06/24/22 06/24/22 [captioning made possible by democracy now!] amy: from new york, this is democracy now! >> this decision isn't just reckless, it is reehensible. it is not what new yorkers want and we should have the rights of determination of what we want to do in terms of our gun laws in our state. amy: in a 6-3 ruling, the supreme court strikes down a century-old new york law limiting the carrying of

concealed handguns outside the home. five other states have similar laws that are now in jeopardy -- california, hawaii, maryland, massachusetts, and new jersey. we'll get an update from slate writer mark joseph stern who says "clarence thomas' maximalist second amendment ruling is a nightmare for gun control." then, the house select committee to investigate the january 6 on the capitol reveals new details about donald trump's efforts to pressure the justice department to subvert the election. >> i want to make sure we do not gloss this over. just say it was corrupt and leave the rest to us. the president wanted the top justice officials to declare the election was corrupt even though he knew it was absolutely no evidence to support that statement. a make congressmember adam kinzinger led the questioning of

former top justice department officials like transformer acting deputy attorney general richard donoghue. >> i said, mr. president, within 24, , 72 hours you could have hundreds and hundreds of resignation with your entire justice department because of your actions. what is that going to say that you? amy: we will bring you the explosive highlights from the hearing. all that and more, coming up. welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. the u.s. senate has approved a bipartisan gun safety bill by a vote of 65 to 33. the vote comes just weeks after the mass shootings in buffalo, new york and uvalde, texas that killed more than 30 people. senate majority leader chuck schumer praised the bill. >> this is not a cure-all for all the ways gun violence affects our nation, but it is a

long-overdue overdue step in the right direction. passing this gun safety bill is truly significant and it is going to save lives. amy: measures in the bill include expanded background checks for individuals under the age of 21 and financial incentives for states to pass red flag laws. the senate bill, however, does not include a number of initiatives included in a recent bill approved by house democrats that aimed to ban the sale of much capacity magazines and raise the minimum age to purchase an assault weapon from 18 to 21. in both the buffalo and uvalde massacres, the gunmen was 18 years old. the senate vote came just hours after the u.s. supreme court struck down a century-old new york law that limited the carrying of concealed handguns outside the home. the court's ruling was 6 to 3. five other states have similar laws that are now in jeopardy -- california, hawaii, maryland, massachusetts, and new jersey. in the majority opinion, justice

clarence thomas wrote the second amendment "protects an individual's right to carry a handgun for self-defense outside the home." the ruling is seen as a major setback for gun control efforts. in his dissent, retiring justice stephen breyer blasted the majority opinion, writing it will make it harder for states to address the dangers of gun violence. we will have more on the ruling after headlines. the house committee investigating the january 6 insurrection has revealed donald trump heavily pressured the justice department to help him overturn the 2020 election. at a hearing thursday, former top doj officials detailed how -- said trump urged the department to seize voting machines, declare the election results corrupt, and investigate bizarre conspiracy theories. during thursday's hearing, video was aired of former attorney general william barr suggesting trump came very close to staying in power. clothes if the position of the department was there not even looking at this until biden is

in office, i'm not sure we would've had the transition at all. amy: during thursday's hearing, former acting deputy attorney general richard donoghue was questioned by republican congressmember adam kinzinger about trump's efforts to pressure acting attorney general jeffrey rosen. >> you also noted mr. rosen said to mr. trump, "doj can't and won't snap its fingers and change the outcome of the election. how did the president respond to that? >> he responded quickly and said, essentially, that is not what i'm asking you to do. i'm asking you to say it was corrupt and leave the rest to us mean the congressman. amy: many of trump's efforts to push the department of justice involved a lower-level doj attorney named jeffrey clark who trump considered naming attorney general. on wednesday morning, the fbi raided clark's home. meanwhile, the january 6 committee revealed six members of congress who supported trump's coup attempt sought

positional pardons. mo brooks of alabama, matt gaetz of florida, louie gohmert of texas, marjorie taylor greene of georgia, scott perry of pennsylvania, and andy biggs of arizona. we will have more on the january 6 hearing later in the program. ukrainian officials have ordered troops to withdraw from the besieged eastern city of severodonetsk which has been the site of weeks of heavy fighting. the move brings russia closer to seizing all of the luhansk region. this comes as the united states has announced it will send an additional $450 million in military aid to ukraine including medium-range rocket systems. on thursday, the european union voted to grant candidate status to ukraine and moldova beginning a process for the countries to join the eu. on thursday, china hosted a virtual meeting with the leaders of brazil, russia, india, and south africa -- a group known colltively as brics. chinese president xi jinping open the meeti by saying nationneed to reject "cold war mentality."

he called for opposition to unilateral sanctions in a reference to efforts by the united states and its allies to isolate russia after it invaded ukraine. russian president vladimir putin also addressed the virtual summit. >> the countries of our alliance are intensifying their cooperation on a range of issues come of international and regional agendas. brics influence growing with every year. it is an objective process because they are well known for having enormous political, economic, scientific, and social attention. we have all the opportunities to work together effectively and develop global stability and security, sustainable growth, prosperity, and improvements to the well-being of the population. amy: afghan officials say the ath toll fm wednesd's earthquake has risen to at least 1150. over 10,000 homes were destroyed or damaged in the largest

earthquake to hit afghanistan in over 20 years. at least five more people died earlier today in a strong aftershock. many afghans lost multiple relatives in the quake. >> the quake happened at night. i was not here myself, but my brothers were here. that is my brother. that one. they were here. the quake suddenly have a net t night. 12 people of my family were martyred. two of the injured were my brothers. amy: the international red cross is calling on nations to release afghanistan's foreign exchange reserves in the wake of the earthquake. last year, the united states froze nearly $9.5 billion in assets belonging to the afghan central bank following the takeover of the taliban. -- takeover by the taliban. the united nations human rights office has blamed israeli forces for fatally shooting al jazeera journalist shireen abu akleh last month as she covered an israeli military raid in the jenin refugee camp in the occupied west bank.

earlier today, a spokesperson for the u.n. human rights office said -- "all information we have gathered is consistent with the finding that the shots that killed abu akleh and injured her colleague ali sammoudi came from israeli security forces and not from indiscriminate firing by armed palestinians." in ecuador, indigenous protesters tried to storm the national assembly in quito on thursday on the 11th day of demonstrations against right-wing president guillermo lasso's economic policies and rising fuel prices. at least four protesters have been killed so far and nearly 100 injured. the protests have been led by the confederation of indigenous nationalities of ecuador, or conai. this is the group's leader leonidas iza. >> the house of culture has been taken by force by the people. it is the first triumph, brothers and sisters.

with the national government a saint simply in their hands. we are not going to lose the north. they have tried to assassinate me yet we are alive and we have said here are the 10 points and for that reason the government falls, it is not our problem, brothers and sisters. amy: the burmese military has moved the country's deposed leader aung san suu kyi to solitary confinement. the nobel peace prize laureate has been jailed since a military coup in february 2021. the u.s. supreme court has ruled criminal suspects cannot sue police officers who do not read them their miranda rights at the time of their arrest. the ruling was 6 to 3 with all six conservative justices in the majority. the aclu criticized the ruling saying -- "this dangerous decision widens the gap between what the constitution guarantees and what we can hold our government accountable for." we will have more on this later in the show. in other legal news, the california lawmakers have approved a bill to protect abortion providers and patients from civil suits in other states.

california simile member said the legislation is aimed at making california a "legal sanctuary for reproductive choice." the vote comes as the nation prepares for the u.s. supreme court to issue a ruling in which it is expected to overturn roe v. wade. thursday marked the 50th anniversary of title ix, a 1972 federal law barring discrimination on the basis of sex in any school that accepts federal funding. the biden administration marked the anniversary by proposing to expand protections under title ix to transgender students. the national women's law center praised the move but called on the white house to protect trans student athletes as well. and the university of washington center for human rights has revealed a private plane owned by the new england patriots football team has been used at least three times this month by the federal government for deportation flights to honduras. the finding comes as part of a broader probe by the center looking at how professional and college sports team charter many

of the same planes used on deportation flights. and those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. it's been one month since the may 24 massacre at robb elementary school in uvalde, texas, when an 18-year-old gunman killed 19 fourth graders and two teachers. just 10 days before white , a supremacist wearing body armor and carrying an assault rifle opened fire on a supermarket in the heart of buffalo, new york's african american community, killing 10 people. of the 13 shoppers and store workers shot in the assault, 11 were black. in response, thousands of people took to the streets across the country to continue to demand the biden administration enact federal gun control laws. on thursday, the u.s. senate approved a bipartisan gun safety bill by a vote of 65 to 33. it is the first time in decades the senate agreed to new gun legislation.

this is senate majority leader chuck schumer. >> it is not a cure-all for all the ways gun violence affects our nation, but it is a long-overdue step in the right direction. passing this gun safety bill is truly significant and it is going to save lives. amy: measures in the bill include expanded background checks for people under the age of 21 and financial incentives for states to pass red flag laws. the senate bill, however, does not include a number of initiatives that were included in a recent bill approved by house democrats which aimed to ban the sale of large capacity magazines and raise the minimum age to purchase an assault weapon from 18 to 21. the buffalo and uvalde gunman were both 18 years old. the democratic-led house is expected to take up the bill quickly to send to president biden's desk. it came just hours after the u.s. supreme court struck down a century-old new york law that limited the carrying of concealed handguns outside the home.

the ruling was 6-3. five other laws have similar laws -- california, hawaii, maryland, massachusetts, and new jersey. in the majority opinion, justice clarence thomas wrote the second amendment "protects an individual's right to carry a handgun for self-defense outside the home." the ruling is seen as a major setback for gun control efforts following the recent mass shootings in buffalo, new york and uvalde, texas. new york governor kathy hochul blasted the ruling. >> this decision asian just reckless, it is reprehensible. it is not what new yorkers want. and we should have the right of determination of wt we want to do in terms of our gun laws in our state. amy: retiring justice stephen breyer blasted the majority opinion in his dissent -- "many states have tried to address some of the dangers of gun violence just described by passing laws that limit, in various ways, who may purchase, carry, or use firearms of different kinds. the court today severely burdens states' efforts to do so."

meanwhile, supreme court lawyer and former solicitor general tweeted, "going to be very weird if supreme court ends constitutional right to obtain an abortion next week saying it should be left for the states to decide right after he just imposed a constitutional right to concealed carry a firearm saying it cannot be left to the states to decide." well, for more, we're joined in new york by mark joseph stern, senior writer at slate covering the u.s. supreme court, federal, appellate, district, state and local courts. his latest piece is headlined "clarence thomas' maximalist second amendment ruling is a nightmare for gun control." welcome to democracy now! mark, can you just lay out this ruling for us? >> yes. justice clarencthomas's opinion for the court really works revolution in second amendment law. he declares that any restriction

on the right to self-defense is unconstitutional and the only way a state can say it's can restriction is if it can pinpoint some historical analogue that not only existed but was common in either 1791 when the second amendment was ratified or 1868 when the 14th a minute was ratified, applying the second amement to an estate. those were very different times from today. to give one example, there were not subws back then. so when states looked to limit the carrying of guns on subways, they will now be severely burdened if not totally disarmed, so to speak, because they cannot look back to history to satisfy thomas's new and very stringent test. amy: explain where -- with the maximalist stance of clarence thomas is. >> justice thomas rights the second amendment is different

from other rights in that the courts cannot look at the real world impact of gun violence when assessing the legality of gun restrictions. this is very different from every other right. when we look at free speech, the right against unreasonable searches, the court always balances interest. it asks whether the government has a compelling interest, whetr it has tailored its restriction further that interest, and it looks at how the government's actions have actually addressed the problem that it seeks to solve. in this decision, clarence thomas has all of that is off the table in second amement cases. judges are prohibited from considering any kind of empirical evidence about how gun restrictions or gun laws have an effect on the real world, including whether certain gun laws happen to protect our communities and individuals from

gun violence. he says that is irrelevant to the constitution, it doesn't matter if these laws save lives or not stop all that matters is whether a state can prove the framers of the second or 14th amendment would have greenlighted that law. and if you cannot hold a séance with those framers and prove to clarence thomas's satisfaction that they would have been ok with what you're trying to do, then you're gun law will be struck down by the federal judiciary. amy: talk about what the new york law, the century-old new york law was. >> the new york law restricted who could carry a concealed weapon in public places and how that in order to get such a permit, you do show some kind of heightened need for self-defense. you cannot just say, "i am scared of other people and what to be able to shoot them if they attack me." you had to show, for instance, had a stalker, were a victim of

abuse. at is similar to oth state laws like lifornia and maryland. in this decision, clarence thomasaid, wl, those laws are historical anomalies. in fact, for much of american history, individuals have had a guaranteed right to carry firearms in public that the government cannot take away without a very good compelling reason. to support that argument, he cherry picked a lot of history and actually ignored a number of state -- data points that show in the 18th century and 19th century, american states restricted guns a lot more than we usually assume today. if you entered a town in the american west carrying a gun, you may well have been kicked out stop if you tried to carry a gun in the streets of a city when theonstitution was ratified, you may well have been arrested. but thomas is not a real

historian. he is an amateur. so he deploys this kind of dilettante analysis to exclude every single fact that is not convenient for his conclusion and only focused on those states that had more liberal gunaws and used tho to levera against new york's current laws, which as you said, is a century-old come to claim it is an anomalynd cannostand under the second amendment. amy: so can you talk now about what this means? we're talking about five other states similar to new york. and the irony of this coming on the very day the senate, which does not want to pass any gun control -- at least republicans do not -- in the senate did pass limited gun control legislation. >> it feels like one step forward, two steps back to me. i think the senate bill is very good for what it does. it is important to increase

scrutiny for gun buyers under 21 who are statistically far more likely to can -- commit crimes. it is good to increase incentives for red flag laws. but there is a lot of evidence that shows more permissive concealed carry regimes like the one that the serpent court just forced on new york, lead to increase in gun homicides and increase in overall gun violence within a state. there is meanwhile as centrally no evidence -- essentially no evidence these permissive concealed carry laws protect individuals from violence or help victims of crime. you can seek out individual anecdotes in which someone used a gun to protect themselves but if you look at the broader level, look at the state population, individuals are far more likely to be murdered with a concealed weapon for no good reason than they are to protect themselves with one. so while i think the senate will certainly save lives, i think

the supreme court's decision will cost lives and it is especially sad because states like new york, hawaii, maryland are doing a lot of good in tackling gun violence. and this decision withdraws from the public sphere, from the democratic debate, one of the single most important tools that a state previously had to reduce the rates of gun homicides within its borders. amy: before we go, gun control, lifting the gun ban and opposing abortion ban, essentially, are the two big cases everyone is looking for. but there have been other rulings. can you talk about the piece you wrote about "alito's attack on miranda warnings is worse than it seems." >> justice alito's opinion for the court in this decision held receiving miranda warnings, the right to remain silent, the right to have a lawyer -- we have all seen it on tv and crime shows. that that right is not actually rooted in the constitution and

that it is a court-made right. so when it is violated, victims have no redress. they cannot sue in court, cannot seek some kind of remedy even if they are wrongfully convicted on the basis of a miranda olation. and his opiniocontains language that suggests the court may outrht overre the miraa dision from 1965. if the court takes that step, he will usher in a new era of coerced and involuntary confession, many of which are unreliable or outright false, and knocked down one of the few remaining safeguards that protects criminal suspects from an abusive and coercive tactics when they are taken into custody and targeted. amy: mark joseph stern, thank you for being with us, senior writer at slate. weill link to your pieces you right there. next outcome, the house select committee to investigate the january 6 attack on the capitol reveals new details about donald

trump's efforts to subvert the 2020 election. stay with us. ♪♪ [music break] amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. the house select committee to investigate the january 6 attack on the united states capitol has revealed new details about president donald trump's efforts to pressure the justice department to help him stay in power after he lost the 2020 election. in the committee's fifth

televised public hearing thursday, former top doj officials testified about how trump urged the department to seize voting machines and declare the election results corrupt. today we bring you highlights . this is part of committee chair congressmember bennie thompson's opening statement. >> donald trump didn't just want the investigation of donald trump, he wanted the justice department to help legitimize his lies. to basically call the election corrupt, to appoint a special counsel to investigate alleged election fraud, to send a letter to six state legislatures urging them to consider altering the election results. and when these and other efforts failed, donald trump sought to replace mr. rosen, the acting attorney general, with a lawyer who he believed would

inappropriately put the full weight of the justice department behind the effort to overturn the election. let's think about what that means. wherever you live in the united states, there's probably a local government executive, a mayor, or a county commissioner. there's also an official responsible for enforcing the laws, a district attorney,r local prosecutor. imagine if your mayor lost a reelection bid, but instead of conceding the race, they picked up the phone, called the district attorney, and said "i want you to say this election was stolen. i want you to tell the board of elections not to certify the results." that's essentially what donald trump was trying to do with the election for president of the united states. it was a brazen attempt to use

the justice department to advance the president's personal political agenda. amy: one of the former top doj officials who testified at thursday's hearing was trump's former acting deputy attorney general richard donoghue. he was questioned by one of the committee's two republicans, congressmember adam kinzinger. donoghue described a phone conversation with president trump. this begins with a video clip of republican lawmakers like matt gaetz and marjorie green taylor promoting trump's big lie. >> january 6, i'm joining with the fighters and the congress and we are going to object to electors from states that did run clean elections. democracy is left undefended if we accept the result of a stolen election without fighting with every bit of vigor we can muster. >> the ultimate date of significance is january 6. this is how the process works. the ultimate arbiter here, the ultimate check and balance is the united states congress. and when something is done in an

unconstitutional fashion, which happened in several of these states, we have a duty to step forward and have this debate and have this vote on the 6th of january. >> today is the day american patriots start taking down names and kicking ass. >> mr. donoghue, on december 27 you had a 90 mine conversation with the predent wheree raised fse claim after false claim with you and mr. rosen. how did you respond to what you called a "stream of allegations?" >> the december 27 conversation was in my mind an escalation of the earlier conversations. as the former acting ag indicated, there were a lot of communications that preceded that. as we got later in the month of december, the president's entreaties became more urgent. he became more adamant that we weren't doing our job. we need to step up and do our job.

and he had this arsenal of allegations that he wanted to -- to rely on. and so i felt in that conversation that it was incumbent on me to make it very clear to the president what our investigations had revealed, and that we had concluded based on actual investigations, actual witness interviews, actual reviews of documents that these allegations simply had no merit. and 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. and i felt that being very blunt in that conversation might help make it clear to the president these allegations were simply not true. and so as he went through them and what for me was a 90 minute conversation or so, what for the former acting ag was a two hour conversation. 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 -- in a serial fashion as he moved from one theory to another. >> can you give me an example of one or two of those theories? >> so, one that was very clear at that point was the antrim county -- the asog report that i mentioned earlier. allied security operations group released this report that said 68% error rate. there was in fact in antrim county a hanrecount. had nothinto do with the department. the department did not request that. that was pursuant to litigation brought by otherarties, but there was a hand recount. so they were able to compare the hand recount to what the machines had reported. and for the ballots that were actually counted by machine, more than 15,000, there was on error, one ballot. and i did a quick calculation and came up with .0063% error rate, which is well within tolerance. and so i made it very clear to the president because he was so fixated on the asog repo in the december 15 conversation

that, in fact, our investigation revealed that the error rate was .0063%. so that, mr. president, an example of what people are telling you that is not true and that you cannot and should not be relying on. so that was one very explicit one. and i think you see that reflected in my notes. we went through a series of others. the truck driver who claimed to have moved an entire tractor trailer of ballots from new york to pennsylvania. that was also incorrect. we did an investigation where the fbi interviewed witnesses at the front end and the back end of that trailer's transit from new york to pennsylvania. we looked at loading manifests. we interviewed witnesses, including of course the driver, and we knew it wasn't true. whether the driver believed it or not was never clear to me, but it was just not true. so that was another one that i tried to educate the president on. there were a sers of others mostly in swing states of course. he wanted to talk a great deal about georgia, the state farm arena video which he believed

for various reasons was as he said it -- fraud staring you right in the face. amy: many of president trump's efforts to push the department of justice to help him overturn the election involved a lower-level doj attorney named jeffrey clark, who trump considered naming attorney -- trump actually named attorney general for a brief period of time. on wednesday, federal agents raided clark's home. witnesses were asked about clark during wednesday's hearing of the house select committee. this clip begins with a video deposition recording of investigators questioning trump's top campaign lawyer rudy giuliani. cook's you remember recommending to anybody that mr. clark, jeffrey clark, doj, be given election-related responsibilities? >> you mean beyond the president?

>> correct. >>ell, beyond the president, i do recall saying to people that somebody should be put in charge of the justice department who isn't frightened of what's going to be done to their reputation, because justice department was filled with people like that. >> should put somebody that's not frightened of what's going to be done to their reputation. mr. donoghue, when you told the president that you wouldn't pursue baseless claims of fraud, was it because you were worried about your reputation? >> no, not at all. >> mr. clark's name was also mentioned in the white house in late december and early january, as described by a top aide to mark meadows, cassidy hutchinson.

>> was it your understanding that representative perry was pushing for a specific person to take over the department? >> he wanted mr. clark, mr. jeff clark, to take over the department of justice. >> mr. rosen, after your call with president trump on december 24, you spoke with mr. clark on december 26 about his contact with the president. can you tell us about that conversation? >> yes. because i had been quizzical about why his name had come up, i called him and i tried to explore if he would share if there was something i ought to know. and after some back and forth, he acknowledged that shortly before christmas, he had gone to a meeting in the oval office with the president. that, of course, surprised me and i asked him how did that happen. and he was defensive. he said it had been unplanned, that he had been talking to someone he referred to as general perry, but i believe is congressman perry.

and that unbeknownst to him, he was asked to go to a meeting and he didn't know it, but it turned out it was at the oval -- he found himself at the oval office. and he was apologetic for that. and i said, well, you didn't tell me about it. it wasn't authorized, and you didn't even tell me after the fact. you know, this is not -- not appropriate. but he was contrite and said it had been inadvertent and it would not happen again, and that if anyone asked him to go to such a meeting, he would notify rich donoghue and me. >> is there a policy that governs who can have contact directly with the white house? >> yes. so across many administrations for a long period of time, there's a policy that, particularly with regard to criminal investigations, restricts at both the white house and in the justice department and those more sensitive issues to the highest ranks. so for criminal matters, the policy for a long time has been

that only the attorney general and the deputy attorney general from the doj side can have conversations about criminal matters with the white house or the attorney general and the deputy attorney general can authorize someone for a specific item with their permission. but the idea is to make sure that the top rung of the justice department knows about it and is in the thing to control it and make sure only appropriate things are done. >> mr. engel, from your perspective, why is it important to have a policy like mr. rosen just discussed? >> well, it's critical that the department of justice conducts its criminal investigations free from either the reality or any appearance of political interference. and so people can get in trouble if people at the white house are speaking with people at the department. and that's why the rpose of these policies is to keep these communications as infrequent and at the highest levels as possible, just to make sure that people who are less careful about it, who don't really

understand these implications, such as mr. clark, don't run afoul of those contact policies. >> thank you. so the select committee conducted an informal interview with the white house counsel, pat cipollone, and his deputy pat philbin about their contact with mr. clark, though neither has yet agreed to sit for transcribed and videotaped interviews. but pat cipollone told the select committee that he intervened when he heard mr. clark was meeting with the president about legal matters without his knowledge, which was strictly against white house policy. mr. cipollone and mr. philbin, like mr. rosen, told mr. clark to stand down and he didn't. on the same day acting attorney general rosen told mr. clark to stop talking to the white house, representative perry was urging chief of staff mark meadows to elevate clark within the department of justice. you can now see on the screen behind me a series of s between -- texts between representative

perry and mr. meadows. they show that representative perry requested that mr. clark be elevated within the department. representative perry tells mr. meadows on december 26 that "mark, just checking in as time continues to count down. 11 days to january 6 and 25 days to inauguration. we've got to get going." representative perry followed up and says, "mark, you should call jeff. i just got off the phone with him and he explained to me why the principal deputy won't work, especially with the fbi. they will view it as not having the authority to enforce what needs to be done." mr. meadows responds with, "i got it. i think i understand. let me work on the deputy position." representative perry then texts, "roger. just sent you something on signal, just sent you an updated file. did you call jeff clark?"

amy: we will be back with more of the house select committee to investigate the january 6 attack in 30 seconds. ♪♪ [music break] amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. as we continue with highlights from the fifth public hearing of the house select committee to investigate the january 6 attack

on the united states capital that revealed new details about former's efforts to pressure the justice department to help him stay in power and subvert the 2020 election, this is republican congressmember adam kinzinger asking about the baseless conspiracy theory that an italian defense contractor had hacked a satellite, switching votes from trump to batten, which was embraced by senior officials including president trump and representative scott perry. >> the final a male -- email has an italian defense contractor uploaded software to a satellite that switched votes from trump to biden. the select committee investigation found this wild, baseless conspiracy theory made it from the recesses of the internet to the highest echelons of our government. on december 31mr. meadows received this internet

conspiracy theory from representative perry. on the screen now is the that representative perry sent to mr. meadows copying a youtube link with the message "why can't we just work with the italian government?" the next day the president's chief of staff sent the youtube link to mr. rosen who forwarded it to mr. donoghue. mr. donoghue, did you watch this video? >> i did, congressman. >> how long was the video? >> approximately 20 minutes. >> let's just take a look at an excerpt of that video, if we may. >> what's being said out of rome, out of italy is that thi was done in the u.s. embassy. that there was a certain state department guy whose name i don't know yet. i guess this is probably going to come out in italy at some point. and he was the mastermind -- not the mastermind, but the -- but the -- anyway, the guy running the operation of changing the votes. and that he was done -- doing this in conjunction with some

support from mi6, the cia, and this leonardo group. >> mr. donoghue, what was your reaction when you watched that entire 20 minute video? >> i emailed the acting attorney general and i said pure insanity, which was my impression of the video which was patently absurd. >> mr. rosen, you were asked by mr. meadows to meet with mr. johnson, who is the person in that video. what was your reaction to that request? >> so ordinarily, i'd get an email like this and there was no phone call. it would just come over the transom. but this one, he called me, mr. meadows, and asked me to meet with mr. johnson. and i told him this whole thing about italy had been debunked and that should be the end of that. and i certainly wasn't going to meet with this person.

and he initially seemed to accept that. he said, you know, why won't you meet with them? i said because if he has real evidence -- which this video does not show -- he can walk into an fbi field office anywhere in the united states, there's 55 of them. and he said, ok. but then he called me back a few minutes later and complained, and said, i didn't tell you, but this fellow johnson is working with rudy giuliani. and mr. giuliani is really offended that you think they have to go to a fbi field office. that's insulting. so couldn't -- couldn't you just have the fbi or you meet with these guys? and by then i was somewhat agitated and told them that there was no way on earth that i was going to do that. i wasn't going to meet with mr. johnson. i certainly wasn't going to meet with mr. giuliani. i'd made that clear repeatedly. and so that's the end of that.

you know, don't -- don't raise this with me again. and so, because mr. donoghue and i had been exchanging our views about this, it was 7:13 on a friday night of new year's day, i had run out of patience. and i sent the email that you're talking about. i made pretty clear that i had no interest in doing anything further with this. amy: that is trump's former acting attorney general thursday's hearing on the january attack on the u.s. capitol. the hearing revealed senior justice department officials threatened to resign en masse if president trump had fired jeff rosen as attorney general and replaced him with jeff clark. this is republican congressmember adam kinzinger questioning. >> as part of the investigation, we found mr. rosen and mr. donoghue and mr. engel were preparing for their meeting at the white house, jeff clark in the president were in constant

communication beginning at 7:00 a.m. white house call logs obtained by the committee showed by 4:19 p.m. january 3, the white house began referring to mr. clark as the acting attorney general. as far as the white house was concerned, mr. clark was already at the top of the justice department. two hours later, doj leadership arrived at the white house. the select committee interviewed every person who was inside the room that -- was inside the room during this sunday evening oval office meeting. mr. cipollone told the committee that he was "unmistakably angry" during the meeting and that he, along with eric herschmann and mr. donoghue, "forcefully challenged mr. clark to produce evidence of his election fraud theories." mr. rosen, can you describe how that meeting started? >> yes. so after some preliminaries, so we -- we -- mr. meadows had

ushered us all in and then he left. so, mr. cipollone did some introductions and things. so after some preliminaries, the president turned to me and he said, well, one thing we know is you, rosen, you aren't going to do anything. you don't even agree with the -- the claims of election fraud, and this other guy at least might do something. and then i said, well, mr. president, you're right that i'm not going to allow the justice department to do anything to try to overturn the election. that's true. but the reason for that is because that's what's consistent with the facts and the law, and that's what's required under the constitution. so that's the right answer and a good thing for the country, and therefore, i submit it is the right thing for you, mr. president. and that kicked off another two hours of discussion in which

everyone in the room was in one way or another making different points but supportive of my approach for the justice department and critical of mr. clark. >> so at some point, mr. donoghue comes in the room. can you explain what led to him coming in the room? >> oh, i forgot about that. so initially, in part i think because he was underdressed, we -- and we had not arranged -- we had not yet told the president that he was going to come in -- the white house had had a list of who would be there. that did include mr. engel and the white house counsel and the deputy white house counsel, mr. herschmann. we went in and then we told the president, you know, maybe 10 minutes into the meeting or something, i forget how far in, that mr. donoghue was outside. and he said, well, bring him in. and then mr. donoghue came in and joined the meeting. >> so, mr. donoghue, you -- you enter that room. can you set the scene for us and describe the tone you walked into? >> yes. but if i could just back up one

moment, congressman, because you put the pictures up on the screen of the aag's. i just want to make clear, one of the aag's who was not on the screen was john demers. john was the national security division aag. john was on the call, but i prefaced a call by saying, john, we need you to stay in place. national security is too important. we need to minimize the disruption. whether you resign is entirely up to you, obviously, and we'll respect your decision either way, but i'm asking you, please stay in place, and he did. so i don't want to leave the impression that he was not willing to resign, because i think he was. thank you for that. >> >> so with regard to entering the oval office, i was sitting in the hallway. an administrative assistant passed by. she asked me are you supposed to be in this meeting with the president? i said no, i'm simply here in case questions come up that other people don't have the answer to. and she walked away, and then came back probably 30 seconds later and said the president wants you in the meeting. i proceed into the oval office. i took probably two or three steps in and i stopped because i

was, as the ag said, not exactly properly attired. i was wearing jeans and muddy boots and an army t-shirt, and i never would arrive in the oval office this way. i said, mr. president, i apologize. i'm sorry, i didn't know i was going to be here. and he said, no, no, no, just come in, come in, come in. and so i went in. i attempted to take a seat on one of the couches that are behind the chairs arrayed in front of the president's desk. and he said, oh, no, no, no, you're going to be up here. and everyone kind of laughed and they moved the chairs a little bit. someone from the white house counsel's office picked up a spare chair and put it directly in front of the president, and i took that seat. >> was there discussion about mr. clark? can you kind of enlighten some of what that discussion was? >> yes. so the conversation at this point had moved beyond the specific allegations, whether it was state farm arena or antrim county or pennsylvania or whatever. we had discussed those

repeatedly and the converse -- that was backdrop to the conversation. but the conversation at this point was really about whether the president should remove jeff rosen and replace him with jeff clark. and everyone in the room i think understood that that meant that letter would go out. so that was the focus. it was about a hour meeting 2.5 after i entered. and so there were discussions about the pros and cons of doing that. early on, the president said , what do i have to lose? and it was actually a good opening because i said, mr. president, you have a great deal to lose. and i began to explain to him what he had to lose and what the country had to lose and what the department had to lose, and this was not in anyone's best interest. that conversation went on for some time. everyone essentially chimed in with their own thoughts, all of which were consistent about how damaging this would be to the country, to the department, to

the administration, to him personally. and at some point, the conversation turned to whether jeff clark was even qualified, competent to run the jusce department, which in my mind he clearly was not. and it was a heated conversation. i thought it was useful to point out to the president that jeff clark simply didn't have the skills, the ability, and the experience to run the department. and so i said, mr. president, you're talking about putting a man in that seat who has never tried a criminal case, who has never conducted a criminal investigation. he's telling you that he's going to te chargef the department, 115,000 employees, including the entire fbi, and turn the place on a dime and conduct nationwide criminal investigations that will produce results in a matter of days. it's impossible. it's absurd. it's not going to happen and it's going to fail. he has never been in front of a trial jury, a grand jury.

he's never even been to chris wray's office. i said at one point, if you walked into chris wray's office one, would you know how to get there? and two, if you got there, would he even know who you are? and do you really think that the fbi is going to suddenly start following your orders? it's not going to happen. he's not competent. and that's the point at which mr. clark tried to defend himself by saying, well, i've been involved in very significant civil and environmental litigation. i've argued many appeals in appellate courts and things of that nature. and then i pointed out that, yes, he was an environmental lawyer, and i didn't think that was appropriate background to be running in the united states justice department. >> did anybody in there support mr. clark? >> no one. >> mr. rosen, it was you he was going to replace. so what was your view about the president's plan to appoint mr. clark? >> well, as i alluded to earlier, the issue really wasn't about me.

it was -- it would have been fine, as i said, to have had rich donoghue replace me. i would have said great, i -- i get 17 days vacation or something. but the issue was the use of the justice department, and it's just so important that the justice department adhere to the facts and the law. that's what it's there to do, and that's what our constitutional role was. and so if the justice department gets out of the role that it's supposed to play, that's really bad for our country. and i don't know of a simpler way to say that. and when you damage our fundamental institutions, it's not easy to repair them. so i thought this was a really important issue to try to make sure that the justice department was able to stay on the right course. >> mr. donoghue, did you eventually tell the president that mass resignations would

occur if he installed mr. clark and what the consequences would be? >> yes. so this was in line with the president's saying what do i have to lose? and along those lines, he said, so suppose i do this. suppose i replace him, jeff rosen, with him, jeff clark? what would y do? and i said, mr. president, i would resign immediately. i'm not working one minute for this guy, who i had just declared was completely incompetent. and so the president immediately turned to mr. engel. and he said, steve, you wouldn't resign, would you? and he said, absolutely i would, mr. president. you leave me no choice. and i said, and we're not the only ones. no one cares if we resign. if steve and i go, that's fine. it doesn't matter. but i'm telling you what's going to happen. you're going to lose your entire department leadership. every single aag will walk out on you. your entire department leadership will walk out within hours. and i don't know what happens after that. i don't know what the united states attorneys are going to

do. we have u.s. attorneys in districts across the country, and my guess would be that many of them would have resigned. and that would then have led to resignations across the department in washington. and i said, mr. president, within 24, 48, 72 hours, you could have hundreds and hureds of resignations of the leadership of your entire justice department because of your actions. what's that going to say about you? amy: that is richard donoghue most of trump's paper attorney general jeffrey clark on wednesday. the january 6 committee revealed six members of congress who supported trump's coup attempt sought presidential pardons. a brooks of alabama, matt gaetz, louie gohmert, marjorie taylor greene, scott perry, and andy biggs. this is republican congress member adam kinzinger. >> my colleagues and i also take an oath.

some of them failed to uphold theirs and instead chose to spread the big lie. days after the tragic events of january 6, some of these same republican members requested pardons in the waning days of the trump administration. five days after the attack on the capitol, representative mo brooks sent the email on the screen now. as you see, he emailed the white house "pursuant to a request from matt gaetz, requesting a pardon for representative gaetz himself and unnamed others." witnesses told the select committee that the president considered offering pardons to a wide range of individuals connected to the president. let's listen to some of that testimony. >> and was representative gaetz requesting a pardon? >> i believe so.

the general tone was we may get prosecuted because we were densive , you know, the president's positions on these things. e pardonhat he was diussing reqsting was as broad as you can describe, from beginning -- i remember he's -- from the beginning of time up until today for any and all things. then he mentioned nixon. and i said nixon's pardon was never nearly that broad. >> and are you aware of any members of congress seeking pardons? >> i gue mr. gaetz and mr. brooks, i know, have both advocated for there'd be a blanket pardon for members involved in that meeting, and a handful of other members that weren't at the december 21st meetg as the psumptive -- preemptive pardons. mr. gaetz was personally pushing for a pardon, and he was doing

so since early december. i'm not sure why mr. gaetz would reacout to me to ask if he could have a meeting with mr. meadows about receiving a presidenti pardon. >> did they all contact you? >> not all of them, but several of them did. >> so you mentioned mr. gaetz, mr. brooks. >> mr. biggs did. mr. jordan talked about congressional paons, but he never asked me for one. it was more for an update on whether the white house was going to pardon members of congress. amy: that is kathy hudgins said in her videotape deposition. before her, senior white house legal advisor eric herschmann. to see thursday's full hearing, go to democracynow.org as well as all five of the hearings in

full. the public hearings of the january 6 committee will resume in mid july. that does it for our show. happy birthday to karen ranucci! happy sixth birthday to ava crosby wallach.