The commission investigating the uprising accuses the magnate of inaction as the vice president’s advisers said goodbye to their loved ones over the radio
Where was Donald Trump during the critical three hours when his supporters wrecked the Capitol looking for the vice president and congressional leaders to lynch them? In the famous Tension Room intended for moments of crisis? Meeting in the Oval Office? No, in the dining room, watching TV.
To visualize the scene, the bipartisan commission investigating the uprising showed last night, during the final hearing of the season, a scale model of the West Wing that even illustrates what it saw on the screens at the time: the attack in real time by Fox news. It wasn’t until the anchor reported that the Pentagon had sent 1,800 troops to retake the legislative palace that Trump agreed to pleas to include a statement urging his supporters to come home.
The coup had failed, it was time to join those who defended democracy and act as president, rather than leader of the mobs. The attack on the Capitol killed ten people, including four police officers who committed suicide in the days that followed and injured 140. Everyone in the White House understood what was going on. “We were in shock,” admitted the national security adviser to whom the commission guaranteed anonymity. “We all knew what it meant. This was no longer a demonstration. If Trump went to Capitol Hill, it would be a coup, an insurrection.” And that’s why everyone tried to prevent it.
Trump didn’t get to read the statement written for him, but “what came out of his sleeve”. He began adding fuel to the fire, repeating the lie of the fraud that led to the violence. “I understand you, I know what hurts. They stole the elections from us,” he applauded them. “We love you, you are very special, but now you have to go home.”
That’s what he did, go to his rooms and end it, despite the fact that at the time the windows in the Capitol were still smashing open and the National Guard rushing in. The Chief of Staff, General Mark Milley, estimated Congressional leaders would take at least “four or five hours” to regain control of the building and allow them to return to the room to review the election results. to certify. The vote finally took place at 3 a.m.
“Mike Pence left me hanging,” was all the president muttered, leading him to his rooms that afternoon. Certainly, the vice president, who holds a ceremonial position as chairman of the ballot, was known to be pilloried that day. Trump had tried to persuade him to abort the trial on the grounds that the elections had been fraudulent in several key states, but his lawyers had made it clear that there was no indication that this was true, nor did he have the legal authority to prevent the certification of results.
And Pence, who had been loyal to Trump throughout the presidency, decided that day that that was as far as he was concerned. Fearing that the president had sent the secret services to kidnap him, he refused to get into the limousine when the violence started and they wanted to evacuate him. “Pence folded, Hang Mike Pence!” the crowd shouted. The situation was so horrifying that members of his team “started to fear for their own lives” and came to say goodbye to their loved ones, the national security adviser, who testified anonymously, said. “There was a lot of screaming, a lot of personal radio calls, it was very disturbing, I don’t like talking about it,” he recalls traumatized. “There were phone calls to their relatives to say goodbye.”
While Pence ordered Pentagon leaders to send troops and take back control, Trump remained tucked away in the dining room alone, hoping his supporters would change the course of history. “Well, I think they’re angrier than you about the election results,” he told House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy, who had called to beg him to intervene.
At least two senior White House officials, who testified under oath yesterday, resigned that day for not wanting to “defend the indefensible,” Sarah Matthews, assistant secretary for communications, testified last night. If White House counsel Pat Cipollone did not resign, it was because he feared he would be replaced by “someone who gave the president very bad advice,” he said in veiled reference to Rudy Giuliani. That same night, as if nothing had happened, the former mayor of New York called several senators to try to convince them not to accept the election results, according to reports he left on the wrong answering machine in his own voice when he tried to call senator. Tommy Tuberville, one of the many unpublished documents heard last night. Trump himself refused to accept it the next day, after Congress had already completed the election work. “I don’t want to say the election is over,” he said in one of the fake shots that aired yesterday, in which his daughter Ivanka can be heard in the background, instructing him to record the message with which he uses his face. can save.
“Trump did not make a mistake in not acting, but chose not to act,” concluded Congressman Adam Kizinger of his party, a member of the committee. “The mob reached its goal, of course it wasn’t going to intervene.” Those 187 minutes of silence, alone in front of the television screen, are the most compelling evidence that the president, active or passive, was complicit in that coup attempt that could have changed the world.
The committee rests with that conclusion until September, the date on which it promises to return with a new season of the drama that has glued half the country to television for a month and a half. The break will allow the collection of testimonies from other witnesses who feel compelled to testify now that the truth has come to light, if only to save their place in history, as Trump’s children wanted their father would do that day.
Source: La Verdad
I am an experienced and passionate journalist with a strong track record in news website reporting. I specialize in technology coverage, breaking stories on the latest developments and trends from around the world. Working for Today Times Live has given me the opportunity to write thought-provoking pieces that have caught the attention of many readers.
