/12 Cheney very smartly plays up that these are NOT "RINOs" - asking leading ?s & letting them, in their own words, talk about abject nonsense like how great Trump's foreign policy was or how much you admire Kayleigh McEnany (!). Adds credibility, obviously, but ...yeesh
/13 I take seriously that these witnesses are feeling intimidated.
/14 so far we're half an hour in and there hasn't been significant new evidence. As of now, I'm a little puzzled why this was a prime-time hearing.
/15 Rep. Luria confirms that there is lots of information-gathering going on among the Secret Service.
/16 I'm not sure Rep. Luria is explaining this adequately: the President does not go 7 hours without making or receiving a phone call, nor does he go nearly 3 hours in the middle of the day without doing anything. The evidence of what he did do has obviously been scrubbed.
/17 Not one member of defense or law enforcement heard from Trump during the insurrection. I... we knew this already but it still feels weird to actually say it out loud.
/18 and... as we predicted 5 minutes ago, the J6 committee does in fact have evidence that Trump didn't sit by himself in silence for 7 hours but called co-collaborators like Rudy Giuliani.
/19 Cipollone: "almost immediately after I found out" testifies that he told Trump "people have to be told to get out of the Capitol" & adds Meadows was among those also telling Trump to do that.
/20 remember our last episode - this testimony about Mark Meadows is VERY equivocal - Meadows is still potentially on the hook here, particularly if you look at the documents
/21 Matthews says Trump could have gone on the air in multiple ways "in 60 seconds"
/22 more need for Secret Service evidence: testimony that "if we don't leave now, we may lose the ability to leave altogether" & NSC was monitoring this in real-time
/23 again, this is bad stuff - the crowd learned that Pence "betrayed us" & got violent - but this is missing a direct link to Trump. For 18 USC 2384, you have to show that Trump "by force" conspired "to delay the execution of any law of the US"
/24 lol that was a kind of random "Just a reminder, Josh Hawley pissed his pants and ran away during the insurrection" moment
/25 10-minute recess as per usual; so far I would say this is the least "breaking news" #Jan6thCommittee hearing so far - it's not bad, but we're learning only snippets of new info (e.g., calling Giuliani, Tuberville). Hope the second half has more
/26 interesting emphasis on STAY peaceful, REMAIN peaceful in reviewing Trump's 1/6 afternoon tweets.
/27 And now, Don Trump Jr.'s tweets to Meadows are put into context - "he [Trump] has to condemn this shit ASAP"
/28 it is of course a measure of how far we've fallen that everyone thinks it's perfectly normal that various Fox News hosts are calling and making demands of the President.
/29 Patsy Baloney telling us Meadows was "mostly" on board (with condemning the violence) confirms what we've been saying for the past few weeks.
/30 this actually IS useful - how Trump's supporters interpreted his tweets - "heh heh notice [Trump] didn't say 'don't harm the Congressmen'"
/31 this Matthews outburst ("I pointed at the screen and said 'does this look like we're winning??'") is the kind of authentic testimony that prosecutors look for
/32 okay, even I had forgotten how offensive, how infuriating, how ..treasonous.. that Trump 4:17 video was.
/33 the new evidence is that Trump went WAY off script on that 1/6 4:17 Rose Garden video. And again, this does help evidence subjective intent
/34 instead, it was McConnell, Pence, and Schumer who reached out the Secretary of Defense - get the military out to secure the Capitol.
/35 Mark Milley: Meadows said “We have to kill the narrative the Pence is making the decisions.. we have to establish the narrative that Trump is in charge.” - we keep saying REMEMBER TO KEEP YOUR EYE ON MEADOWS
/36 I also think it's effective to show the mob saying "oh, Trump is saying 'go home'.. those are our orders... time to go home"
/37 NEW!🚨After the Capitol was cleared, Rudy Giuliani contacted Trump’s “closest allies” in Congress to try and delay: Jim Jordan + Sens. Blackburn, Tuberville, Hagerty, Lindsey Graham (!), Hawley & our good buddy @tedcruz – at 7:02pm Rudy left a VM – “try to just slow it down”
/38 another Mitch McConnell kick to the groin
/39 yeah, we're just going to have to pretend that people like Pat Cipollone & Gene Scalia patriotically hung around for two more weeks because they were worried Trump would appoint someone even worse
/40 Trump TODAY can't say "the election is over"! I definitely laughed at the Trump practice video but I'm not sure what this gets you.
/41 I do not need to hear a Republican begin a sentence with "In one of his finest moments, Richard Nixon..."
/42 OOOOOH secret recordings of Kevin McCarthy suggesting invoking the 25th Amendment now broadcast nationwide. This has no bearing on holding Trump accountable but it does embarrass that weasel McCarthy so I'm all for it.
/43 Rep. Luria really enjoyed being able to say "shitty"
/44 Kinzinger's close here is the most forceful, the most direct calling-out by anyone on the J6 Committee (& it comes from a Republican) - laws mean nothing if we do not hold people accountable - we'll recommend changes to the law because Trump & his goons are still out there
/45 always stay tuned in for the Liz Cheney mid-credits scene!
/46 "Do you really think Bill Barr is such a delicate flower that he would wilt under cross-examination?" - I legitimately LOLed at that one. Man these Cheney closing statements are amazing
/47 bookending with Bannon - "this was premeditated" - then Cheney pointing out Trump's advisers were privately saying THE EXACT SAME THINGS she was saying publicly (& for which she was drummed out of leadership)
/END and that's a wrap - back to the main feed
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