donoghue. mr. donoghue, did you watch there video? >> i did, congressman. >> how long was the video? >> president 20 minutes. >> let's just take a look at an excerpt of that video. >> what's being said, this 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. he was the mastermind -- not the mastermind but the guy running the operation of changing the votes. and that he was not doing this in conjunction with some support from mi 6, the cia and this leonardo group. >> mr. donoghue, what was your reaction when you watched that entire 20-minute video? >> i e-mailed the acting attorney general. i said pure insanity, which was my impression of the video which was patently absurd. >> mr. rosen, you were asked be i mr. meadows to meet with mr. johnson, the person in that video. what was your reaction to that request? >> so ordinarily i get an e-mail like this and there was no phone call. i would just come over the transom.

donoghue and mr.re 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

donoghue and mr.engel were preparing for that meeting at the white house, jeff clark and the president where in constant communication beginning at 7 am. white house call logs obtained by the committee show that by four 90 pm on january 3rd, the white house had already begun 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, what's inside the room during this sunday evening oval office meeting. mr. cipollone told the committee that he was, quote, unmistakably angry during the meeting and that he along with eric harshman and mr. donahue, quote, forcefully challenged mr. clock to produce evidence of election fraud theories. mr. rosen, can you describe how that meeting started? >> yes. so after some preliminaries -- so mr. meadows had assured us all in and then he left so mr. cipollone did some introductions and after some pre

richard donoghue: he said: "so, suppose i do this.se i replace him, jeff rosen, with him, jeff clark. what would you do?" and i said: "mr. president, i'm going to 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." laura: donoghue went on to say that, also, hundreds of department of justice officials would go on to resign if trump tried to install jeffrey clark atop of the justice department. and one final important point about clark here, judy, is that he went before the committee in private deposition, and he pled the fifth over and over again, so as not to incriminate himself. judy: it appears he didn't answer any of the -- any of the committee questions. lisa, i want to turn to you now. we learned more today about the role in all of this of several members of congress, didn't we? lisa: we h

donoghue and mr.engel were preparing for that meeting at the white house, jeff clark and the president where in constant communication beginning at 7 am. white house call logs obtained by the committee show that by four 90 pm on january 3rd, the white house had already begun 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, what's inside the room during this sunday evening oval office meeting. mr. cipollone told the committee that he was, quote, unmistakably angry during the meeting and that he along with eric harshman and mr. donahue, quote, forcefully challenged mr. clock to produce evidence of election fraud theories. mr. rosen, can you describe how that meeting started? >> yes. so after some preliminaries -- so mr. meadows had assured us all in and then he left so

donoghue, that's a direct quote from president trump, correct? >> that's an exact quote from the president, yes. >> perhaps the most dramatic moment of the testimony was what donoghue later said about a december 2020 white house meeting where he tried to explain to donald trump in great detail what would happen if trump removed then acting attorney general jeffrey rosen and tried to install jeffrey clark as attorney general to push this discredited election fraud nonsense. >> this was in line with the president 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 you do? >> and i said, mr. president, i would resign immediately. i'm not working one minute for this guy, who i 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'd leave me no choice. and then i said, and we're not the only ones. no one car

donoghue, and mr. engel were preparing for their meeting at the white house, jeff clark and the president were in constant communication beginning at 7:00 a.m. white house call logs obtained by the committee show that by 4:19 p.m. on january 3rd, the white house had already begun 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 -- was inside the room during this sunday evening oval office meeting. mr. cipollone told the committee that he was, quote, unmistakably angry during the meeting, and that he, long with eric her shman and mr. donoghue, quote, 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, mr. meadows had ushered us all in, and the

donoghue. mr. donoghue, did you watch this video? >> i did, congressman. >> how long was the video? >> approximately 20 minutes. >> let's take a look at an excerpt of that video if we may. >> it is being said out of rome, out of italy this was done in the u.s. embassy, 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, anyway, the guy running the operation of changing the votes, and that he was doing this in conjunction with some support from mi-6, the cia, and this lendo 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. >> patently absurd. >> patently absurd about vote switching, satellites and leonardo's and then to mark meadows and the highest levels of the u.s. justice department and the white house chief of staff didn't let it, go he wanted the attorney general, jeffr

and to be clear, donoghue, rosen had repeatedly told him it wasn't corrupt.t the idea it was corrupt was a lie. ryan, my question to you is if everything we heard yesterday there was that sentence, there was a sentence which jumped out at me where donoghue testifies the president said to him you guys may not be following the internet the way i do. of all of it where is the greatest legal jeopardy for donald trump? >> so i think we heard it in part from eric herschmann white house lawyer he says to jeffrey clark if you go through with this your very first act as acting attorney general will be to commit a felony. so there is a felony in trying to send this letter to georgia and other states on the basis of a false hood and say you need to decertify before january 6 that's interfering in an election. the other is a political coercion act, you are not ever able to coerce a u.s. official to intervene on behalf of a candidate. they were threatening rosen with his very job if he didn't go through with their scheme. >> laura, the letter which you are holding in your

and donoghue dismissing that out of hand? a great article by my colleague here at the "washington post." and one at the department of the justice telling jeffrey clark maybe he should go back to his office and they'll call him when there's an oil spill. because he has no qualifications to be an attorney general. he has no criminal prosecution record, nothing to even qualify him to talk about an investigation of election fraud which he promises he will deliver to donald trump which is also a huge red flag. when i investigate it, we'll find a ton of, you know, widespread fraud, that's kind of a worrisome thing for someone to say. i will just answer your question, willie, your smart question, by saying that this is an attorney who had a very conservative history and record. even after leaving georgetown. and at kirkland and ellis, while at this very respected firm was viewed as being pretty conservative, although level-headed as joe mentioned earlier. what is so interesting about him is he is sucked in to the president's vortex.

donoghue, could you tell us what you meant by that? >> well, i had to read both the email and the attached ledger twice to make sure i really understood what he was proposing because it was so extreme to me i had a hard time getting my head around it initially. but i read it and i did understand it for what he intended, and i had to sit down and sort of composed what i thought was an appropriate response. i actually where it initially went next door to the acting ag's office and he was not there. we both were on email and we knew we would both have only have a similar reaction to what. he was not in my office. i returned to my office and i sat down to draft a response because i thought it was very important to give it era a trump prompt response rejecting this out of hand. they were, in response i explained a number of reasons this is not the department's role to suggest or dictate to state legislatures how they should select their electors. but more importantly, this was not based on fact, this was actually contrary to the facts as de

donoghue, can you tell us what you meant by that? and the attached letter twice to make sure i really understood what he was proposing. because it was so extreme to me, i had my hard time getting my head around it initially. but i read it and i did understand, it for what he intended. and i had to sit down and sort of composed but i thought was an appropriate response. i thought it was very important to give a prompt response rejecting this out of hand. there were, in my response, i explain a number of reasons, this is not the departments role, to suggest we're dictate to state legislatures how they should select their electors. but more importantly, this was not based on fact. this was actually contrary to the facts, as developed by department investigations over the last several weeks and months. so i responded to that. and for the department to insert itself into the political process this way, i think, would have had grave consequences to the country. it may very well have spiraled us into a constitutional crisis. and i want to m

rosen and donoghue said president trump wanted a special counsel to investigate, one of his cronies, and wanting to seize machines from states, something they refused to do >> we had seen nothing improper with regard to the voting machines, and i told him that the real experts of that had been at dhs, and they had briefed us that they had looked at it and that there was nothing wrong with the voting machines, and so that was not something that was appropriate. >> the president was very agitated by the acting attorney general's response the president again was getting very agitated and he said, people tell me i should just get rid of both of you i should just remove you, and make a change in the leadership, put jeff clark in and maybe something will finally get done. >> jeffrey clark, a little known environmental lawyer at the doj who had a penchant for conspiracy theories and was willing to do the president's bidding. they found out clark started launching his own unauthorized investigations and even had an oval office meeting with the president, and that was strictly forbidden under

donoghue, on january 6th, we know from mr. reconvene a joint session, is that correct? >> yes, sir. >> we see here in a video that we're going to play, you arriving with your security detail to help security the capitol. mr. donoghue, 30 minutes after you arrived at the capitol, did you lead a briefing for the vice president? >> i'm not sure of the time frame, but i did parade in a call and participate in a briefing the vice president, as well as the congressional leadership that night. >> where did you conduct that call at? >> i was in an office, i'm not entirely sure because of the acoustics were such that it wasn't conductive to having a call. so they found an office. we went to that office, and i believe i participated in two phone calls, one at 1800, one at 1900 that night from that office. >> what time did you end up leaving the capitol? >> i waited until the senate was back in session, which i believe they were gavelled in a few minutes after 8:00 p.m. and once they were back in session, and we were confident that the e

. point thatjeff donoghue. point that jeff clark donoghue. point thatjeff clark is i made the point thatjeff criminal attorney or conducted a criminal investigation and his life. and he kind of retorted by saying well, i've done a lot of very complicated appeals and civil litigation and environmental litigation and things like that and i said that's right, you are an environmental lawyer. how about you give it to your office and we will call you when there is an oil spill? and i remember saying, that letter that this guy wants to send, that letter is a murder suicide pact, it is going to damage everyone who touches it. earlier i asked the bbc�*s peter bowes what the key takeaways were from thursday's hearings. i think the main takeaway is that we are now hearing from several former officials from the justice department about this alleged pressure that donald trump was putting on them and the department to essentially back him in his claims that he had won the election, that the result was fraudulent as a result of voter malpractice is. we heard from the former acting attorney generaljeffrey

donoghue, representative perry called you the next day on december 27. who told him to call you? >> my understanding is the president did at the outset of the call, congressman. perry told me that he was calling at the behest of the president. >> what did he want to talk about? >> about pennsylvania in particular. he gave me some background about why he in particular doesn't trust the fbi and why the american people don't necessarily trust the fbi. and then he went in to some allegations specific to pennsylvania which included amongst others this allegation that the secretary of state had certified more votes than were cast. >> did you direct the local u.s. attorney's office to investigate that claim? >> mr. perry said that he had a great deal of information. that investigations had been done, that there was some sort of forensic-type report that would be helpful to me. i didn't know congressman perry. i never heard of him before this conversation. i said sir, if you have something that you think is relevant to what the justice department's mission is, feel free to send it to me.

donoghue testified to what he told trump about clark at that a january 3rd meeting.he point that jeff clark is not competent to serve as the attorney general but he had never been an attorney, he has never conducted a criminal in litigation in his life. he has never been a trial judge attorney, so he reported by saying, i have done very collocated appeals and civil litigation and environmental litigation, and things like that. and i said that's right, you are an environmental lawyer. how about you go back to your office and we will call you when there is an oil spill. >> he refers to this team, whiskey tango foxtrot, trump was willing to scrape the bottom of the barrel to overturn democracy and doj officials threatened to resign en masse if he did so. we were this close to a catastrophe. >> he had to. no one of credibility would do the dirty work he wanted to do, so, scott perry pick this guy up out of relative obscurity and hands him over to the white house, and essentially, he asks, will you do this thing if we put you in position of power to do it and he says sure

, mr rosen, _ being rebuffed by mr donoghue, mr rosen, and others.december 31st and called an emergency meeting with the _ 31st and called an emergency meeting with the leadership. —— january sixth — with the leadership. -- january sixth. . . with the leadership. -- january sixth. , , ., , ., sixth. the president was a little more agitated _ sixth. the president was a little more agitated than _ sixth. the president was a little more agitated than he - sixth. the president was a little more agitated than he had - sixth. the president was a little | more agitated than he had been sixth. the president was a little i more agitated than he had been in the meeting — more agitated than he had been in the meeting on— more agitated than he had been in the meeting on the _ more agitated than he had been in the meeting on the 15th. _ more agitated than he had been in the meeting on the 15th. he - the meeting on the 15th. he discussed _ the meeting on the 15th. he discussed a _ the meeting on the 15th. he discussed a variety - the meeting on the 15th. he discus

clark said, according to the donoghue disposition.hat's right, you are an environmental lawyer, how about you go back to your office and we will call you when there's an oil spill. at the end of the meeting trump decided not to make jeffrey clark the acting attorney general, saying, i appreciate you being willing to suffer the abuse but the reality is you are not going to get anything done donoghue, these guys are going to quit, everyone else is going to resign. it's going to be a disaster. the bureaucracy will you live. and no matter how much you want to get things done in the next few weeks you won't be able to get it done, and it's not going to be worth the breakage. clark was shot down by other lawyers in the room when he tried to discuss what authority vice president mike pence would have on january 6th, in counting the electoral college votes. but that wasn't the end of that idea. attorney john eastman push the idea in the white house, of having mike pence reject the electoral votes from key states won by joe biden. the january

donoghue and mr.stand their oath was to the constitution or in the the personal or political interests of the president. the president and his allies became keenly aware with legal challenges exhausted and electoral votes certified, their only hope would be a last ditch scheme to prevent congress from certifying the win, thus throwing the entire system into constitutional chaos. the president wanted the department to sew doubt in the legitimacy of the election to empower his followers and members of congress to take action. if the department could just lend its credibility to the conspiracies, people would have the justification they needed to spread the big lie. so president trump ultimately wanted the department of justice to say the election was, quote, corrupt, and, quote, leave the rest to me and the republican congressmen. as you will hear today, the department's top leadership refused. not surprisingly president trump didn't take no for an answer. he didn't accept it from attorney general barr.

( laughter ) at the meeting, donoghue expressed why he had doubts that clark was the man for the job:oint that jeff clark is not even competent to serve as the attorney general. he has never been a criminal attorney, he has never conducted a criminal investigation in his life. and he kind of retorted by saying, "well, i have done a lot of very complicated appeals, and civil litigation, and environmental litigation, and things like that." and i said, "that is right. you are an environmental lawyer. how about you go back to your office, and we will call you when there is an oil spill?" ( audience reacts ) >> stephen: oh, damn! this is the department of justice and you just got served! "hey, jeff! why don't you go screw a protected otter, you grass-hole. isn't there a baby pelican you should be scrubbing with a toothbrush? you want to be helpful? go hump a redwood, you shaved lorax." we've got a great show for you tonight. my guests are beto o'rourke and "station eleven's" matilda lawler. but when we come back, i'll be back here for more monologue about the folks who crimed and how they

only then, donoghue said, trump backed off. >> and i began to explain to him what he had to lose, and what the country had to lose and the department had to lose. and this was not in anyone's best interest. >> reporter: jeffery clark did not testify today, but invoked the fifth amendment at a previous deposition and, yesterday, federal investigators raided his northern virginia home. meantime, the committee named more republican lawmakers who sought pardons after a meeting with the former president toar strategize ways to block the certification of the election. norah. >> o'donnell: looks like there are new revelations every day. nikole killion, thank you. let's turn now to our cbs news s exclusive, and a new twist in the committee's investigation, in the form of 120 hours of never-before-seen footage of tho trump campaign and white house. the new revelation is making some members of former president trump's inner circle nervous. ♪ ♪ ♪ >> reporter: what's being billed as "an intimate, behind-the-scenes look at the trump family"... >> okay. >> my father... >> reporter: the newly-reveal

donoghue said today. i'm proud of the department of justice they help lead.may sound corny to some of your viewers. but that's what you are supposed to do. you are supposed to do the right thing, even when it is hard. they did that, good for them. but that is the job. but had they not intervened, had there been weaker people, had there been spineless people in their seats rather than them, chaos, stephanie. because it would have given the imprimatur of the department of justice to anybody in georgia who wanted to submit a false slate of electors or who wanted to claim that even the justice department believed that the election in georgia and elsewhere was fraudulent. so, a very important moment, when that we should not overlook. and i'm very glad that smart people -- courageous people -- did the right thing. again, that's the job. that is what you were supposed to do, even when it is hard. >> where they able to do the right thing, luke, by appealing to trump's narcissism? they stopped him, not because they convinced him that the letter was a bad idea or that

donoghue, that's a direct quote from president trump, correct?t quote from the president, yes. >> the next note shows that even the president kept pressing, even though he had been told there was no evidence of fraud, the president keeps saying that the department was quote obligated to tell people that this was an illegal, corrupt election? >> that's also an exact quote from the president. >> john, let's go back to this quote. he responded very quickly, the president of the united states, he said, what i'm asking you to do is say it was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the republican congressman. that's richard donoghue, handwritten notes direct confederate from the president of the united states. what does that tell us and where does it lead us. >> it leads us to a place we were many times until the trump administration, the president was on some level an idiot, and also on some level kind of nuts but he wasn't totally a moron, and he wasn't completely crazy. he wasn't literally certifiable. these moments where you see trump acting -- he's

you mentioned the handwritten notes by richard donoghue, he says he just wants the then president trump wanted them to say the election was corrupt and leave the rest up to him and the republican congressmen. we also learned more about the pardons, we have seen members of this committee sort of tease they were going to put more information forth about the republican lawmakers who sought pardons, they named a whole lot of names in the hearing yesterday, people like matt gaetz, mo brooks, louie gohmert, marjorie taylor greene, a number of these folks said they didn't actually seek pardons or you're misunderstanding what was going on here, the committee says they have the proof. back to you. >> sara murray, thank you for all of that reporting, really significant day yesterday and federal investigators also, we learned in the middle of all of this yesterday, conducted a search of former justice department official jeffrey clark's home. that's who sara was talking about, this happened on wednesday. >> evan perez with us now. evan, tell us what exactly they were looking for in his home and wh

and that quote you just played with donoghue where the -- president trump is saying, you know, just say it's -- it's a fraudulent election and i will take care of the rest. that suggests that the president has no interest in actually counting the votes and winning legitimately. all he's interested in is overturning the election. it's an extremely damaging set of facts. >> and that was after he raised every single one of the conspiracy theories. so it wasn't even -- he can't now say, oh -- he can't try to back out of it and say i was just saying, you know, that they should really look into this investigation because he went down every single one of the theories and richard donoghue who had said he was closer to the facts because they spent inordinate resources on these crazy wild conspiracy theories, literally went down every single one and said you are wrong. that is not true. and then his last thing that he resorts back to is, all right, fine, just say it's corrupt and i will take care of the rest. it's just like what he said to zelenskyy back in the first impeachment, just announce th

donoghue testified in our hearings last week. the email identifies apparent planning by those coming to washington on january 6 to, "occupy federal buildings" in discussions of "invading the capitol building." here's what mr. donoghue said to us. >> and we knew that if you have tens of thousands of very obsessive people showing up in washington, d.c., that there was potential for violence. >> the u.s. secret service was looking at similar information and watching the planned demonstrations. in fact, their intelligence division sent several emails to white house personnel like deputy chief of staff tony ornato and the head of the president's protective detail robert engel, including certain materials listing events like those on the screen. the white house continued to receive updates about planned demonstrations, including information regarding the proud boys organizing and planning to attend events on january 6. although ms. hutchinson has no detailed knowledge of any planning involving the proud boys for january 6, she did note

but ultimately as the committee drilled down on yesterday, because of jeffrey rosen, rich donoghue and steven engle, three people who stood up against jeffrey clark and the former president and threatened to cause a mass resignation so jeffrey clark would be leading a graveyard. the former president was not able to go through with a lot of what he was trying to. >> jackie, talk to me about the pardons. i mean, you even saw a staffer being deposed about the pardons and having a hard time keeping a straight face because they were ridiculous. who was asking for pardons, why and what kinds of pardons were they looking for? >> yeah. mika, there were a number of pardons that were thrown out at the end there. you had cassidy hutchinson and eric hershman saying that andy biggs, louie gohmert and scott perry were in some capacity asking for a preemptive pardon or a pardon to potentially ward them against any criminal prosecution that might have come out of their efforts to assist trump in over turning the results of the election. there was an email that was displayed at the beginning of this se

donoghue testified to what he told clark about that january 3rd meeting. the point that jeff clark is not even competent to serve as the attorney general. he's never been a criminal attorney. he's never conducted a criminal investigation in his life. he's never been in front of a -- jury much less a trial jury. and he kind of retorted by saying, well, i've done a lot of very complicated appeals and civil litigation, environmental litigation, and things like that. and i said, that's right. you're an environmental lawyer. how about you go back to your office, and we'll call you when there's an oil spill. >> s.e., trump was willing to scrape the bottom of the barrel to overturn the democracy. >> no, he had to. >> and these doj officials threatened to resign en masse if he did so. we were that close to a catastrophe. >> he had to. no one of credibility would do the dirty work he wanted to do. so scott perry picks this guy up out of obscurity, relative obscurity, and hands him over to the white house and essentially he's asked, will you do this thing if we put

donoghue, who appeared before the committee before today. mr. donoghue, we talked so much about whether or not the white house and the president was informed. on the results of the investigation, the interviews that have gone on on in fulton county, how were those results communicated to the white house, to the president? >> i don't know how to initially communicated and they came up in subsequent communications with the president and we looked into it and it was not true. ms. cheney: he was informed? >> i told the president several times that these allegations about ballots smuggled in in a suitcase and run through the machine several times it was not true. ms. lofgren: after u.s. left the u.s. attorney's office is the next u.s. attorney, mr. trump's personal pick, did he investigate any remaining claps of fraud? and if so, did he find any evidence that supported the president's claim of voter fraud? pac pk -- mr. pak: he was unable to find any evidence of fraud that affected the scrowt come of the investigation. ms. lofgren: after investigatin

donoghue, that's a direct quote from the president, correct?ext note shows that even the president kept pressing, even though he'd been told there was no evidence of fraud, the president keeps saying that the department was, quote, obligated to tell people this was an illegal, corrupt election. >> that's also an exact quote from the president, yes. >> even after being told repeatedly there was no fraud but he didn't seem to want the truth. does that say something about trump's motivation, his state of mind? >> it's breathtaking. yes, of course. what it says is he's completely indifferent to the facts, which he's been told about again and again and again. let's make a deal. just say it's corrupt, you don't have to do anything else and i can go out and wave around the paper from the department of justice that will back. >> off, dominos could fall and at the end of the day, guess who might be president, meaning the end of the democracy. but it's such a trump we'd heard a little bit about that but he adds me and the republican congressmen will take

donoghue and mr. barr and mr.ennsylvania have been debunked. they'd run them down, which maybe is a conversation for another day, that federal resources were used running down what bill barr called b.s., but they'd been run down. trump knew they were false when he singled out this man that resulted in threats to his family's life. >> it is a conversation for another day but it is completely absurd how many government resources, both state and federal, were used to track down drunk rudy's frivolous claims of election fraud. and it's amazing that that could actually occur. but you raise a good point, and it's something -- a different context to think about it, also, nicole, which is we saw this in the first impeachment with the threats to the whistle-blower and the threats to alex vindman and the threats to other witnesses, and then you would see trump's supporters actually execute whatever trump said, and go and make these threats after his tweets, and it reminds me that one of thinks defenses is that when he said,

acting deputy attorney general richard donoghue described jeff clark's letter this way. "this would be a grave step for the department to take and could have tremendous constitutional, political, and social ramifications for this country." the committee agrees with mr. donahue's assessment. had clark assumed the role of attorney general in the days before january 6th, and issued these letters, the ramifications could indeed have been grave. mr. donoghue also said this about clark's plan. >> and i recall toward the end saying, what you're proposing is nothing less than the united states justice department meddling in the outcome of a presidential election. >> in our hearings, you will hear firsthand how the senior leadership of the department of justice threatened to resign, how the white house counsel threatened to resign, and how they confronted donald trump and jeff clark in the oval office. the men involved, including acting attorney general jeff rosen and acting deputy attorney general richard donoghue, were appointed by president trump. these men honored their oaths

donoghue in that december 27th call, quote, you guys may not be following the internet the way i do. >> we are also learning that several congressional republicans were pushing these internet conspiracy theories trying to overturn the election asking for pardons from trump. and they include scott perry, matt gaetz, mo brooks, marjorie taylor greene. more now from manu raju. >> he just told me it is your job to seize machines and you are not doing your job. >> reporter: top justice officials testifying about the lengths donald trump went to use the power of the federal government to pursue this conspiracy that the election was stolen. despite being told repeatedly there was no merit to his claims, trump demanding they declare the election corrupt and leave the rest to him and members of congress. >> were any of the allegations he brought up found credible, did you find any of them credible? >> no. >> reporter: trump's pressure campaign was relentless. >> between december 23rd and january 3rd, the president either called me or met with me virtually every day. >> reporter: all of it cam

here is a clip from donoghue's deposition. >> the president says suppose i do this, suppose i replaceth jeff clark. what do you do? i said, sir, i will resign immediately. there's no way i'm serving one minute under this guy, jeff clark. >> "the washington post" reports at one point when clark tried to tout his qualifications to be attorney general, donoghue shot back, how about go back to your office and we'll call you when there's an oil spill? so we talked about this last week, "the washington post" had all this reporting on it. you had donoghue and rosen running into the oval office to try to stop jeffrey clark, this guy way down the chain at the department of justice who was trying to usurp their power and become the attorney general by telling donald trump exactly what he wanted to hear and that extraordinary moment where they basically told him to beat it and prevailed on donald trump to stay where they were. >> yeah. it is really interesting to me that those same republicans i referenced a minute ago that don't have the courage to stand up and say we want to support someone el

we heard from a former deputy, richard donoghue.fascinating bit talking about a phone call with former president trump. during the phone call, mr. donahue took notes because he wanted to report the allegations that the former president was making. i want to show you a graphic of one of the things he said that former president trump told him. he told him he was asked by the president ash just stayed the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and republican congressman. there, a former president trump is implicating republican congressmen in this idea of overturning the election calling it corrupt. we have little evidence -- we have a little evidence of who he was talking about. the leader of the house freedom caucus known for its conservative values and for trying to affect what happens on the floor of the house. i reached out to representative perry's office the we have not heard back. the idea was that perry himself was the one that helped raise jeffrey clark as the potential to change the top of the justice department to he