The House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6attack on the United States Capitol conducted its ninth hearing on the post-election violence following the 2020 national elections. The members voted to subpoena former President Donald J. Trump to account for his role in the attempted coup.
“Four months ago, this committee started to present our findings to you, the American people,” the chairman, Representative Bennie Thompson, (D) Miss., announced at the opening of the October 13 hearing, which also served as a formal committee business meeting.
“From the beginning, we understood that some people watching those proceedings would wrongly assume that the committee’s investigation was a partisan exercise. That’s why I asked those who were skeptical of our work to simply listen to the evidence, to hear the testimony with an open mind, and to let the facts speak for themselves before reaching any judgement,” Mr. Thompson said on behalf of the bipartisan body. “Over the course of these hearings, the evidence has proven that there was a multi-part plan, led by former President Donald Trump, to overturn the 2020 election.”
Adding that much has happened in the country since the last hearing on July 21, Committee Vice-Chair, outgoing Representative, Liz Cheney, (R-Wyo.), said that new and extensive documentation from the U.S. Secret Service, and new witness testimonies, regarding attempts to obstruct the committee’s investigation and to conceal key facts, may lead to criminal referrals to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ).
“The preamble to our constitution recites, among its purposes, to ‘establish justice,’ and our nation’s judiciary and our U.S. Department of Justice have that responsibility,” Ms. Cheney explained. “A key element of this committee’s responsibility is to propose reforms to prevent January 6from ever happening again. We’ve already proposed, and the House has now passed, a bill to amend the Electoral Count Act, to help ensure that no other future plots to overturn an election can succeed,” she said.
Stating that the former president, members of his inner circle, and many of his followers were the primary orchestrators of the insurrection, Ms. Cheney stated that the vast weight of evidence presented, to date, speaks for itself. “The central cause of January 6 was one man, Donald Trump, who many others followed,” she said. She warned of the likelihood of another January 6 happening again if steps are not taken to prevent it. “None of this would have happened without him, he was personally and substantially involved in all of it.”
Describing how the former president’s assertions of a stolen election were both fraudulent and premeditated, Ms. Cheney said Mr. Trump’s claims were prepared prior to the election taking place and with the intent of keeping him in power should he lose.
“Many of those who stepped forward to help, including Rudy Giuliani, knew they never had real evidence sufficient to change the election results and on the evening of January 5, they admitted they were still trying to find that phantom evidence,” Ms. Cheney noted. “Please recognize that President Donald Trump was in a unique position—better informed, about the absence of widespread election fraud—than almost any other American. President Trump’s own campaign experts told him that there was no evidence to support his claims,” she said.
Other committee members presented evidence, including video recordings of Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi; Senate Majority Leader, Chuck Schumer; Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell; and other members of Congress, recounting the effort to certify the 2020 election. Video recordings included footage of government officials under duress as mobs of rioters and insurrectionists, including members of White nationalist groups such as the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys, rampaged through the halls of the U.S. Capitol.
Included in the new evidence was an audio recording of former Trump advisor Steve Bannon, made days prior to the election, telling associates that the former president would declare victory, regardless of its outcome, and predicted that chaos would ensue shortly thereafter. “And what Trump is going to do is just declare victory, right? He’s gonna declare victory, but that doesn’t mean he’s the winner, he’s just going to say he’s the winner,” Mr. Bannon said before the November 2020 election.
Closing the hearing with a unanimous vote to subpoena Mr. Trump to account for his actions both before and after the January 6insurrection, the nine-member panel said more information is yet to be forthcoming. But with a contentious partisan divide on Capitol Hill and the 2022 mid-term elections only weeks away, compelling the former president to testify against himself appears doubtful.
In a time where questions over which party will take power hangs in the balance, Nation of Islam Southwest Regional Student Minister Dr. Abdul Haleem Muhammad of Muhammad Mosque No. 45 in Houston, said the answer lies in America’s history and track record of justice and jurisprudence toward the masses of its citizens.
“It is as the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan described the national elections in 2016, it’s a case of ‘Satan casting out Satan,’” Student Minister Muhammad told The Final Call. “The three branches of the U.S. government are approaching their breaking point under the stress of corruption,” he added.
“As politicians and policymakers call for the severe punishment of ‘street crime’ committed by the poor, while downplaying the ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’ of those holding the highest offices in the land, America is calling down the wrath of Allah (God) on the country,” he said.
