what's it like to be one of america's most well-known republicans? >> thanks for everything. >> now navigating a party at a crossroads. >> he is now the party of donald trump. >> a long-time friend and high-profile friend of donald trump. >> he is rewriting the playbook of american politics. >> and turn ed harsh critic of

trump's big lie. >> we can no longer talk about the past and the past elections. >> it's a high wire balancing act for the two-term governor and so far, one-time presidential candidate. now trying to use his trademark blunt talk. >> sit down and shut up. >> to rid the republican party of the conspiracies trump perpetuates. >> this is the most corrupt election in the history, maybe of the world. >> attempting to define a new role for himself. >> how seriously are you considering running for president in 2024? it's all part of being chris christie. good evening, i'm dana bash in washington and welcome to another episode in a series of special hours where i spent time with people in the news and people of power and influence to try to find out more about what it's like to be them. tonight, chris christie. he's out with a new book "republican rescue", and it's a memo to his own party about how to move forward after six years defined by donald trump. the former president is already lashing out at christie for

starting to speak out about the need to move past 2020 election lies, but can christie distance himself from trump now and is there still room in the gop for anyone not fully on the trump train? these are questions we put to trump in the next hour and how he answers says as much about his own future as it does about the republican party himself. you are a hard charging politician. you say what's on your mind. you're seen as an enabler by people who hate donald trump. you're seen as a traitor to people who love donald trump. so what is being chris christie like? >> being yourself. look, to me, i don't apologize for any of what you just said because in all those instances, i was being who i am, someone who tells the truth and goes with their gut, who believes in this country, believes in the things that i think are important to make the country better and feels like i have an obligation to speak out. for me, that's who i am and

being me is sometimes not easy but most of the time it's fun. >> cnn projects joseph r. biden junior is elected. >> for republicans like christie, the last year has not always been that fun. take me back to election night 2020. you're watching the then president and he starts talking and you do what? >> i felt absolutely sick to my stomach physically stick to my stomach watching him stand behind the seal of the president of the united states in the east room of the white house saying something that i knew at that moment he couldn't prove was true. but he was saying it as if it was an absolute fact. >> we were getting ready to win this election frankly, we did win this election. >> you cannot as president of the united states stand up there and say that the election was stolen to the american people as your first statement after the results are coming in unless you have absolute concrete proof and

that's the prosecutor in me, i guess. i felt like it was the obligation of even someone who had been a supporter of his, had voted for him earlier that day to say what the truth was and the truth was at that moment, there was no evidence that the election was being stolen and in fact, we're now, you know, nearly a year later and there is still no evidence the election was stolen. >> he's still saying it? >> yes. >> you call that speech one of the most dangerous pieces of political rhetoric i have ever heard in my life. that's a big statement. >> well, it is a big statement but it's true and all you need to know to back that up is to see how many people today still believe it. because look, one of the things that i think the president never completely took in was that his words when he became president had much greater import than they did when he became president. he didn't change an iota before the election of 2016 to 2020.

he was the same guy. >> lock them up. >> i thought that the presidency would change him, but it did not change him a bit. >> remember, in 2016 he wanted the job himself. >> i am proud to announce my candidacy for the republican nomination for president of the united states of america. >> but ultimately. >> wow, there is a lot of press. >> christie became the first of trump's rivals to endorse him for president. >> the one person that hillary and bill clinton do not want to see on that stage come next september is donald trump. >> so people are going to be listening to you and thinking give me a break. he was there almost from the beginning and you're an enabler of donald trump. how do you respond to that? >> you know, i think people who make those kind of accusations to somebody who is trying to make the country better don't understand what politics is all about and what government is all about. any time i objected to the

president's conduct from a policy or personal perspective, i said it to him. that's the kind of relationship we have. i didn't have to hold back and i didn't. >> do you accept any responsibility for what happened after election day? >> responsibility? >> yeah. >> no. >> as somebody who helped him along the way. you helped him get to where he was. >> i don't consider myself so important that without my help donald trump wouldn't have been president, wouldn't have been able to do the things he did. that's ridiculous. it was clear to me he would be the republican nominee and we had a relationship so i wanted to try to make him the best candidate he could be and if he won the best president he could be. i don't make apologies for that. i was one very small part of the effort to help make him president so the responsibility i'll take is i voted for him twice. i admit that and i wouldn't change my vote. >> even a second time? >> no, i wouldn't. i wouldn't change my vote. because so many things down

there are happening now in the country from a policy protective to me are so long term bad for the country. >> i have to follow up on that. looking back, the fact democracy in your words was at such risk and is at such risk, isn't having a policy debate a luxury when what is really a problem is the constitution itself? meaning, don't you have to have the constitution and democracy and the bones there in order to have the ability to have a debate about policy? >> i think there -- the two are indivisible. i don't think that you can pick one over the other. i don't think you ever should pick one over the other and i don't think the founders would have wanted us to pick one over another. if you have a constitutional republic that is driving the constitutional republic off the road, that's just as bad and you got to stand up against that, too.

you're asking me in retrospect who i would have voted for knowing everything i know today sitting here and i'm saying to you, i could not given what i stand for in my public life, what i've worked for in my public life, i couldn't justify a vote for joe biden. >> you better run, cops! >> that includes what happened on january 6th. christie watched on tv as rioters stormed the u.s. capitol. >> we want pence! >> and immediately tried to reach then president trump on the phone. >> the first thing i did before i called the president was i called kellyanne conway and asked if she had spoken to him, and she said that she tried, but she couldn't get through. she said you have to call him. i tried four different ways i had found successful in getting in touch with the president over the years. first, i called his secretary. she didn't pick up the phone.

i called his body person and he didn't answer his phone. then i called the white house switchboard and asked to be put through. and they said he was not available. and then i called his personal cell phone. now, i knew most of the time he didn't bring his cell phone into the oval office but i thought maybe he had it or in the residence, i didn't know where he was so i tried his cell phone and it went to voice mail and the president and i never spoke that day. >> we fight like hell and if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore. >> was president trump responsible for the insurrection on the capitol? >> i don't think the speech he gave that day caused what happened. >> that's worse than one speech. >> my point is that i think people minimize what happened on the 6th by pointing to the speech that he gave on the ellipse on the 6th. >> it sounds to me like you're saying he was responsible for it. >> what i'm saying is that you can never be wholly responsible for the conduct of other people.

and each one of those individual people are responsible for what they did. >> would they have done that if they had not heard from their candidate, the president, that it was rigged? >> i don't think they would have gone there if they thought the election was fair. if they thought the election had not been stolen, there would have been no reason for the rally. >> did donald trump try to stage a coup to stay in office? >> i don't think so. >> how could you hear that he was trying to change election results and think of it as anything other than that? >> well, because to me the way i view a coup is to utilize the military to try to overturn a civilian election. he wasn't doing that. he was using, trying to use civilian things to overturn election and he said no to. so i don't think it was -- it certainly wasn't a successful coup. >> how do you see it? >> someone desperate not to lose, desperate not to lose and tried to exert pressure on people to do things legally that

he couldn't get the courts to do. >> christie and trump had been friends for almost 20 years but have not spoken since january. >> he calls me on the way back from my sunday morning show to say he didn't like what i said. if i think it's an impeachable offense, that's what i would do, george. i'm not in there. >> we argued back and forth as we often did. the conversation ended perfectly civilly and that's the last time we spoke. >> do you care? >> well, sure i care. i don't like anybody to be angry with me but on the other hand, like, there is nothing that i would do differently than what i did or said if i had a chance to do it again. >> you're very clear about how corrosive what he did from election day through right now has been but it's not like that was the first lie that he told. it's not like that was the first

time that he did something that was really damaging to democracy. so is your criticism now too little too late? >> some people can make that judgment. boy, i'll tell you if we get off board of every politician that ever says something not true, we won't be able to support anybody. we can sit here and have a historical conversation about the comparison. it's not useful. in the end, if your question is oh, well, this isn't the first lie he told therefore you're an enabler, you know, then put me in the pantheon of people who supported a politician who didn't put the people who supported a politician who didn't tell the truth 100% of the time in a room big enough to fill the taj mahal to fit us all in.

this is from people who in the end don't like donald trump, never wanted him to be president and now want to try to get a two-for with me. sorry, not going to get it. coming up, the mistake that almost cost chris christie his life. >> you got covid at the white house. you thought it was a safe zone. >> uh-huh. i was wrong. yeah. i was wrong.

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finally! a totally different way to finance your ride. only from carvana. the new way to buy a car. for seven days in october of 2020 being chris christie meant fearing he was going to die. you got covid at the white house while helping president trump prepare for a debate. you thought it was a safe zone. >> uh-huh. >> it wasn't. >> i was wrong. i was wrong. we got tested every day before we walked in and so, you know, i thought okay, for all being tested and everybody in the room being tested then how will we get covid if we're negative. so none of us wore masks during debate prep. that turned out to be a mistake. big mistake. there was seven people in the room for debate prep and six of

the seven of us got it including the president. >> the president will be heading over to the walter reed national medical center. >> less than 24 hours after the president was rushed to walter reed, christie got the call that his own covid test was positive. as manic and as overweight, the doctors told him to get to the hospital immediately. you have a deadly virus and you pull up to the hospital and see your priest there. >> well, i knew before i saw the priest it was serious and he gave me a blessing and anointed me with oil before i went in and it was emotional because i knew this could be a problem, but that moment in the seriousness of the moment with him and the role that he plays in my life and mary pat's life, that was a really emotional moment for me and i, you know, got done with him and walked into the emergency room and they took my blood oxygen level and said you're out of here going to intensive care and that was it. i was in isolation for the next seven days.

>> what was that like? >> scary, especially the first two days because the first two days i wasn't getting better but worse. nobody could come visit me. you're very much alone. i didn't want to talk too much on the phone because i was having difficulty so i didn't want to spend the energy. you have time to sit there for yourself. my headaches and body aches were so bad i couldn't read. it hurt to read. >> all but one person working on debate with trump got covid and those attending with supreme court justice nominee amy coney barrett but christie never got a call from the white house or contact tracers. they still didn't call you? >> still didn't call me. >> was trump not tested? >> i don't know. i know all of us in the room who entered the white house every day were tested. i don't know what the president's testing protocol was or wasn't.

he never shared but to be honest, i never asked. i assumed he was being tested. whether that's true or not i don't know. the president ultimately called me when i went to the hospital. >> trump made the call from walter reed, one covid patient to another. in his book christie describes what he believes was trump's motivation for that call. are you going to say you got it from me the president asked? i don't know that i got it from you, sir, i said so i would not say that. no. cavalier treatment for a friend whose condition was dire. you were worried you would get intubated. >> i was. the breathing and being asthmatic was an issue. if the doctors do it, they need to tell you first because i want to talk to the kids before it

happens because a lot of people get intubated and never come out of it and i don't want that to be their last memory of me. >> did you talk to them? >> no, i didn't get intubated. >> having that thought. >> yeah, it's emotional now talking about it. the most important thing in my life is being a father. and so the idea of being in that moment and thinking i'm may not be able to continue to help guide my children. that's what i was thinking about was like all these different things in their life that will come that i may not be there for. like how do i give them advice now that will last them for a long time? and so those were the things i was thinking about at the time and that's scary and so, you know, i wanted to make sure at least i had the chance. >> what's it like to face your mortality like that in such an intense way? >> i mean, it's scary is the only word i can use.

you get scared and you think to yourself, you start to think to yourself like what have i done that i should have? so it's just a very isolating thing and scary but after i got the monoclonal antibody treatment, about 24 hours after that i started to feel better for the first time. >> former president trump defies health experts advice. christie is taking the opposite approach. >> you're trying to get people that are vaccine reluctant to get vaccinated. what do you find is the most effective argument. >> i say to people that i have had it. if you haven't had it, you don't know, but you don't want it. you might be like my son who had 14 days of no symptoms and back to college and fine or like me that was until the icu or you could be like my cousin who wound up dead and you don't know which one will be and any doctor that tells you they know is lying. they don't know so why not protect yourself? up next, some very raw

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that was part of your first public office?

>> yeah. >> part of being chris christie about his weight. how had surgery to try to address that. how do you feel how that contributed to who you are? >> oh, gosh, i mean i think everything that is you contributes to who you are. in this time we're examining our sensitivity what we say to people it's extraordinary to watch that applies to everything about a person except for their weight. >> interesting. >> you can't say anything about anybody commenting about their physical appearance or what they do or say because people can find that offensive. the things that are said about

me on the internet about almost any comment i make at any time someone responds with some insult about my weight. i could be talking about the iran nuclear deal and i'll get a response on email or twitter or whatever saying you fat sob. i'm like okay, what's that have to do with the iran nuclear deal. one of the amazing things to me and made me tougher is that no one sees that as a problem. >> if it was a disability or something else -- >> gosh, they would be appalled. i'll give you a great example of it. when you're leaving office, when you're governor, you get all kinds of gifts. solicited, unsolicited from people you know and don't know. get to the end of eight years and eight years of gifts you

have to decide what to do with them. do you know what the single biggest category of gifts was i got in my eight years? books about weight. >> what? >> yup. >> from whom? whom sent a book like that? >> from any -- from people -- almost all of them from people that never met me. here is how you lose it, this is what you have to do for your weight. do this. there were -- i'm not talking about dozens. i'm talking about a couple hundred books, pamphlets, stuff sent into me as gifts to me about my weight. >> christie's weight has been the subject of jokes on late night talk shows for years. >> i read that in the last year of new jersey governor chris christie's approval rating has gone up 12 points. that's impressive. usually the only time he picks up a dozen is going to krispy kreme. >> trump demanded that chris

christie have the white house meat loaf, and coincidentally, that is the position that trump is considering him for. >> new jersey governor chris christie is in the news he's in trouble for calling a politician he doesn't like an sob. meanwhile, christie calls a politician he does like a blt. [ applause ] >> he's a large fellow. >> does it hurt? >> it used to. like after i became governor, it intensified significantly publicly and after awhile you just learn to deal with it. i mean, you know, i'm significantly less heavy than i was at the beginning of the governorship and the surgery that i had helped significantly. i have more weight i want to lose but i no longer feel desperate or frantic about it because i feel like my health is under good control.

>> everybody has a vice. >> yeah, like look -- >> advice or -- >> i don't know if it's -- i can't tell you how many times people will send notes or something like try a salad or how could you be a leader and you can't push yourself away from the dinner table? if it were that simple, i would have fixed it a long time ago. you know, so it's a much more complicated issue. in one way, some of the popularity i had over the years in the country with people is because they could -- there's a lot of people that have weight problems in this country and they look at me and they can relate to me in a different way than people who don't. >> you said it makes you tougher but i'm sitting here thinking it's not -- it's got to be really tough on yourself esteem. >> if -- for awhile it was. sure. it's a daily challenge. let me assure you and assure anybody out there who is listening who has a similar situation, it's a daily challenge. it doesn't go away.

and so you just have to learn how to try to deal with it and learn that when the sun comes up tomorrow morning you have another chance to deal with it and i've come over time to think about how small the people are who decide they want to make that the issue about me. in the end, if that's their biggest issue with me, i'll live with it. >> so this is your covid. >> yes. >> christie has more time to spend on his health these days. he and mary pat, his wife of 35 years are recent empty nesters except in 2020 during the pandemic like many parents, they had all four kids at home. >> it was all six of us back around the dinner table again every night which wasn't the greatest circumstances but great for mary pat and i. we loved having them back here. >> how many years has it been since you and your wife have been without kids at home? >> 28 years. >> and on the cusp of turning

60, he seems more reflective these days. have you ever heard the term i'm -- imposter syndrome? >> no. >> so, well, that's because you are a man. the term imposter syndrome makes you think have i have earned this? am i in the right place? when will they figure me out? have you ever had that feeling? >> sure. >> you have? >> sure. when i first became the u.s. attorney i was 39 years old and i had not worked in the office before. i was in charge of it. and i thought to myself well, i may have reached a little too far here. maybe this -- they're going to find me out. then when i decided to run for governor, i felt the same thing. for me it's been every step along the way i've had a little bit of a worry about, you know, am i really up for this? so yeah, i never knew it had a name but i've definitely felt it. >> so fake it until you make it. >> yes, that's probably right.

that's a good way to put it. fake it until you make it is definitely something everybody has to do. >> later in the program, will he or won't he? how seriously are you considering running for president in 2024? up next, all right. let's go to the beach. a trip to springsteen country.

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♪ >> part of being chris christie is being all jersey. you're so jersey. >> yes, that was a huge advantage for me is to be as jersey as i am. it allowed me to do things other people maybe wouldn't have been able to do. >> how do you define that? >> edgy, genuine, no b.s., you know, tough but also, like, a heart.

like you care about the place. you love the place. and i think all of us who have grown up here have a little bit of a chip on your shoulder. you're stuck between new york and philadelphia and there is all these misconceptions about new jersey around the country and the fact that we know it gives us a little bit of an edge and sense of that kind of swagger, that people like because so many new jersey things turn out to be big national hits. ♪ >> like the guy who put asbury park on the map, bruce sprin springsteen. >> there it is. >> i feel like i should be bowing. >> like jersey temple time. how are you? we had a lot of fun, right? ♪

>> how many times have you seen bruce springsteen in there? >> twice. >> for the uninitiated, this is where he started? >> yes. this is the rock 'n' roll bar in new jersey. >> how many bruce springsteen concerts have you been to? >> 137. >> who is counting? >> 137. >> it's my vice. i don't drink, i don't smoke, i don't do drugs but i've been to 137 bruce springsteen concerts. chris. nice to meet you. >> who is this? >> tiana. >> how are you? >> christie is shall we say personal style? >> i have no interest in answering your question, get the hell off the beach. >> is part of who he is. >> your edge, have you always been like that? have you always had the edge to use your words? >> i think so. >> like out of the womb? >> i don't know about out of the womb but i remember as far back

as like grade school feeling like i had a little edge and mixed with like a little bit of like charm, like being able to like talk to people and convince them of things, and i think to be effective in politics in this state, you have to have both. >> it was here on the jersey shore where that effectiveness was put to the test in 2012. hurricane sandy slammed the east coast killing dozens and causing tens of billions in damage. >> down here on the shore, and we were thinking if governor christi would just come down here. >> christie could come and see us and you did. we're so appreciative. >> obviously, for me politically, this was the most important place for me in eight years. >> because of sanity. >> because of sandy. i was the defining moment of my governorship and always will be and not something we ever asked for or would have wished for but it was my crucible. it was when i was going to prove

myself to be a real leader or not and i think i proved i was a real leader. >> did you feel that at the time? did you know this was your crucible? >> yeah, the devastation was everywhere. and people were personally devastated. and so every time you would meet another person who is grabbing you and crying and telling them, telling you about everything they lost and worried that they're not going to be able to get it back, you can't help but know like this is it. >> the jersey shore is also the scene of one of the most infamous christie images sitting on a closed beach in 2017 as the state government was shutting down over a budget dispute with the democratic legislature. >> it was a mistake. it was a 30-minute mistake. they closed down the government. they didn't give me a budget. i told them if you do it, i'm still going to the beach because it was my last summer there and all the kids had invited friends to come for fourth of july weekend. the mistake was me going on the

beach. and that was like 30 minutes before i went to work that day i said all right, i'll go and sit with everybody and be social and it was a mistake. so, you know, like in the end, as with most things i do, it gets more attention than i originally thought it would but this is being. that's the upside and the downside of being me. >> which is? >> the upside is i never really have a hard time getting attention. the downside is, i don't have a hard time getting attention, right? so when it's good, it's great. when it's bad, it's not. so i got to live with both and what i have to try to do is through my own behavior minimize the bad stuff and try to elevate the good stuff. ♪ >> just keeping busy, baby. thank you. >> walking the boardwalk with chr christie, you hear a lot of

this. >> how are ya? >> how are you? >> good. >> run for president. >> thank you. >> run for president. >> so the run for president thing that you're hearing is picking up? >> uh-huh. yeah. >> so will he run for president in 2024? more on that after the break. the nighttime, sniffling, sneezing, coughing, aching, stuffy head, best sleep with a cold, medicine. just getting by. it's an ongoing struggle. that's why president biden and democrats in congress have a plan to lower costs for america's working families. lower costs of health care premiums. and the price of prescription drugs. pay less for electric bills by moving to clean energy. we do it all by making the ultra-wealthy pay their fair share of taxes. it'd be a win for the everyday american family. right when they could really use one. congress, let's get this done. frequent heartburn? not anymore. the prilosec otc two-week challenge is helping people love what they love again. just one pill a day. 24 hours. zero heartburn. because life starts when heartburn stops.

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sometimes being chris christie is being a bulldog. >> sit down and shut up. >> in his new book "republican rescue" he details in his former prosecutor way to take the same approach with many of the fellow republicans debunking the conspiracy theories in detail

from qanon to pizza gate to the former president's big lie about the election in 2020. you write if the requirement to get the support is to say a bunch of things that aren't true, no thank you. that's no who i am and who we are as republicans. isn't that exactly who republicans are now thanks to the former president and the lies that he's pushing and the conservative media who are buttressing it? >> no, i have more faith in my party and like, like, i think that a lot of people who are pushing that get most of the attention, but i think that there are a lot of people out there who are confused and who want to really know what the truth is, who want us to get back to talking about the issues that have traditionally been really important to the country for our party to be advocating. maybe i'm too optimistic about that, dana, but i believe if you give people the facts, ultimately they come around to the facts. >> a lot of your fellow republicans particularly in washington denounced the insurrection of january 6th and they've either changed their tune since then or they've just >> well, sure it is. everyone's got -- look, everybody is accountable for their own statements and their

own conduct. >> are they scared of donald trump? >> i am confident some of them are. look, some of them fall in different categories. some of them believe him, want to believe it, some are scared of him. some just don't want to talk about it. they want it to just go away. i think that there are lots of republicans who believe exactly what i believe. but no one is saying it to them. the only voice they're hearing right now are voices that say that the election was stolen and that's just not true. you need other voices to speak out. so i'm doing it. >> we better focus on that, and take our eyes off the rearview mirror and start looking through the windshield again. >> christie describes a new gop playbook similar to the winning strategy that republican glenn youngkin used in virginia. >> for us as a party, we have to stop looking backwards because parties that look backwards lose. parties that look forward win. and the only purpose for a political party is to win.

we have no other purpose. and so to me there is an apt analogy there which i try to talk about in the book, which is we cannot any longer looking backwards. it's over. and it's definitively over and we need to now go forward and talk about what we want to do for the country because, by the way, as republicans, while so many people are still arguing about 2020, joe biden is attempting to make serious systemic permanent changes to our government and our society. we need to be a counter voice to that. we can't be effective if all we are doing is talking about yesterday. >> still, even after detailing trump's corrosive lies, christie is not ready to relegate the former president to yesterday. donald trump has made it clear he wants to run for president again. would you support him? >> oh, look, i don't know that he is going to run. >> what if he does? >> look, what if. >> i mean, it's not a secret.

that he is seriously considering it. >> he is seriously considering it. let's see what happens when he does and who he is and what he says and how he conducts himself. >> after everything you described he has done -- >> what i'm saying to you is that i am not going to sit here in 2021 and prejudge all this. i voted for him in '16 and in '20. on election night in '20, i said what he was doing was absolutely horrible and wrong and continued to be. you could draw whatever conclusions from that you want. but in the end, in 2021, the idea of making predictions for 2024 is folly. by the way -- >> with all due respect, that sounds like a cop-out. >> i am sure you think it's a cop-out. you know what? i know that there is no reason to create tumult in a party that already has a lot of tumult in it. >> he sees himself as the best one to bring stability back to his party. how seriously are you considering running for president in 2024?

>> i am definitely thinking about it. i also know that the most important thing is to deal with 2022 first. i will tell you one thing. i have interest in running for the experience. i have already had the experience. if i run, it's because i see a pathway to winning and then being able to make a difference in the country. >> what do you need to feel and to see in yourself to be confident that you could be president and be a good president? >> i already crossed that, you know -- >> how did you get there? >> i think it's you watch yourself and you watch others. it's a comparative business. so part of it is, if not me, who? who do i think would do it better? do i think someone could do it better? do i think that i have skills that the country needs right now? in the end, it's three factors

that i'll go true through in my head probably like a checklist, probably after the midterms in '22. one, do i really want to do it. not do i like the theory of it. do i really want to do everything you have do to get there and then to execute the job once you are there. two, do i see a path to winning? not just a theoretical one, but one i can see given my experience. and, three, is my family supportive of it. so if those three boxes get checked, then i'll run. and if only one of then doesn't get checked, then i won't. >> can you see yourself running against donald trump again? >> i could see myself running against anybody. >> that's a yes? >> including him, yes. sure. >> him running wouldn't preclude you from running? >> i will not defer to anybody if i decide i want the run, including him. no one in my mind on the scene at the moment is worth deferring to. nobody.

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we've spent the past hour on chris christie and what it's like to be him as he tries to lay out a path for himself and for the republican party. thanks so much for watching. i will be bringing you more of these stories on future episodes of "being." i'm dana bash in washington. good evening on a very busy news night this thanksgiving week. a new round of subpoenas from the house select committee investigating the january 6 riot. two big names in the mix. roger stone, along-time ally and adviser of the former president, and alex jones, the far right

radio host and conspiracy theorist, all involved in the stop the steal movement and rallies that preceded the riot. and also, a fresh reminder today about what's at stake and about why it's important to get -- get to the bottom of what happened that day. federal prosecutors have brought five charges, including carrying a loaded weapon and assaulting police officers against an indiana man. he has denied assaulting police officers. more frightening, however, may be what investigators say he told them. according to investigators, mark maza said he wanted to talk to house speaker nancy pelosi that day. he didn't. then, investigators say he said this to them. quote, i was glad i didn't because you'd be here for another reason. cnn law enforcement correspondent whitney wild joins us with the latest on this new round of subpoenas. whitney, what's here? what does it seem the house select committee is focusing on? >> well specifically, when it comes to alex jones and roger stone, they are focusing on the way in which these two men used their enormous platform and possibly their connections to the president to promote the big