The
President's intent was to stay in power at all costs
This election was stolen I flat out said I swore
an oath I'm t gonna break it I'm not putting
on no stinking circus They put their faith in Donald
Trump and he deceived them I don't think by any
large stretch can you characterize it as bipartisan
The Select Committee laid the path down for the Department
of Justice Donald Trump is going to be the defendant
and the candidate It's hard to imagine how it's going
to play out
Now on FRONTLINE
Democracy
on Trial
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empowering
world changing work
An historic
day here in Washington
A federal grand jury here has indicted
former President Donald Trump Mr Trump is charged with three
counts of conspiracy
and
one count of obstruction
This is the third criminal case brought against the former
president this year He will now head to appear in
federal court for the arraignment
This was not quite the return to Washington
this former president had envisioned for himself
We were getting ready to win this election
Frankly
we did winhis election
cheers and applause siren blaring I won this election by
hundreds of thousands of votes There's no way I
lost Georgia there's no way I only need 11 000
votes fellas
I need 11
000 votes Give ma
break
sirens
blaring
Make no mistake this election was stolen from you from
me from the
country
And we fight
We fight like hell and if
you don't fight like hell you're not going to have
a country
anymore
camera
shutter
clicks
typewriter
keys
echoing
NARRATOR
For
the
first time in American history
a president
charged with crimes in office
A major development in Special Counsel Jack Smith's investigation
into former president Trump Special Counsel Jack Smith
will make remarks at a news conference from the Justice
Department shortly
This is a climactic
moment
certainly in this investigation
An indictment was
unsealed charging Donald
J Trump
with conspiring
to defraud the United States
conspiring to disenfranchise voters
and conspiring and attempting to obstruct an official proceeding
Since the attack on our Capitol the Department of Justice
has remained committed
to ensuring accountability
for those criminally responsible
for what happened that day
Jack Smith is sort of like the uh clears throat
central casting
career federal prosecutor
He's been doing this for 20 years
He has a reputation
for being thorough and methodical
He's fairly aggressive
but not
reckless
aggressive
He's a very formidable opponent for Trump's lawyers
In this case
my office will seek a speedy trial
so that our evidence can be tested in court and
judged
by a jury of citizens NARRATOR
In the middle of a presidential
election
a critical moment for American democracy
It lands us right in the middle of a presidential
campaign
It is unavoidably
going to be tainted
with
the appearance of
politics
at play
Obviously that's the card that Donald Trump will play
They waited right to the middle of an election
until I became the dominant
force in the polls
I got indicted over bull bleep I got indicted Bull
bleep I get indicted for saying the election was rigged
If he's convicted
then he's
you know running
for president
as someone who has been found guilty
of federal crimes
I love that mugshot
I love that beautiful woman right there with a
mugshot To say the stakes for that trial are high
doesn't even begin to cover it really
We often in the media use the phrase trial of
the century for
this sensational
trial or that one But really
this would be I think the trial of the century
Because I cannot imagine anything more important th a former
president
on trial
charged
with trying to subvert
American democracy
sirens
blaring
indistinct radio
chatter
Tensions
are still high following the chaos
at the Capitol NARRATOR The federal indictment has its roots
in the aftermath
of the January 6th attack
The chaos
here has
aken the U S Capitol and the country Our nation's
capital under a state of emergency
under a city wide lockdown
NARRATOR
In Congress
there were calls to create a blue ribbon bipartisan
commission a 9 11 style commission to look into the
causes of the attack A bill to create a bipartisan
commission faces an uphill battle in the Senate
What was amazing
was that the Senate Republicans
refused to do that
To do what Congress has done in many previous
incidents of great national
catastrophe
or crisis or controversy
which is to create
a bipartisan
special committee
across both chambers
NARRATOR Republicans
in Congress
led by Senator Mitch McConnell
wouldn't support forming a commission
at might go after Trump
Leader McConnell
almost instinctively goes into damage control mode
He's not necessarily gonna go out on a limb when
the rest of his caucus isn't going to go with
him
NARRATOR
In the face of Republican opposition
the Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi
created a committee of her own
Morning
With great solemnity
and sadness
I'm announcing that the House will be establishing
a
select committee
on the January
6th insurrection
The House of Representatives
today did what the Senate would not voted to create
a select committee
It was the hope of Pelosi and the Democratic majority
that they'd be able to pick off at least some
Republican
support that there wouldn't be that great a pushback but
in fact there was
And in the end only two Republicans
voted for
the formation of that committee
In fact those two Republicans
Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney were the two Republicans who
ended up serving on the committee
The
fact that Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger are the only
two House Republicans
who believe that we should know what happened on January
6th that people should obey subpoenas
from Congress that people should provide documents when requested th's
itself
incredibly
astonishing
NARRATOR
They would spend a year and a half examining
the evidence
Tim Heaphy was the chief investigator
A former U S attorney
Heaphy led the independent review of the violence in Charlottesville
in 2017
and was now taking on January 6th
We ended up hiring
I think it was 14 or 15
former prosecutors
Lawyers that have the skill set to interview witnesses
to digest
a large amount of documents
and to sort of discern what's relevant and separate that
from what's not
That skill set is developed largely by trying cases by
investigating cases in federal and local prosecutors
offices
NARRATOR They conducted more than 1 000 interviews The House
Select Committee is shifting
into high gear preparing to do battle with some pretty
big names in the Trump world NARRATOR Reviewed
millions of documents
The House Committee probing the January 6th Capitol riot has
issued ten new subpoenas NARRATOR Thousands of hours of video
evidence
These subpoenas brings the focus to the actions of former
president Donald Trump in the days and weeks leading up
to the insurrection
They're con people They're con artists
NARRATOR From the beginning
Trump denounced the committee
The Select Committee on January You know like these people
are legitimate
Every one of them is a radical
left hater
The committee issued a subpoena to none other than former
president Trump himself NARRATOR He refuse
Trump suing the January 6th committee to block a subpoena
for
his testimony NARRATOR And while many of his aides did
testify
others followed his lead
Criminal contempt charges against former White House chief of staff
Mark Meadows
Peter Navarro
refusing
to cooperate
with the January 6th committee NARRATOR The committee's final report
spans
692 pages
a case against Donald Trump
A blueprint
for Special Counsel Jack Smith
We saw our work
as the
first step in a process
and not the end of the process
It's very clear
that the select committee laid the path down for the
Department of Justice
The January 6th case that will be heard in Judge
Chutkan's courtroom in Washington D C
has
the most
striking resemblance to
what
unspooled itself from the January 6th committee
The basis
of the indictment
looks like a carbon copy
of what the January 6th committee uncovered
A lot of the evidence
that we uncovered
is now in the hands of the Department of Justice
I just think all
what
we see now
is a by product of the wor of
the January select committee
NARRATOR Bennie Thompson
a longtime
Democratic congressman
chaired the committee
Bennie Thompson is a Mississippi
congressman
a Black man who grew up during the Civil Rights
era in Mississippi
during the last vestiges of Jim Crow
Glory glory hallelujah
and saw
how hard fought
the franchise to vote was for so many Black Americans
NARRATOR
In January
6th
Thompson saw parallels
One
of the symbols
of Southern
resistance
to
voting rights and equal oppounity
was the Confederate
battle flag crowd
clamoring
And to see that flag
being waved by many of the protestors
brought back those memories
When he saw
rioters
storm the Capitol carrying the Confederate battle flag essentially
trying to take away the votes of the American people
crowd chanting Fight for
Trump
that I know affected him profoundly
And certainly was a
driving
factor
in the way that he led the select committee
NARRATOR Thompson's committee had gathered a trove of information
The challenge
what do with it
The one thing that we knew was
the information
that we have is compelling
The thing we needed to do was tell that to
the American people in a compelling way
So that's why we brought in a former president of
ABC News
Yeah I got a call pretty much out of the
blue
from the January the 6th committee
They wanted they wanted a storyteller
And while they were brilliant they were brilliant lawyers
storytelling
for a mass audience is not what they do
To bring in a guy like this who would think
outside the box
really did prove to be fruitful
And it was Goldston who really began to envision
this as in a way a kind of miniseries
that there would be you know sort of nine episodes
and that these episodes would tackle particular themes
Attack on the Capitol
The Investigation
NARRATOR The first hearing was primetime
television
the nation is about to witness a defining moment The
first hearing before the country the results of the January
6th investigation
This is an extraordinary
moment in American history
When it came to that first hearing
we knew how high the stakes were is about to
hold its first
primetime
hearing
We were either going to you
know make people realize that this is important
you know or
once you've lost them you've lost them for good
On the evening of June 9 8
01 p m the drs opened
My heart was beating pretty fast on June 9
and
it was a real question
of
is this going to work or not
All right everybody here we go five on the line
please
I'm
in this
tiny control room right up the stairs from Cannon Caucus
And
we count down to
the start the hearing
and at that point
what can you do
Here we go in three
two
one
The select committee to investigate
the January 6th attack
on the United States Capitol
will be in order
We
wanted to make sure
that this was a presentation that would
grab the audience and hold onto 'em Chairman Thompson loved
to say
It's gotta pop
NARRATOR To get it to pop
they had just the thing
Donald Trump lost the presidential
election
in 2020
Don't believe me
Hear what his former attorney
general had to say about it
on video Not just what I I'd been through I've
had I had three discussions
with the president that I can recall NARRATOR
Former Attorney General
Bill Barr
This is the Attorney General of the United States
of America
For him to come forth under oath
I think was very powerful on video I made it
clear I did not agree with
the idea of saying the election was stolen and putting
out this stuff which I told the president was bull
bleep
Bill Barr
who had been hated by the left and who had
been beloved by Trump all the way until
December of 2020
to hear him
say
mincing
no words
that there was all this bull
bleep that was being perpetrated
by Trump
made you realize that ay we're now about to walk
into a portal
of evidence
that
is
um that is in fact different
than everything else NARRATOR
Following Barr
shocking video
Most of the footage
we are about to play has never been seen
The select committee obtained
it as a part of our investigation shouting Hold thline
Hold
the
line
Hold
the
line
Break
the
line
shouting
We have a breach of the Capitol breach of the
Capitol on the upper level We can't hold this we're
gonna get too many bleep people Look at this bleep
vantage point we're bleep We need
to
hold
the
doors
of
the
Capitol
shouting I need indistinct support shouting We lost the line
We've lost the line All MPD fall back on video
All MPD fall back up to
the upper deck All MPD fall back to the upper
deck ASAP crowd shouting on video crowd chanting Nancy In
the room that moment
we had officers that had been there on January
6
crowd
shouting
on video indistinct
shouting struggling shouting struggling continue There was
a real
gravity
that we wanted to bring to that first hearing that
that video
really put in perspective for us there get him out
get him up Get him up Officer down Get him
up officers shouting Get him up Hold up Hold up
Get him up shouting continues I don't think anyone
until that footage was shown
had really fully understood the violence
of the day
crowd
cheering
crowd
shouting
Help
shouting
continues
on
video
Those
law enforcement
personnel
here are people who were sworn
to protect the Capitol
come to work on that day
too just that
and they are assaulted
crowd cheering on video NARRATOR Paying special attention to the
hearing
Donald Trump who
responded
on his own social media platform dramatized
The so called Rush on the Capitol
was not caused by me
it was caused by a rigged and stolen election
indistinct radio
chatter NARRATOR The committee continued
laying out its evidence to the contrary
The attack on our Capitol was not a spontaneous
riot
President Trump summoned the mob
assembled the mob
and lit the flame of this attack
NARRATOR Vice chair at the hearing
Liz Cheney
a lifelong Republican
and
rock ribbed conservative
or destroy
by force
the government I chose Liz Cheney as my vice chair
she had
Republican
credibility
in the broader sense
So
you take an African American
liberal
and a white
female conservative
to lead this committee
Liz Cheney is Republican
royalty in many ways
She's
the daughter
of Dick Cheney
the vice president
She's very conservative she represents Wyoming
No one would mistake her for a liberal
but
she also
was someone who broke very publicly with Donald Trump
And there is
no RINO in America
who has thrown in her lot with the radical left
more than Liz Cheney
crowd booing She has gone crazy
I will do everything I can to ensure
the former president never again gets anywhere near the Oval
Office
She's been so strong on We need to have the
truth about January 6 We need to have the truth
about what happened before January 6 We can't have Trump
again he can't be president again
I talked to her about what was motivating her
And she said every time
she sees the video crowd chanting Mike Pence of Mike
Pence being rushed to safety for fear of his life
on January 6
Evacuate so we can secure the members on the other
side copy she saw in her mind the image of
her father
A plane has just crashed into the World Trade Center
here in New York City explosion Oh my God That
looks like a second plane
Dick Cheney the vice president being rushed away
from his office in the White House to theunker on
9 11 It is one of the darkest days in
America
attacked
in an act of terrorist
war
Tremendously
sad day
insurrectionists
have stormed the U S Capitol
and they have been cheered on by the president
And suddenly I got it
Suddenly I got it for her
this was what Al Qaeda and 9 11 were to
her father
To the extent that her father
became really
quite driven
by his view of the mission to protect America after
9 11
she saw her mission the same way
to protect America from Donald Trump
NARRATOR Now helping to lead the January 6th committee
Cheney was determined
to lay out the case against Donald Trump
Over multiple months Donald Trump
oversaw
and coordinated
a sophisticated
plan
to overturn
the esidential election
and prevent the transfer of presidential power
In the very first hearing she kind of laid out
the theory of the case right the opening statement where
she puts forth this multi part plan
I think that will sound very much like Jack Smith's
opening statement in the trial
in March
It is a summary
of how all of this fits
togetr In our hearings you will see evidence of each
element of this plan
Frankly
we did win this election crowd cheering We did win
this election
Donald Trump and his advisors
knew
that he had in fact lost the election
but despite this
you will see evidence that President Trump
corruptly pressured state legislators
and election officials
to change election results telephone dialing out picks up
I only need 11
000 votes Fellas
I need 11 000 votes give me a break
telephone hangs up
What you saw at that hearing
methodically
laid out by Liz Cheney
showed that it wasn't just some sort of like random
off the cuff impulsive
actions on his part but that there was in fact
a strategy
and a pattern
and a methology
to
what he was doing
President Trump's efforts to pressure Vice President Pence to act
illegally
likely
violated
two federal criminal
statutes
Because if Mike Pence does the right thing
we win the election
If I could have been a fly on the wall
in the Department of Justice during that
I certainly probably expect everybody sat up and took notice
of what she said after that
In our final hearings you will hear how President Trump
summoned a violent mob
and directed them illegally
to march
on the United States Capitol
We fight like hell and if you don't fight like
hell you're not going to have a country any more
And
with
that
the committee stands adjourned bangs gavel NARRATOR
The hearings
got the public's attention
The first primetime January 6th hearing laying the foundation
for a specific case against Trump The House Committee went
into graphic detail on the results of To put it
crassly the January 6th
committee was a ratings hit From NBC News January 6th
revelations
will blow the roof off the House
The very first one
the primetime viewing
was
at 19 4 million
which was really really remarkable
Huge
surprisingly
huge numbers last night that's on par with events like
Sunday Night Football games There were still multiple
multip
brand new revelations last night that took us by surprise
NARRATOR But for his supporters
Trump had a different story
dramatized The unselect committee of political hacks
refuses to play any of the many positive witnesses and
statements
It's a broadside
And it's not just one broadside
it is a continuous
series
of broadsides dramatized
Bill Barr was a weak and frightened attorney general
who was always being played
and threatened by the Democrats
It's just so relentless
it's so constant
it's so loud
that in parts of MAGA America that MAGA barrage
drowns out anything else
dramatized Warmongering
and despicable
human being Liz Cheney
who is hated by NARRATOR And on the conservative
airwaves
they ampfied
Trump's message
Every news network in this country but this one
faithfully
surrendered
its entire prime time lineup
The effect was North Korean
every channel the same A
full on Hollywood
multimedia extravaganza
to prosecute
Trump with this show trial with this kangaroo court
I don't think really by any large
stretch can you characterize
it as bipartisan
And this is I guess a consequence
of bigger issues about the evenly divided country that we're
in and
extreme partisanship
in the political process
Can they show us one damned sentence in the hundreds
of thousands of documents
that they have collected
the thousand
witnesses
they've had
anything
anywhere
that links Donald Trump to directing
or ordering an attack on the Capitol building Where is
it
If you're talking to somebody who's deep in MAGA America
they didn't pay attention to the January 6th commission
They were told
not to pay attention to it That whatever was going
to come out it was going to be fake or
fake news And this is the way a lot of
Americans
live their lives It's not just red Americans blue Americans
as well We we live in bubbles
And this is the way millions upon millions of Americans
live
siren blaring NARRATOR
In the weeks that followed
the committee laid out the details
of their case
This morning
we'll tell the story of how Donald Trump lost an
election
and knew he lost an election
and
as a result of his loss
decided
to wage an attack
on our democracy
NARRATOR A central question
what the president knew
and when he knew it
For a long time people who have pursued Donald Trump
tripped up on the question of whether they could prove
that he knew what he was doing was wrong or
that he knew what he was saying
was a lie
The January 6th committee got past that by
demonstrating
that he was told
time and time again that he did not win the
election
not by Democrats
not by the media
but by his own people
I want to start by showing
a video that tells the story of what was going
on in the Trump White House
on election night in November
of 2020
on video
The Fox News Decision Desk is calling Arizona
for Joe Biden
That is a big
get
for the Biden campaign
Arizona is called do you remember that I
do
What do you remember happening
where you were
when Arizona was called
Um
I uh there was
surprise
at the call
After
Fox News called Arizona
for Biden there
was discussion about whether President Trump should
say something and should declare victory
The consensus
of almost all of his advisors
was
that he should not
It was
far too early
to be making any calls like that
Um
ballots
were still being counted
Ballots were still going to be counted for days
and
it was far too early to be making any proclamation
like that The professionals
on his campaign staff
are telling him you know
We can't claim victory
either you know you lost or we have to at
least wait and see what's going to happen
And Trump makes the choice
that he wants to listen instead
to Rudy Giuliani
Were you part of any discussions
about whether the president should make
any sort of speech
on election night
I I mean I spoke to the president
They may have been present
but the
president
but I spoke to the president several times that night
NARRATOR
Rudy
Giuliani's advice was very different
than that of Trump's political advisors
His personal lawyer Giuliani
tells Trump
Keep fighting
We will have a legal
crusade
a political
crusade
to keep you in power
Trump loves the idea
Rudy Giuliani is one of the most prominent figures in
American politics in the last 25 years
who is remembered fondly for his leadership post 9 11
But
over the years he drifted
towards Donald Trump
Towards
being someone that would
be essentially a yes man to Donald Trump
and some of his worst impulses
NARRATOR And on election night
Giuliani
insisted
Trump should fight
The president ignores
the sound advice that he's getting
from Bill
Stepien from the political professionals
around him
and he's listening
to one voice
that is telling him something different
and that's Giuliani
saying
You should go out there and declare victory
And did anybody
disagree
with your message
Yes
Who was that
The president disagreed with that Hehought I was wrong
he told me so
and
you
know that they were going to you know go in
a you know he was gonna
go in a different direction cheers
and applause I think the most dangerous speech that Donald
Trump ever gave
was not the one that he gave on January 6
I think it's the speech that he gave at 2
30 in the morning the night of the election
This is a fraud
on the American public
This is an embarrassment
to our country
We were getting ready to win this election
Frankly
we did win this election cheers and applause We did
win this election Trump
knew that the trends looked bad
Trump knew
that there were hundreds of thousands of votes
still to be counted
and
he came out and he said Frankly
we did win the election
We want all
voting to stop
We don't want them to find any ballots at 4
00
in the morning and add them to the list
Okay
cheers and applause NARRATOR
In the years since
Trump has claimed that he believed what he said that
night
I saw what happened I watched that election and I
thought the election was over at 10 00
the evening NARRATOR
But according to the committee
his claims of fraud were part of a well established
plan
The moment
when he said Frankly
I won this election
was telegraphed
many many times
and
throughout the campaign of 2020
he repeatedly
cast doubt on the legitimacy
of the outcome
cast doubt on absentee ballots
et cetera
As early as April 2020
Mr Trump claimed
that the only way he could lose an election
would be as a result of fraud on video The
only way
we're gonna lose this election
is if the election is rigged Remember that it's the
only way we're going to lose this election
This is going to be a fraud like you've never
seen Did you see what's going on Take a look
at West Virginia mailmen selling the ballots
they're being sold
they're being dumped in rivers
This is a horrible thing for our country There is
no there is no
evidence of that This is not going to end well
NARRATOR For the January 6th committee it was crucial evidence
of Trump's intent
He makes numerous speeches
and and TV
comments in TV interviews You're going to see corruption
like you've never seen you're going to see a rigged
election
It'll be the greatest rigged election in history it'll be
the greatest fraud ever perpetrated
It's all a big fraud
It's a crooked deal it's a rigged deal new ballots
are coming out that are thrown in garbage cans with
the name Trump on it This was part of the
scheme
of
getting his supporters
sensitized
to the fact that There's going to be some fraud
here
Because the only way they're going to win
is by a rigged election
I really believe that
This is a pattern for Trump He has done this
every
step of the way through his career long before potics
My name's Donald Trump and I'm the largest real estate
developer in New York When The Apprentice
lost an Emmy to The Amazing Race
he claimed that the Emmy contest was rigged
dramatized Amazing Race winning an Emmy again is a total
joke The Emmys have no credibility Twitter chime The Emmys
are all politics
that's why The Apprentice never won
Twitter chime The public is smart
They know it's a con game
I have just called President Obama to congratulate
him on his victory
He claimed that the election was rigged in 2012
when Mitt Romney whom he had endorsed lost to Barack
Obama dramatized This election is a total sham and a
travesty
We are not a democracy Twitter chime More reports of
voting machines switching Romney votes to Obama Twitter chime Let's
fight like hell and stop this great and disgusting
injustice
Twitter chime We can't let this happen We should march
on Washington
Twitter chime Every step along the way anything he has
ever lost
is because somebody else has cheated
and stolen it from him Fox News can now project
that Texas senator Ted Cruz has won Iowa Ted Cruz
wins the Republican
contest
here in Iowa
The big question now
how is Donald Trump going to handle a loss
dramatized The State of Iowa should disqualify
Ted Cruz from the most recent election on the basis
that he cheated
a total fraud
Twitter chime You have twted
that Senator Ted Cruz stole the Iowa election Everything about
it was disgraceful
It was a fraud as far as I was concerned
Knowing what we know now
I think you would go back
to February 1
of 2016
It's a total voter fraud when you think of it
and actually
I came in probably first if you think about it
That episode
was a
bright red blinking light foreshadowing
everything that was to come
The portrait that both prosecutors
and the January 6th committee are trying to paint
is that Trump knows what's going on
That this wasn't something spontaneous
This wasn't something that the president truly believed
That it was all part of an overall
and illegal
according to prosecutors and the committee strategy
to remain in power unlawfully
NARRATOR
And in court filings
prosecutors
have said Trump's statements are evidence of the criminal conspiracy
at the heart of the case
They demonstrate the defendant's
common plan of falsely blaming fraud for election results he
does not like
as well as his motive intent
and plan to obstruct the certification
of the 2020
election results and illegitimately
retain power
Intent
the whole ball game
The jury is making an evaluation
of that
Um that's the most difficult thing to prove Not impossible
but it is the most difficult thing to prove NARRATOR
Robert Ray was an independent
counsel who investigated
President Bill Clinton
and helped get Trump acquitted in his first senate impeachment
trial
Our system requires that a jury of 12
unanimously
meaning all of them all 12 of them find the
defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt
gavel bangs NARRATOR
To try to show the president's intent
the committee focused on his own statements
after election night
Although he publicly claimed that he had won the election
privately
he admitted that Joe Biden would take over as president
I remember maybe a week after the election was
called I popped into the Oval just to like
give the president the headlines and see how he was
doing
and he was looking at the TV and he said
Can you believe I lost to this effing guy
At the same time that President Trump was acknowledging
privately
that he had lost the election
he
was hearing that there was no evidence of fraud or
irregularities
sufficient to change the outcome
His
campaign
team
and this included
his son in law Jared Kushner
went to him
after the election was declared
And they didn't just rebut
the claims of voter fraud
They explained
to him their analysis of why he lost
They showed him the numbers
state by state in the swing states
I made this case I know Hope Hicks and others
did to him which was
You should kind of make this a victory lap Go
around the country talk about what have accomplished
and you're going to be in a great place in
2024
to win the presidency back
But then you had Rudy Giuliani
who was whispering in his ear what Trump wanted to
hear
Trump likes the people who tell him what he wants
to hear
And he picked in effect Rudy Giuliani
in order to go
down the road of challenging
the election
There is strong evidence
that this was an election that in at least
three or four states and possibly ten
they they it was stolen
Bringing in 100
000 ballots
in garbage cans
and every single one of them was for Biden
NARRATOR The federal indictment
alleges that by the middle of November
Trump's conspiracy
to overturn the election was underway
November 14 2020 is an important date
in the federal indictment
of Donald Trump
It is the moment when Donald Trump said
Rudy Giuliani
he's
the only one who's providing me with a plausible path
forward
and I'm going to take it
Look you can fight it all you want The reality
is dead people voted
Over 300 000
ballots were
counted in secret
Rudy Giuliani
was central
to a lot of these schemes
framing them orchestrating
them directing other people being in on the communications
And so once Trump
made a decision
to defer to Rudy Giuliani
as the person who was setting the tone and giving
people their talking points
for what the approach was that's when he decided
to go after these nutty theories
8
021
ballots from dead people
mail in ballots for dead people
We're checking the records of the cemeteries
around Philadelphia
audience laughter NARRATOR
During that period
Giuliani and Trump would repeat dozens of false allegations
and the committee believed
they had evidence it wasn't an honest mistake
One of the things the committee did that was critical
was putting together this timeline in which they showed
very clearly
the president would be told one thing one day
not true
don't say that And he would go right back out
and say it the next day anyway
That's really important toward I think establishing
intent to lie intent to defraud
Each ballot went three times
here's ballot number one
here it is a second time third time next ballot
I told the president myself that these allegations
about ballots run through the machine several times
it was not true
In several counties in Georgia there's clear evidence that tens
of thousands of votes were switched
from President
Trump to Biden Well Mr President we did a hand
re tally of all the ballots and compared that to
what the machine said and it came up with virtually
the same result
In Detroit
a vote dump came in unexpectedly
I'll tell you what's wrong
voter fraud
And then
he raised the big vote dump in Detroit
and I said There's no indication
of fraud in Detroit
Over 10
300 ballots in Georgia were cast by individuals
who died prior to the election
The actual number
were two
two people that were dead that voted
You have Dominion
which those machines are fixed they're rigged
You can press Trump and the vote goes to Biden
I specifically
raised the Dominion voting machines
I saw absolutely zero basis for the allegations
I told him that it was crazy stuff
Stretching the truth in a campaign ad or on the
debate stage
is
But when you are using that lie
to subvert the democratic process
and to convince people
that they need to overturn the election
now you're talking about conspiracy
And
that's what he's charged with
NARRATOR
Trump wouldn't talk to the committee
but he did talk to NBC News
The most senior lawyers in your own administration
and on your campaign told you that after you lost
more than 60 legal challenges
that it was over
Why did you ignore them and decide to listen to
a new outside group of attorneys Because I didn't respect
them
As lawyers You'd hired them Sure But that doesn't mean
you know you hire them you never met these people
you get a recommendation
They turn out to be RINOs or they turn out
to be not so good
In many cases I didn't respect them But I did
respect others I respected many others
that said the election was rigged Were
you calling the shots though Mr President ultimately
As to whether or not I believed it was rigged
Oh sure Okay It was my decision
NARRATOR One of the allegations
in the charges against Trump
is that he used lies
to carry out his criminal conspiracy
The Defendant's
knowingly false statements
were integral to his criminal plans
NARRATOR But to the president's defenders
his statements about the 2020 election
true or not
should be protected
under the constitution
You will see Trump and those who defend him essentially
using the free speech
defense and saying that these are just words
and in the end it's not a crime in America
to lie to the American public even though Donald Trump
lied to the American public a lot
This is a central
area of the president's defense
He does have First Amendment rights
and particularly
as president
And trying to turn words into criminal conduct
is a very slippery road
for the prosecution
under the First Amendment
And in the event of a conviction I can guarantee
you this this will be point one
in the brief
on appeal
Lying to the government
is not
protected by the First Amendment Obstructing justice
is not protected by the First Amendment
NARRATOR Ken White is a prominent criminal defense lawyer
and a First Amendment expert
And so here the government's position is going to be
We are not going after him for
u know
what he said on the news
that's not the crime The crime is he's specifically
pushed
to derail specific
government functions
NARRATOR As they gathered their
evidence the January
6th committee returned again and again to onetate
Georgia
When Donald Trump tried to overturn
the election results
he focused
on just a few states
The former president had a particular
obsession
with Georgia
I think that Trump chose us
because
Republicans
did control
basically
every
level of government
You got the House you got the Senate all Republican
controlled not even close
I think he thought he could come here
and basically
just by some kind of fiat say Okay make it
happen
NARRATOR And it was in Georgia that Donald Trump received
a stark warning from Gabriel Sterling
an election official
Gabriel Sterling
explicitly
warned President Trump about potential violence
on December 1 2020
more than a month before January
6 You will see excerpts from that video
repeatedly
today
Mr President
it looks like you likely lost the state of Georgia
Stop inspiring people to commit potential acts of violen Someone's
going to get hurt
someone's going to get shot
someone's going to get killed
and it's not right
Gabe Sterling called out Donald Trump
He was the first to really as far as I
remember to really come out and say There's going like
this is going to lead to violence
We're investigating
there's always a possibility
I get it You have Gabe Sterling is not listed
as some kind of Republican
in name only or some kind of liberal Republican
prior to that moment
I've been a Republican since I was about nine
when Reagan was running for reelection
I was nine years old when I first kind of
declared myself My mother was not very happy
But my dad was pleased
I was working campaigns
in the late '80s and early
'90s
So yeah I've been in Republican politics as an operative
and a volunteer
since before I could drive a car
So yeah I've been at it for a while
The chair recognizes
the gentleman from California
Mr Schiff for an opening statement
Mr Sterling
thank you also for being here today
Schiff
I remember they told me he was going to question
me I'm like Damn it
I can't stand that guy
laughs
He irritates me to death
because I think he's wrong and doesn't tell the truth
a lot
But I said you know what I'm just going to
play this straight I'm a fact witness just answer the
questions
Donald Trump claims that there was
massive voter fraud in Georgia
Mr Sterling that was just plain false wasn't it
Yes sir
interview I want to give some perspective for this
I was a voting systems implementation
manager
I was a
bureaucrat
of all bureaucrats basically at that time No one should
know who the hell I am
I just was doing my job
NARRATOR Sterling was on the frontline
as Trump attacked the Georgia election results
dramatized Thousands of uncounted votes discovered in Georgia counties Twitter
chime Big voter fraud information
coming out concerning Georgia
Twitter chime Georgia Republicans
are angry
all Republicans
are angry
Get it done Twitt
chime The people in Georgia are mad
They know their votes were stolen
Georgia of the six states I looked at is a
cesspool
Georgia's probably going to be the first state I'm going
to blow up and the secretary
of state need to go with it Everyone must go
to the capitol of Georgia now We need to see
people power and this will do it
chanting
We want Trump NARRATOR On the ground
tensions were mounting
I mean you have a whole voting population
out there
who still today
believes
that this election was stolen
chanting
America
First And I
they think that
you know some fraud happed
And that's how you end up in situations where they're
threatening
the election officials in Georgia chime
Keep opposing the audit and somebody in your family is
going to have a very unfortunate
incident
Please pray
We plan for the death of you and your family
every day
I'm sorry
You and your family will be killed very slowly
It wasn't fun I can tell you that Um
We were in the mix of
a
radicalized
lie
essentially
And
it just kept on escalating
chime Y'all oughta blow your
bleep brains out you piece of bleep
NARRATOR The threats poured into the voicemails of election officials
chime Hope you're happy with the way bleep going
'cause you know who's fault this is when the bleep
bleep hits the goddamn fan 'cause you know it's coming
We're coming after you and every mother bleep
with our Second Amendment Bleep
enemy communist bleep sucker
you will be served
lead
It's all
gone
too
far
All of it
It has to stop interview
I had no script
In fact I didn't realize I was going to call
out the president until I was literally saying the words
out loud at the time
Mr President
you have not condemned these actions or this language
This
has to stop
We need you to step up
and if you're going to take a position of leadership
show some
After you made this plea to the president
did Donald Trump urge his supporters to avoid the use
of violence
Not to my knowledge
Now as we know the president was are of your
speech because he tweeted about it later that day
Twitter chime The president retweeted
a criticism
of Gabriel
Sterling's press conference
So the president was aware
that there were threats of violence and he persisted
in the Big Lie
You have Gabriel Sterling saying People will die
This was the warning
and
Donald Trump was unmoved by
it Was there any sort of a sense that maybe
we ought to dial down the rhetoric that maybe this
is getting out of hand maybe this is dangerous No
Gabriel
Sterling's warning that someone could get killed I think that
still remains true today
Because
you still have the president targeting
judges
and
law clerks
and witnesses
And I think it is
remarkable
that no one has been physically hurt But I think
time will tell whether something does
happen sirens wailing horns honking The committee plans to reveal
even more evidence former President Trump pressured state officials to
overturn
the results of the 2020 election NARRATOR Rusty Bowers
the Speaker of the Arizona House
and lifelong Republican
was a crucial witness to Trump's campaign of pressure on
local officials
Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers testifying today he received numerous
calls asking him to decertify
the Arizona electors
NARRATOR Bowers would testify
about his private conversations
with the president
Going in the room we walked down through the hall
and there's
lots of people in the hallways
and then guards
and then there's a doorway and you know I'm thinking
Okay
how big is this room
And then I walk in the room and I'm thinking
Oh
my word
cameras clicking This is one big room laughs
I'm like
Wow
And there's
ten million photographers
all jammed together jostling in front of us
And I'm
trying to maintain composure
and
not
run screaming off down the Mall down towards the Lincoln
Memorial
But I saw Liz Cheney and she was looking at
me and
that kind of calmed me down
gavel bangs
I now welcome Rusty Bowers
a distinguished
legislator
from Arizona
Speaker Bowers
thank you for being with us today
This is a loyal
lifelong Republican
He's a conservative
who fought to get Trump reelected
Arizona
House Speaker Rusty Bowers
come on up here
cheers and applause Rusty Bowers is a compelling person
It's hard to talk to him and not
believe him
And the stories that he told about his direct communications
with the president
were just so indicative and so powerful
that he was kind of an obvious choice frankly for
somebody that America needed to hear from directly
After the election you received a phone call from President
Trump and Rudy Giuliani
in which they discussed the result
of the presidential election in Arizona
If you would tell us about that call
Mr the president
initially
laid out the broad
claim
of fraud
across the country
named different states
including my own
What was the ask
during this call
He was making these allegations of fraud but he had
something or a couple things
that they wanted you to do what were those They
said Well we have heard
via an official high up in the Republican
Legislature
that there is a
legal theory or a legal ability in Arizona
that you can remove
the
um
electors
of President
Biden and replace them
chuckles Well
for them to say to me Yeah we just want
you to throw out those electors and put in Trump's
I'm thinking
Have have I gone to another planet
I mean it's like what
I'm not gonna do that
I mean I wanted him to win okay so what
I'm not gonna cheat
I'm not gonna cheat to win
What what's that
I flat out flat out said
You're asking me to break my oath
I swore an oath I'm not gonna break it
period
Not gonna break it
I said Well
if you're talking this
I gotta have the proof
I said Rudy
do you have the names of the dead people who
voted
He goes Yes
And do you have the names of the
200 000
illegals
who voted
in our election Yes
I said I want those names
And the presidensays
Rudy give the man what he wants give him what
he wants He says Yeah we've got them Mr President
and I'll get them to him NARRATOR
In the criminal indictment
Jack Smith saw the call as evidence of a crime
The Defendant
and Co Conspirator 1
asked the Arizona House Speaker
to use the legislature
to circumvent the process
by which legitimate electors
would be ascertained
If you are calling a state official
and you're asking them
to nullify
lawful votes
and to replace them with unlawful votes
that is squarely
within federal statutes
regulating
election conspiracy
NARRATOR
Not long after the call
Rudy Giuliani
himself
arrived in Arizona
Did you meet with Mr Giuliani and his associates
while they were in Phoenix
Yes I did sir
There was a row of people and
Giuliani
and Jenna Ellis
I recognized them
And I sat down on the opposite side
And I just said Did you bring me the proof
And he said What I said
Do you remember our phone call
when you said you were going to bring me the
proof
And
he said Oh yeah
I said Did you bring it
And he looked turned to Jenna Ellis and he says
Do you have the proof
And she said Yeah
Well can we see it
She
leans over and fumbles through her briefcase
and says Oh no I don't have it here must
be at the hotel room
This meeting or at any other later time did anyone
provide you with evidence of election fraud sufficient
to affect the outcome of the presidential election in Arizona
No one provided me ever
such
evidence
interview
Giuliani was kind of frustrated
with us all and he said You know we've got
a lot of theories we just don't have the evidence
chuckles
And I when I
heard him say that I
I said
Did he just say what I thought he
said laughs And they all looked at me like the
same thing on their mind like
Whoa
laughs You know that Yeah he
just said that
That was like a rocket's red glare moment Like wow
laughs That's
you gotta be kidding
this is like a
this is the clown show they're
out hunting they're trying to find something
and and they're wanting us to participate
in this and and he says that
Holy
moly we can't do this stuff you know it's like
NARRATOR
Rudy Giuliani refused to answer questions from the committee about
his conversations
with Bowers
Trump attorney Jenna Ellis also refused
For the January
6th committee
that meeting with Bowers
was a bombshell revelation
We have a lot of theories but we don't have
any evidence
That shows
that
none of this had to do with evidence or reality
right This is all about
just making stuff up in order to justify keeping Trump
in power NARRATOR The phrase Giuliani uttered would become iconic
and Giuliani
a central figure in Trump's indictment
listed as Co Conspirator mber 1
Co Conspirator 1 responded with words to the effect of
'We don't have the evidence
but we have lots of theories
It shows
Rudy Giuliani
admitting
that there's no evidence
for the theories they had that these are just talking
points not backed
with any fact
And that's exactly
the theory
of the government
During the conversation
did he bring up the fact that you shared a
similar party
He would say
Aren't we all Republicans
here I
would think we would get a better reception
I mean I would think you would listen a little
more open to my suggestions
we're all Republicans
For someone to ask me
to deny my oath
and just let the courts figure it out
or
let somebody else punt it to someone else
is not something
I will do
What you have to understand here is that Rusty Bowers
this guy who
worked for Trump wanted Trump to be reelected in Arizona
worked for Trump's reelection
is given a choice he can choose between his oath
to the Constitution
or President Trump
And he stays loyal to the Constitution
That is in effect
what the choice that he's given Even in the past
when there
have been Rusty Bowers
speaks with a moral and legal clarity that's very necessary
to understand
We choose
to follow the outcome of
the will of the people It's it's my oath And
and I hope that I'll never break that
I know I'm not you know I'm not perfect I'm
certainly not a perfect witness
But I am a witness
And uh
I had my say
And I wasn't trying to flower it up I
wasn't trying to be
anything other than just Rusty
NARRATOR
Rusty Bowers is now a key witness on a central
charge of the indictment
The Defendant and his co
conspirators executed a strategy to use knowing deceit
in the targeted states
to impair obstruct
and defeat the federal government function
NARRATOR In their filings
Trump's lawyers have argued he is immune from prosecution
because was doing his job as president
when he worked to change the election results
The indictment is based entirely on alleged actions within the
heartland of President Trump's official duties
or at the very least within the 'outer perimeter
of his official duties
The
former president has a motion claiming
that he is
immune
from criminal process
with regard to these charges which involve his official acts
as
president of the United States
As President Trump is absolutely immune from criminal prosecution
for such acts
the Court should dismiss the indictment
Donald Trump's legal team suggesting
that even a president who had a political
rival
assassinated
could still be immune from criminal
prosecution NARRATOR
The federal judge presiding over the case has already rejected
Trump's immunity claims
saying a president is not entitled
to a life long
get out of jail free
pass
The questions being raised right now regarding presidential immunity
are absolutely
key
to the very foundation
the very philosophical
foundation
of this republic
Because if you take an oath of office in the
United States of America
you're swearing an oath to our system of government
And so
if a president
is not subject to that system of government if he's
not subject to that code of laws
we don't have
quite the republic
that we thought we had
siren wailing NARRATOR An appeals court is now considering the
question of immunity
Whatever the decision
both sides could appeal to the United States Supreme Court
indistinct
chatter
The committee's investigation
kept bringing them back to what happened in Georgia
laughter Mr Giuliani what are you doing here in Georgia
You'll see
NARRATOR
Giuliani was there to make his case to the Republican
state legislature
Bless you too Don't
give up Oh I'm not giving up Never never give
up Nope
He was very jovial
I have to tell you
I think he had gotten basically a king's welcome
by all the Republicans
cameras clicking It was like
you know he was their superstar
or whatever
man laughs They all wanted pictures with him They were
all so impressed with him and couldn't believe that he
was there
Um
very
obsequious cheers and applause We appreciate you Rudy We love
you Rudy NARRATOR Giuliani and others from Trump's team had
come with a conspiracy
theory
election workers were counting suitcases
of illegal ballots
Tha
you Mr Chairman Thank you Senator Jordan
Thank you Mr Chairman
NARRATOR Jen Jordan a Democratic state senator was in the
room with Giuliani
Jenna Ellis and Trump's other lawyers
They are going to pull
ballots
out from underneath a table
Watch this table
You had the woman who was narrating
This table
the black one
was placed there
by
the lady with the blonde braids
And saying You see this woman here
You see her here
At about 8 00 in the morning we're going to
roll this back and show it to you there you
go
so now they're going to start pulling these ballots out
from under this table
I don't know the name of the lady in the
blonde braids but one of them had the name Ruby
across
her shirt somewhere
She's taking the ballots
o
filling them in or she's stealing these ballots
NARRATOR It was an allegation
Trump personally
amplified
There's even security camera footage from Georgia
that shows officials
telling poll watchers to leave the room before pulling suitcases
of ballots
out from under the tables
and continuing
to count for hours
They kept on recycling
these things
The footage appears to show poll workers
It's like playing outwhack a mole Yeah how about those
suitcases
that were pulled out from the table in Georgia Looking
at ballots they're finding them under the tables
I mean this is like a banana republic NARRATOR But
the full surveillance
video
didn't show what Trump and Giuliani
claimed
The magic suitcases
which were really just ballot carriers that had been put
under the table about an hour earlier and they were
placed under there with the monitors and the press in
the room
NARRATOR A day after
Giuliani's presentation
the video aired on local TV
Their claims were debunked
This is the short section of the video the Trump
team has shared It's not suitcases
being pulled from under that table
but official
sealed ballot containers
If we go back in the video to hours before
you can see that table being brought into the room
at 8 22 a m Nothing underneath
no hidden suitcases
As ballots that have been opened but not counted are
placed in the boxes
sealed up and stored under the table No magical appearing
ballots These were ballots that were processed in front of
the monitors
put in the boxes in front of the monitors and
placed there in front of the monitors
And I
I'll go to my deathbed knowing that they knowingly lied
They looked in the state senators eyes the people of
Georgia the people of America and lied to them about
this and knew they were lying
to try to keep this
charade going on that there was fraud in Georgia
NARRATOR But the conspiracy
theories
continued
This is not a conspiracy
theory
those are legitimate
questions
I think the woman in charge here is named Rubyreeman
and I think her daughter Shay Freeman Moss
either was helping here or helping her earlier
NARRATOR Giuliani
had caed out by name two election workers
Shaye Moss
and Ruby Freeman
After pulling out hidden boxes
stuffed with ballots
Ruby Freeman as seen here in this video
repeatedly
scanned the same batch of ballots at least three times
NARRATOR Like the claim about suitcases
of ballots
it wasn't true
The secondary part of that was They were scanning multiple
times multiple times
And
a standard operating procedure is if there's a mis scan
you delete that batch and straighten it up like you
do And then run it through again
and that's what they were doing
And the reason we know that's the case is because
we had a hand tally
that showed
the number of ballots matched what was counted
So we know that they didn't do that
I now welcome
Andrea Shaye Moss
In December 2020
Miss Moss and her mother
Ms Ruby Freeman
became the target
People
say You know
I know somebody just like those two ladies in my
community
who work elections
And they're just
everyday people
To have them as a witness for our committee
I
think was very powerful
I understand that you are here
along with your mother today
Uh would you like to introduce your momma
Hi Ma
chuckles
Well I know the events that we're here to talk
about today are incrediblyifficult
to relive
I'd like to show you some of the statements that
Rudy Giuliani made a week after that video clip from
State Farm Arena was first circulated
by Mr Giuliani
and President Trump I
want to advise viewers that these statements are completely false
and also deeply
disturbing
Tape earlier in the day
of Ruby Freeman and Shaye Freeman Moss and one other
gentleman
quite obviously
surreptitiously
passing around
USB ports
as if they're vials of heroin or cocaine
He sounded a lot more
despera Quite frankly he seemed
more unhinged
He made some
overtly
racist
comments
They look like
they're passing out dope
not just
ballots It
is quite clear they are stealing
votes
They're still walking around Georgia
lying They
should have been they should have been they should have
been questioned already
Their places of work their homes should've been searched
for evidence of ballots
evidence of
USB ports
for evidence of voter fraud
NARRATOR
But there was no evidence that they were passing USB
drives
In one of the videos we just watched Mr Giuliani
accused you and your mother of passing some sort of
USB drive
to each other
What was your mom actually handing you on that video
A ginger mint
Passing along a ginger mint back and forth
gets spun up into this baseless theory
not an accident It is meant to stir up people's
anger It wasn't just Rudy Giuliani And these two Black
women who
are ing their civic duty are vilified
It really does end up ruining people's lives
I mean I can't tell you how many emails I
got
with respect to Shaye Moss and Ruby Freeman and that
they should be strung up
Were a lot of these threats
and vile comments racist
in nature
A lot of them were racist
a lot of them were just hateful
A lot of threats
um
wishing death upon me
um
Telling
me that
you know I'll be in jail with my mother
and
saying things like
Be glad it's 2020
and not 1920
These women
whose lives had been completely
destroyed
that's where
the story
about the state pressure
ca
I felt horrible
I felt like it was all my fault like
if I would have never
decided to be an elections
worker
like
I could have done anything else but
that's what I decided to do And now
people are lying
and spreading rumors and lies and attacking my mom
I'm her only child
I just felt like it was it was my fault
for putting my family in this situation
There are real world consequences
to lying and attacking
and demonizing
innocent people in this country
And Donald Trump has always been very heedless of the
human costs
of his lies and his gaslighting
And this is a very painful
example
of that
Ms Moss I want to thank you for coming in
to speak with us and
to thank you for your service
to our democracy
With your permission
I would like to give your mother
the last word
My name is Ruby Freeman
I've always believed it when God says that He'll make
your name great
but
this is not the way it was supposed to be
soft chuckle
I built my own business
around that name LaRuby's
Unique Treasures
a
pop up shop catering
to ladies with unique fashions
I wore a shirt that proudly
proclaimed
that I was
and I am
Lady Ruby
Actually
I had that shirt on
I had that shirt in every color
I wore that shirt on Election Day 2020
I haven't worn it since
and I'll never wear it again
Now
I won't even introduce
myself by my name anymore
There is nowhere I feel safe
Nowhere
Do you know how it feels to
have the president
of the United States to target you
The president of the United States is supposed to represent
every American
Not to target one
But he targeted
me
Lady Ruby a
small business
owner
a mother
a proud American
citizen
who stand up
to help Fulton County run an election
in the middle of the pandemic
NARRATOR
Federal prosecutors
have cited the lies about Freeman and Moss in their
indictment
Co Conspirator 1 orchestrated
a presentation
to a judiciary
subcommittee of the Georgia state senate with the intention of
misleading
state senators
into blocking the ascertainment
of legitimate
electors Breaking news in Georgis investigation
into alleged interference
in the 2020
presidential
election NARRATOR In Georgia prosecutors
have ao weighed in with their own charges
Members of the enterprise
including several of the defendants
falsely accused Fulton County election worker Ruby Freeman
of committing election crimes in Fulton County Georgia
flash bulb pops NARRATOR Trump Giuliani
and others have been charged in Georgia with a host
of crimes related to their attempts to overturn the 2020
election
While Trump and Giuliani await trial
four of their codefendants
have pled guilty
including Jenna Ellis
If I knew then what I know now
I would have declined to represent Donald Trump
I look back on this whole experience
with deep remorse
for those failures of mine Your Honor
It's very important that Jenna Ellis pled guilty to criminal
charges
Because
it raises the point that Wait a minute this wasn't
a traditional lawyer client relationship
And so when you have lawyers
pleading guilty to crimes
that is broadcasting
loudly that they were not providing
conventional
legal advice
NARRATOR In a separate civil case
a federal court ordered Rudy Giuliani
to pay 146
million for defaming Freeman and Moss
A legal loss for Rudy Giuliani that could cost him
millions
Rudy Giuliani
the once respected
New York mayor and former attorney for Donald Trump has
filed for bankruptcy Forced to declare bankruptcy
the latest chapter in a dramatic fall for the man
once dubbed America's mayor
NARRATOR As the January
6th hearings continued
the committee linked the efforts in Georgia to Trump personally
gavel bangs
They had evidence and a witness
Brad Raffensperger
is the 29th Secretary
of State of Georgia
serving
in this role since
2019 My job as secretary of state is to make
sure we have honest fair and accurate elections
He's a very strong Christian hand
he's very conservative n
He was an engineer
Now being an engineer
allowed him to lean into the numbers and lean into
the data
He felt very comfortable with that
which is you know a rare thing for
anybody in politics because engineers are very mathematical
very
linear
you know not always the biggest personalities
I looked at as the office osecretary of state
as how do we really improve the process of elections
All
159 counties had new election
equipment
with a verifiable paper ballot
ready for the election of 2020
NARRATOR
It was a phone call from the president
that put Raffensperger
at the center of the
hearings dial tone phone dialing out That phone call is
one of the most powerful piec of evidence that's come
out of
this this post election period
electronic beeping indistinct chatter connecting
tone
Oh
uh Mark Meadows reached
out to my deputy secretary of state
and she called me and
I told her I didn't think that was a good
idea
And
we were kind of told that no we definitely need
to have this conversation
on recording It shows
how
frantic
and desperate
President Trump had become
by that phone call
I think it shows
how
his demands
were fully removed
from
any kind of evidence
I just listened to him talk
I was making some notes
Okay 5 000
Okay great and I'll respond to that
But
when I got an opportunity to
you know speak
then I I just said Well Mr President the challenge
that you have
is your data is wrong
on recording
My job was just to respond with the facts
And if I had a different set of facts I
would have responded with whatever they were
We just our job was to give him
the true data which I did
The former president
was
pushing
to see if he could somehow
you know
it would move me somewhere
someplace
Because I think that's been an effective strategy for him
over his business career and political career
That people tended to buckle
instead of stand firm
on their principles
NARRATOR In Georgia
Trump had lost to Biden by 11
779 votes
Trump didn't understand
it just doesn't click didn't click with him that someone
wouldn't just give in
It just did not occur to him that there was
some higher
level
of loyalty
to the law and the Constitution
I knew that we had followed the law we had
followed the Constitution
and
I think sometimes momentsrp
and just take the shots
You're doing your job
and that's all we did
You know
we just followed the law and we followed the Constitution
and at the end of the day President Trump came
up short
But I had to be faithful to the Constitution
and that's what I swore an oath to do
This call becomes critical because it's recorded
We get to hear in the president's own voice how
he's doing it what he's doing how he's putting pressure
on these people
So
look
all I want to do is this I just want
to find
uh
11 780
votes
This is a scheme to overthrow an election
He knew the number that he needed to hit
to change the outcome of the election
NARRATOR And Trump accused Raffensperger
himself of a crime
allowing
election fraud
The president of the United States
demanding
that an election official find thousands of votes and then
strongly
implying that there would be criminal sanction in the event
that those votes were not found I mean that is
terrible
evidence for the president
What I knew is that we didn't have any votes
to find We continued to look
we investigated
like I just shared the numbers with you there were
no votes to find
That call is damning and I think it's going to
be damning potentially in front of a jury
because juries
when they can hear a defendant's voice on tape
when they can hear something
that is that real and that visceral
it can be incredibly
powerful testimony
call ends
The Defendant
said that he needed to 'find
11
780 votes
It shows him demanding
a remedy
that doesn't make any sense in the context of anything
lawful
That's just asking
I want to win you've gotta do it I think
it's going to be a very
powerful call for that jury
NARRATOR
For his part Trump has defended the phone call with
Raffensperger
describing it as perfect
A 'perfect phone call to discuss a rigged and stolen
election
and what to do about it with many people including
lawyers d others knowingly on the line
After weeks of trying to overturn
the results of the election
his legal team has come up with nothing NARRATOR In
the middle of December 2020
In the courts where evidence gets scrutinized
authenticated
and tested they're getting hammered
NARRATOR As the president was failing in his attempts to
reverse the election
All but now ending the president's attempt to reverse his
election loss NARRATOR A new pse began And
it comes as the electoral college is set to cast
their votes for president
tomorrow
On December 14
2020
the presidential
election was officially
over
The electoral college had cast its vote
Joe Biden
was the president elect of the United States
The president has reached the end of the road
The electoral college certified the election
His legal team and allies lost more than 50 challenges
The cases run their course the electoral college meets
people are saying no
So he's running out of options right The sequence is
increasingly
desperate
On Friday December 18 his team of outside advisors
paid him a surprise visit in the White Hou
that would quickly become
the stuff of legend
This meeting
is one of the most extraordinary meetings that ever happened
in that building
in more than 200 years of history
Here you had a president of the United States who
had lost an election in the Oval Office being advised
by a
swarm of colorful characters
to say the least
NARRATOR At the meeting
former national security advisor Michael Flynn
and attorney Sidney Powell
by then
both known for their embrace of conspiracy theories about the
election
You had people in there
counseling
Donald Trump
that he should
explicitly
order martial law that he should create
a special czar
The person they had in mind for this was Sidney
Powell
that she
should become the special elections czar and be empowered
to use the machinery
of government itself
to overturn
the election
NARRATOR As word of the meeting spread
senior White House lawyers rushed to the oval office
including
White House counsel Pat
Cipollone
President Trump's close advisors
White House Counsel
Pat Cipollone
Eric Herschmann advisor to the president
and others who were in that room
who were saying to this group
What evidence do you even have that there was fraud
in the election
NARRATOR The White House lawyers were insistent
that the psident shouldn't declare martial law to overturn the
election
or empower Sidney Powell
At times there were pple shouting at each other
hurling insults
at each other
chuckles The president
is taking all of this in
mostly a passive observer in this meeting but he is
watching this play out
His close advisors
telling his lawyers
You have no evidence
that there was fraud in the election
And you've lost every case
Every case you brought in to court you've lost And
Sidney Powell says The judges were corrupt
That's why we lost
And Eric Herschmann
supporter
close advisor to the president says What are you talking
about
Every case
The judges We appointed many of those judges You're saying
they're all corrupt
Like you people have nothing you're crazy
I think that it got to the point where the
screaming was
completely
out there I mean you get people walk in it
was late at night it'd been a long day and
what they were proposing
I thought was nuts
Flynn screamed at me that I was a quitter and
everything kept on standing up and turning around and screaming
at me
And at a certain point I had it with him
So I yelled back
Better sit your effing ass back down
I'm gonna
categorically describe it as
you guys are not tough enough
Or maybe
I put it another way You're a bunch of pussies
Excuse the expression
At the end of it Trump sees that there is
so much opposition
including
from his White House counsel
He understands
that people would very likely resign
And so
it seems that he reluctantlyoncludes
that he's not going to declare martial law
NARRATOR Instead
late that night after the meeting had broken up
the president turned to Twitter
Statistically
impossible
to have lost the 2020 election
Big protest in D C on January
6th Be there
will be wild
Twitter chime Dissatisfied
with his options
Donald Trump decided to call
for a large and wild crowd
on Wednesday January 6
the day when Congress would meet
to certify
the electoral votes
While he doesn't actually go ahead with martial law he
is embracing a path that is in fact radical anyway
He's not using the United States miliry but he's summoning
his own army of supporters to Washington
some of whom are known to be extremists
and in some cases violent
to
help him stay in office
over the will of the voters
It's Saturday
December 19
And one of the most historic
events in American
history
has just
taken place
President Trump in the early morning hours today
tweeted that he wants the American people
to march
on Washington D C
on January
6
This
wildly
inflammatory
tweet
was a bullhorn
that immediately
went out to some of the more violent
organized
Trump supporters
The Oath Keepers
He called us all to the Capitol and wants us
to make it wild
Gentlemen we are heading to D C Pack your
bleep The Proud Boys
It's all or nothing patriots
Boldness
and bravery is necessary
They heard it as a message
from their leader
Come to Washington
The Will be wild tweet
was the call
in a call and response
They mobilized to come to Washington These individuals came to
Washington
because Donald Trump told them to be there Because Donald
Trump told them the election was rigged
Because Donald Trump told them
that someone was trying to take their votes away from
them and silence their voices They believed it This could
be Trump's last
stand And it's a time when he has specifically
called on his supporters to arrive in D C
The time for games is over
The time for action is now
Where were you when history called Where were you when
you and your children's destiny
and future was on the line NARRATOR
For prosecutors
that tweet
the call to march on Washington
represents a crucial step in Trump's criminal conspiracy
Jack Smith's theory is that that was part of the
attempt to obstruct the proceedings
on January 6
That Trump wanted
a large
at least
boisterous
if not violent
crowd
there
to interfere
with the proceedings
maybe stop them
put pressure on the people there And that was one
component
of his obstruction
After cultivating
widespread
anger and resentment for weeks with his knowingly false claims
of election fraud
the Defendant urged his supporters
to travel to Washington
on the day of the certification
proceeding
The special counsel is sort of situating it as this
hinge where things sort of really start to go wrong
That
shows
that
this was part of a plan
And if they can convince the jury of th that's
a huge portion of the ball game
NARRATOR In their filings
Trump's attorneys have argued that his statements were protected
by the First Amendment
The indictment
therefore attempts to
criminalize core political speech and political advocacy
which is
categorically impermissible
under the First Amendment
There should be room under the First Amendment and otherwise
for the president to say an awful lot
without having to tag him with a criminal offense And
that's why
there's a First Amendment
You're given a big
amount of latude
to say a lot of wild and crazy
even stupid
things
without having to worry about somebody afterwards deciding that you
should be sent to jail for it
While prosecuting
the president
in an electoral context
is
new
prosecuting
people for electoral
fraud is not new at all
There are burdens of proof
there are legal tests there are jury instructions
and if you can meet those elements
then you're outside of the protection of the First Amendment
This is not a novel
legal theory
here siren
wailing NARRATOR As January 6 approached
Trump refocused
his efforts closer to home
at his own Department of Justice
Today we'll tell the story of how the pressure campaign
also targeted
the federal agency
charged with enforcement
of our laws
the Department of Justice
Trump tried to weaponize the Department of Justice
against
our own democracy
Bill Barr is the first one to stand up and
say No I'm not going to do that He steps
aside he resigns
And he's replaced by Jeff Rosen and Richard Donoghue as
a sort of tag team here keyboard keys clacking NARRATOR
Rosen was a Republican
political appointee
who had served throughout Trump's administration
Donoghue
also a Republican
had spent much of his career as a government lawyer
in the Army and at the Department of Justice
These are folks who were
appointed by Donald Trump They are
aligned with him politically
Pretty much every day after Barr left
Trump would call Jeffrey Rosen at the Justice Department or
his deputy Richard Donoghue and try to put pressure on
them
to get the department
to go along with this narrative that there were serious
questions about the integrity of the election
Mr Donoghue you had a conversation
with the president
where he raised false claim after false claim with you
and Mr Rosen
How did you respond
to what you called a stream
of allegations
I wanted to try to cut through the noise
because it was clear to us that there were a
lot of people whispering in his ear
feeding him these conspiracy
theories and allegations
As the president went through them I went
piece by piece to say No that's false that is
not true And to correct him
really in a serial fashion as he moved from one
theory to another
How did the president respond to that sir
He responded very quickly and said
essentially
That's not what I'm asking you to do What I'm
just asking you to do is just say it was
corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican
congressmen He's
saying Don't care about evidence don't care about facts just
say this
And then I'm going to be able to use
that to give people political cover
to do what I want them to do which is
to overturn the vote
I look I think that's a very
unfortunate
statement on the on the president's part
but it wouldn't be the first time that a president
made a a conscious decision to reject advice
from his legal advisers including the Department of Justice
Is that evidence of criminal misconduct
Could be
But sorting that out before
a fair minded jury
assuming that there's a fair minded jury is I think
another question
NARRATOR As it became clear Rosen and Donoghue wouldn't go
along
Trump looked for someone who would
Trump turns to this mid level Department of Justice employee
Jeff Clark
and he says Let's put him in as the acting
attorney general
He had been an environmental
prosecutor
Clark's official role has nothing to do with anything involving
election fraud
He had no business at all being involved in
this NARRATOR Clark drafted a letter that would claim publicly
that the department was concerned
about serious allegations
of election fraud
even though his superiors
had said there was no such evidence
That letter of course was never sent
Clark tried to push for it to be sent by
sort of attempting to dethrone
acting attorney general Jeffery Rosen
NARRATOR According to testimony
and evidence before the committee
Trump told Clark that he was going fire Rosen and
make him the new attorney general
Well Clark
makes an incredibly
stupid
mistake
which is that he tells
Jeffrey Rosen the acting attorney general that he is going
to be replaced
On the on Sunday the third
he told me that the president had offered him the
job and that he was accepting it
Clark tells him
Oh yeah Trump is going to put me in
And
he gives notice
to his opponents
That's always a huge mistake
in Washington or anywhere else
Well
you know on the one hand I wasn't going to
accept
being fired by my subordinate
chuckling So
I wanted to talk to the
thpresident directly
And there was another crazy White House meeting
where Rosen
Donoghue
meet with
Clark
the president
and other presidential advisors
in the Oval Office for hours
fighting over whether Clark should be the attorney general
Jeff Clark was proposing
that
Jeff Rosen being replaced by Jeff Clark
And
I thought the proposal was
asinine
And when he finished discussing what he planned on doing
I said Good
bleep excuse me sorry effing a hole
Congratulations
you just admitted your first step or act you take
as attorney general
would be committing a felony and violating Rule 6 e
You're clearly the right candidate for this job
Mr Donoghue did
did you eventually tell the president that mass resignations
would occur if he installed Mr Clark and what the
consequences would be
I said Mr President within
24 48
72 hours you could have hundreds and hundreds of resignations
of the leadership of your entire Justice Department
because of your actions
What's that going to say about you
In the end
that proves to be enough
to stop Trump very reluctantly
very reluctantly
from putting Clark in as his acting attorney general
Talk about a close call
NARRATOR But for the January 6th committee and federal prosecutors
the pressure on the Justice Department
was another part of the conspiracy
He's trying to enlist as part of a scheme
these officials of the Justice Department
Lawyers
officers of the court people who have taken an oath
to uphold the rule of law
and they won't go along with it
The Defendant and co conspirators
attempted to use the power and authority of the Justice
Department
to conduct sham election crime investigations
NARRATOR As with the pressure on state election officials
Trump's attorneys
have argued that he was just doing his job
Urging his own Department of Justice to do more to
enforce the laws that it is charged with enforcing
is unquestionably
an official act of the president NARRATOR And the president
is entitled
to name anyone he wants as the attorney general
Deliberating
about whether to replace the acting attorney general of the
United States is also a core presidential
function
Jack Smith has made that judgment that that has crossed
over the line into criminal conduct
But he is now going to have to prove that
the president went over that line whatever that line is
NARRATOR Having called his supporters to come to Washington
on January 6
Trump turned his attention to a key player in his
effort to stay in power
Vice President
Mike Pence
Today we're focusing on President
Trump's relentless
effort to pressure Mike Pence
to refuse to count electoral
votes on January 6
The pressure campaign on Vice President Pence is the last
gambit
to keep Trump in power I mean basically it's the
last
lever that they can pull
to try and steal the election
NARRATOR It was based on an obscure legal theory that
the vice president had the power to overturn the election
results
Greg Jacob
was counsel to Vice President Pence
He conducted a thorough analysis
of the role of the vice president
in a joint session
of Congress under the Constitution
I now recognize
the gentleman from California
Mr Aguilar
Mr Jacob did you go to the vice president's residences
on the morning of January 6
Yes
And did theice president have a call with the president
that morning
He did
We were told that a call had come in from
the president
The vice president stepped out of the room to take
that call and no staff went with him
The president had several family members
with him
for that call
I'd like to show you what they and others told
the select committee
about that call
along with never before seen photographs of the president
on that call
from the National Archives
When I entered
the office the second time
he was
on the telephone with who I later found out to
be was the the vice president
Could you hear the vice president or only hear the
president's end
Only hear the president's end And at some point it
started off
as a calmer tone
and then it became heated
Donald Trump is focused on this idea
that
Pence wielding the gavel on January 6
can single handedly overturn the election because he was presiding
over this final
certification
of the electoral votes
The conversation
was
pretty heated
It's an extraordinary
thing
a president pressuring a vice president this way insulting
him that way a person who had been nothing but
loyal to him through all those
all those months and years
Did Ms Trump share with you any more details about
what happened
Her dad
had just had an upsetting conversation
with the vice president
It was a different tone than I'd heard
him take with
the vice president before Iean I think she was
uncomfortable
over the fact that there was obviously that type of
interaction between the two of them
The word at she relayed to you that the
president called the vice president
I
apologize for being impolite but do you rememr what she
said
her father called
him
The P word
Trump
told Pence You have a choice
You can either be a patriot
or you can be a pussy
Patriot
means
turn the election over to me
Being a pussy means being afraid
to use your power
Mr Jacob how would you describe
the demeanor of the vice president following the call with
the president
When he came back into the room
I'd say that he was
steely
determined
grim
NARRATOR In almost four years
it was the first serious
break between Pence and Trump
Donald Trump had every expectation
that he would go along with him on this
Why wouldn't he He'd done everything else up until now
Pence is a vice president who has been
exceedingly
loyal to Trump
for three years
11 months and however many days
Mike Pence never
ever broke with the president
NARRATOR Now Pence had to make a critical decision
Pence had just a clear conflict between what Trump wanted
him to do
and what the Constitution
and the rule of law required him to do I
thk he managed to navigate those conflicts in various ways
over four years Not always in my view in the
right way
But this was such a blatant transgression
NARRATOR
Pivotal to the plan
was this man
John Eastman
Here's this law professor
a member of the
Federalists His role was to provide
a
sort of a pseudo intellectual
cover
for legal arguments
And he manufactures
this
theory of the vice president's power
that bas that says that the vice president of the
United States is the ultimate arbiter on January 6 those
were his words the ultimate arbiter
And Trump fully endorses
Eastman's plan
Well John Eastman
was one of my law clerks
Perhaps 20 25 years ago
I was greatly concerned
that John had given the advice that he had given
Judge J Michael Luttig
is one of the leading conservative
legal thinkers in the country
He's served in administrations
of President Ronald Reagan
and George H W Bush Judge Luttig
had a kind of moral authority
within
the conservative community
A guy himself who had been short listed for the
Supreme Court
Was on a first name basis with members of the
Supreme Court
Judge Luttig I had the incredible honor of serving as
one of your law clerks
Another person who did
was John Eastman
And you've written that Dr Eastman's
theory
is
in your words
Incorrect
at every turn
Mr Eastman
said to the president
that there was both
legal
as well as historical
precedent
for the vice president
to overturn
the election
This is Constitutional
mischief
I would have laid my body
across the road before
I would have let
the vice president
overturn the 2020
election
I diagrammed
his
uh his
his legal analysis
from beginning to end
and concluded
that we was wrong
at every
every turn of his analysis
every turn of his thinking
Judge Luttig
you wrote that the efforts by President Trump to overturn
the 2020 election
were
the most reckless insidious
and calamitous failures in both legal
and political judgement
in American history
What did you mean by that
Exactly what I said
Congressman
NARRATOR
White House lawyers had also warned about Eastman's theories
But Trump persisted
summoning the vice president to the Oval Office
The Eastman plan
It was the last option for Donald Trump
January 4 2021
In the Oval Office
John Eastman
President Trump
they pull Vice President Pence in
He's joined by his aides Greg Jacob and Marc Short
Trump says to Pence in front of others
You have to now listen to John Eastman
you have to follow the Eastman plan
object
to the certification
It's a pressure campaign
Pence says to Trump
I'm going to do what I can Mr President I
want to help you out
but I'm listening to my lawyers He turns to Greg
Jacob
his advisors and he says They're telling me I can't
do it
I can't do it it's not constitutional
it's not legal
Trump says You can do it listen to John
Mr Jacob
during that meeting between the president and the vice president
what theories did Dr Eastman present regarding the role of
the vice president in counting the electoral votes
So during that meeting
on the fourth
I think I
raised
the problem
that
Mr Eastman's proposals
would violate several provisions
of the Electoral
Count Act
Mr Eastman acknowledged
that that was the case
Pence turns to Trump and says Are you listening to
this Do you hear this
But Trump isn't listening to that he just he's banging
away on Pence
You are the guy who's going to keep us in
power
siren
blaring NARRATOR Pence stood firm
This is a man who has been so loyal for
so long
but I think at the end of the day Mike
Pence knew that he s going to uphold
the Constitution
And
he knew that he had no power to overturn and
do the things that the president was saying
The
choice Mike Pence was facing was not really a choice
He had no choice to do anything other
than count the votes that took place
But at this point Donald Trump had surrounded himself
with
people who were feeding him more and more nonsense
about how this process
worked
It was just another situation
of the president creating his own reality
deciding things that can happen that simply can't
and set Mike Pence up for the fall in a
way that he had really no choice in what to
do
NARRATOR The pressure on Pence figures prominently
in the indictment of Trump
The Defendant and co
conspirators attempted to enlist the vice president
to use his ceremonial
role at the January
6 certification proceeding
to fraudulently
alter the election results
NARRATOR John Eastman
is listed as one of
the unindicted co conspirators
though he still defends
the advice he gave the president
Trump's interactions
with Pence direct and indirect are crucial
They really go to showing that part of the way
he obstructed justice
was trying to wrongfully
pressure
Pence who had an official task
not to undertake that task
Is the ct that Donald Trump asked him to do
that
is is that criminal
Again I think you've got to be really careful there
I don't think that's something you want to make criminal
you know on its own
The mere ask to say you know I want you
to not certify the results
It doesn't necessarily
mean that it was a violation of the criminal
law It depends on context and whatever other evidence the
government has
Whether or not a particular act that the president is
alleged to have engaged in
is in and of itself
a crime
isn't really going to be the question at that trial
It's going to be whether that act was in furtherance
of a criminal objective
All of these acts
all of the things that we've been talking about they
don't have to be illegal in and of themselves
The
crime
is a conspiracy
to defraud the United States
There's a
lot of anticipation
for today's hearings The committee says it will present newly
obtained evidence and testimony NARRATOR In the midst of the
Jaary
6th committee's hearings
a dramatic moment Live testimony
from a White House advisor who was right there in
the West Wing on January
6 NARRATOR A surprise witness
During the Watergate
hearings there was only one surprise witness
it was Alexander Butterfield
while in the January 6 hearings the surprise witness is
Cassidy Hutchinson
NARRATOR Cassidy Hutchinson a 25
year old White House staffer
The most intimidating
thing is all those cameras sitting one foot from her
face taking pictures of her
camera flash pops This
is a young woman
standing
in
a setting that could
almost feel amphitheatrical
I was with Cassidy on the day of her testimony
During it I'm sitting behind her
She was incredibly
nervous
I think like any
normal person would be to do this
There was a time beforehand where
she wanted to back out
Because it was really scary
to go up against
the president of the United States
and speak the truth
is
something that only
a few people will know
She was a hardcore Trump loyalist
And she's getting ready to
destroy
the tribe
that she gets her identity from I've been there right
I've been in that moment
It was pretty awe inspiring to be quite honest with
you
I will now swear in our witness
Knowing
how
Trump had become so intimidating
a person for people who crossed him
and this one young woman
doing what so many other
much older frequently male staffers
wouldn't do
which is come forward and testifying
truthfully
under oath the whole truth and nothing but the truth
so help you God
inaudible Thank you you may be seated
NARRATOR
Inside the White House
Hutchinson had been a top aide to Trump's chief of
staff Mark Meadows
and in the room during key events the committee was
investigating
Hutchinson was a crucial witness in terms of helping
to
shine a light on the president's state of mind because
so
few people
were
capable of doing that NARRATOR Hutchinson revealed details
about Trump's plans for January 6
On January 2 four days before the attack on our
Capitol
President Trump's lead lawyer
Mr Giuliani
was meeting with White House chief of staff Mark Meadows
and others
Ms Hutchinson we understand that you walked Mr Giuliani
out of the White House that night
and he talked to you about January 6 What do
you remember him saying
As Mr Giuliani and I were walking to his vehicles
that evening
he
looked at me and said something to the effect of
Cass are you excited
for the sixth
It's going to be a great day
I member
looking at him saying Rudy could you explain
what's happening on the sixth
And he had responded something to the effect of We're
going to the Capitol
It's going to be great
The president's going to be there He's going to look
powerful
She clearly had nothing to gain by doing it She
was telling the truth as she saw it
This poised
composed
young woman
with no obvious axe to grind as she's telling her
story
it's the most powerful moment I think in the entire
hearings
And I found Mr Meadows in his office scrolling through
his phone
I remember leaning against the doorway and saying
I just had an interesting conversation with Rudy Mark It
sounds like we're going to go to the Capitol
He didn't look up from his phone and said something
to the effect of
There's a lot going on Cass
but
I don't know
things might get real real bad on January 6
crowd chanting U S A U S A U S
A Tensions are running high
30 000 supporters of the present are gathering right now
They're having what they're calling a Stop the Steal rally
NARRATOR And on January 6
Hutchinson
was in the president's
inner circle
I think the campaign is aware that January 6 would
be the last stand
Once that certification
happens on the sixth
that it's really over
siren
blaring Miss Hutchinson
did you go to the rally
in the presidential motorcade
I I was there yes
siren blaring
And were you backstage
with the president and other members of his staff and
family
I was NARRATOR It
was in the tent backstage
that Hutchinson
heard crucial evidence of what Trump knew about the potential
for violence that day
on video When we were in the fstage
announce
area tent behind the stage
he was very concerned about
the shots
meaning the photographs that we would get because the rally
space wasn't full
The former president was unhappy with the crowd se