Cipollone, lawyer Eric Herschmann and former White House staff secretary Derek Lyons.

Giuliani used an epithet to accuse White House lawyers of not being courageous enough to pursue allegations of election fraud. But Cipollone said he and Herschmann kept asking what evidence the outside advisers had for widespread election fraud.

“It was not a casual meeting,” Lyons said. “At times there were people shouting at each other, hurling insults at each other.”

Giuliani escorted out of White House

Giuliani had to be escorted out of the White House after the heated meeting by then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows.

Cassidy Hutchinson, a former Meadows aide, captured the moment in a picture. A committee member, Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., said the escort was to “make sure he didn’t wander back into the mansion.”

“The west wing is UNHINGED,” Hutchinson said in a text message that night.

Order drafted for Pentagon to seize voting machines

During a luncheon at the Trump International Hotel on Dec. 16, 2020 – two days after the Electoral College vote and two days before the Oval Office meeting – Raskin said Powell, Flynn and others drafted an executive order to have the Defense Department seize voting machines.

“Effective immediately, the Secretary of Defense shall seize, collect, retain and analyze all machines …” Raskin quoted from the draft order, which was never implemented.

Former Attorney General Bill Barr called the allegations voting machines were being manipulated “nonsense." He had refused to seize voting machines.

“I told him that it was crazy stuff and they were wasting their time on that and it was doing a grave disservice to the country,” Barr said in videotaped testimony.

The draft executive order also sought to name Powell a special counsel to investigate election fraud.

Cipollone opposed her appointment.

“I was vehemently opposed,” Cipollone said in videotaped testimony. “I didn’t think she should be appointed to anything.”

Oath Keepers and Proud Boys mobilized after Trump tweet

Trump tweeted early in the morning of Dec. 19, 2020, after the raucous Oval Office meeting ended, telling his supporters about a “Big protest in D.C. on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!”

The committee presented evidence that extremist groups such as the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, whose members have been charged with seditious conspiracy in the attack, joined forces to protest election results. 

Kelly Meggs of the Oath Keepers outlined the plan in a Dec. 19, 2020, Facebook post.

“Well we are ready for the rioters, this week I organized an alliance between Oath Keepers, Florida 3%ers, and Proud Boys. We have decided to work together and shut this s--- down,” read the post.

Meggs has been charged with seditious conspiracy and has pleaded not guilty.

Donnell Harvin, a professor at Georgetown University and the former chief of homeland security and intelligence for the government of the District of Columbia, said non-aligned groups were beginning to collaborate.

“All the red flags went up at that point,” Harvin said, “knowing that you have armed militia collaborating with white supremacy groups, collaborating with conspiracy theorist groups online, all towards a common goal.”

Oath Keepers are ‘dangerous militia,’ former spokesperson says

Jason Van Tatenhove, a former spokesman for the Oath Keepers, told the committee the group is a “dangerous” and “violent” militia.

“I think the best illustration for what the Oath Keepers are happened Jan. 6, when we saw that stack military formation going up the stairs of our Capitol,” he said. 

Van Tatenhove testified the group is largely driven by the ego of its founder and leader Stewart Rhodes, a Yale law school graduate who will stand trial in September for seditious conspiracy in relation to his involvement with the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. 

Rhodes has pleaded not guilty.

Jan. 6 defendant was 'hanging on every word' from Trump

Stephen Ayres, an Ohio man who pleaded guilty June 8 to disruptive conduct in the Capitol, said he lost his job and the riot “changed my life and not for the good.”

Ayres testified he was “pretty hardcore” consuming false social media posts about the election being stolen and thought Trump would join protesters at the Capitol.

But he no longer believes the falsehoods and told the committee he might not have come to the Capitol if he had known Trump had no evidence of fraud, which “makes me mad, I was hanging onto every word he said.”

Ayres also said he’s concerned for the next election because “thousands and millions” like himself held onto Trump’s claims.

Ayres shakes hands with Capitol Police officer

After he testified, Ayres shook hands with Capitol Police Sgt. Aquilino Gonell, who was injured during the Capitol attack, and apologized.

Gonell has had two surgeries since the attack. One was to fuse bones in his toes that were sticking out in opposite directions. The other was to repair muscle and cartilage in his shoulder. He took 10 months off from work to recover from his injuries and returned to limited duty in November. He also suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder.

Raskin said Gonell was forced to "leave policing for good" because of his injuries. 

Twitter employee says platform ‘relished’ being Trump’s favorite

A former Twitter staffer, who worked on the platform’s moderation team during 2020 and 2021, said stricter content rules were adopted after Trump told the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by” during a 2020 presidential debate.

“My concern was that the former president for seemingly the first time was speaking directly to extremist organizations and giving them directives,” said the employee, whose voice was changed in videotaped testimony. “We had not seen that sort of direct communication before, and that concerned me.”

But the employee said Twitter’s leaders “relished” being Trump’s favorite social media platform, and that any other user would have been permanently banned “a long time ago.”

Trump was eventually banned two days after the Capitol attack.

Cheney: Trump not 'impressionable child'

The committee's vice chair, Rep. Liz Cheney, took direct aim at Trump by arguing that his own White House advisers and Justice Department officials told him he lost the 2020 election and yet he willfully refused the accept that conclusion.

“The strategy is to blame people his advisers called ‘the crazies’ for what Donald Trump did,” said Cheney, R-Wyo. “This, of course, is nonsense. President Trump is a 76-year-old man. He is not an impressionable child. Just like everyone else in our country, he is responsible for his own actions and his own choices.”

Cheney argued Trump had access to more detailed information than almost anyone else.

“No rational or sane man in his position could disregard that information and reach the opposition conclusion,” Cheney said. “Donald Trump cannot escape responsibility by being willfully blind.”

Bannon warns: 'All hell is going to break loose'

The day before Jan. 6, Trump called former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon twice. After their initial call, Bannon said on his podcast that “all hell is going to break loose tomorrow.”

“It’s all converging and now we’re on as they say, the point of attack,” Bannon said. “Right, the point of attack tomorrow. I’ll tell you this. It’s not going to happen like you think it’s going to happen. It’s going to be quite extraordinarily different. And all I can say is strap in.”

Bannon faces trial Monday on criminal contempt charges after defying a committee subpoena. He has since offered to testify, but it's unclear when that might happen.

Trump tried to contact a witness, Cheney said

Cheney said the panel learned that Trump tried to contact a witness after the last hearing held in June.

The witness, though part of the committee’s investigation, has not yet been seen in the hearings, Cheney said. The witness declined to answer or respond to Trump, but alerted a lawyer who told the committee.

“This committee has supplied that information to the Department of Justice,” Cheney said. “Let me say one more time, we will take any effort to influence witness testimony very seriously."