Commission investigating the January 6, 2021 attack proves how the former US president signaled violent groups to intervene
When all avenues to invalidate the election results failed in the seven states where he had already lost a month of President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration, Donald Trump and his allies prepared for the last resort, to take action by force. .
In its seventh hearing yesterday, the Jan. 6 committee focused on making the connection between the then US president and organized violence groups, and how Trump took advantage of the anger he fueled in the country as a weapon to launch a violent attack. at the Capitol and annul the election results.
In the early morning of December 19, 2020, Trump published a tweet giving the armed groups the coded signal to mobilize on January 6: “Big protest in (Washington) DC on January 6”, “Be there, it will be wild! The response was immediate. It was confirmation of plans for the attack on the Capitol, signaling that the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, Three Percenters and other extremist groups were waiting to begin preparations.
Hours after the tweet, the organization Stop the Steal announced a large march in Washington and in the days that followed asked for permission to hold a protest on Capitol Hill, which was promoted on the WildProtest website.
It was already planned. Under the cover of a mass demonstration over alleged electoral fraud, extremist groups would attack the Capitol to prevent Biden from winning Congress. The next day, according to the federal investigation, Enrique Tarrio, former national president of the Proud Boys, created an encrypted chat called MOSD Leaders of Group, which would act as a committee for “planning national demonstrations” and that included his chief lieutenants . For the rest of December, they hosted the “trip to DC” via chat, urging their members to dress incognito for the January 6 surgery.
Top leaders of the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers have been charged with federal sedition and await trial. The Oath Keepers militia group implemented similar plans led by its boss Stewart Rhodes, another of the accused. They mobilized to provide weapons and created a rapid reaction force ready to head for the Capitol.
The day before the tweet, at a White House rally, former Trump National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, campaign attorneys Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani and others urged the president to crack down on the electoral fraud plot: invoking of emergency powers for alleged foreign election interference, -without evidence-, to confiscate the voting machines and install Powell as the special prosecutor of the investigation.
Pat Cipollone, a former White House attorney who testified before the panel last Friday, alarmed during a “confidential” meeting in the Oval Office with the president, without the presence of government officials, called several attorneys and they appeared. Amid outcry and accusations of lack of courage between one group and another, Cipollone found the idea of confiscating voting machines “appalling” and warned it would be a government intervention for which he had “no legal authority”. When the conspirators’ plan fell apart, the attack on Capitol Hill proved to be Trump’s last chance to remain in power.
The Commission has finally released the names of 10 Republican congressmen who attended a meeting in the White House on Dec. 21 to discuss options to overturn the election results. They include, those already suspected, Brian Babin, Andy Biggs, Matt Gaetz, Louie Gohmert, Pablo Gosar, Andy Harris, Jody Hice, Jim Jordan, Scott Perry, and Marjorie Taylor Greene (an elected congressman at the time).
At the conclusion of the hearing, Commission Vice-President Liz Cheney made an important announcement about Trump’s attempt to contact an unnamed witness involved in the investigation into the Capitol bombing. The appeal was addressed to the witness’ lawyer, who has never spoken to the former president, and has referred the panel to the Justice Department. Cheney reiterated that the Commission takes very seriously any attempt to influence the testimony of witnesses, whose harassment is a serious crime.
Source: La Verdad
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