Meadows’ Closest Aide Set To Testify During Surprise Jan. 6 Hearing

[trnc]

@steviedee111

Do you think Trump personally, affirmatively put in motion the storming of the Capitol building? And if he did, was there a point in time during or after the various speeches at the Ellipse he could have made the decision it was not going to happen, and stopped it?
Seems to me once the J6 events kicked off it was doomed to unfold as it did, and much of it was beyond Trump’s control, at least by about noon that day.

He pushed and pushed and pushed for months starting before the election. If he hadn’t pushed it for all that time, it’s hard to imagine anyone else pushing it to the point where we wind up with an armed crowd ready to storm the capital.

If you’re only rewriting the single event of the speech and not everything leading up to that, would the extremely amped up crowd have listened if he had called for calm at that point? Maybe, maybe not. Doesn’t matter because he got them there, and because he clearly did the opposite of trying to contain it.

He’s guilty as fuck. How about we leave it at that.

[deuce]

@thunderclapnewman

They could have kept them as period books.
They rewrote them, changed the plots, and destroyed what made them charming.

And @chelsea530, @26degreesrising

My childhood favorite(s) was Freddy the Pig

[deuce]

@lestatdelc

And after Babbitt was killed…

There were multiple entry points in the Capitol and it being a vast complex I can see where The shooting of dear Ashley wasn’t immediately known by the mob elements which had breached elsewhere

[read2much]

@ajm

Beast

Agreed. But it was a SUV, not the beast.

[txlawyer]

@cgwca

Way up the thread it was noted that Hutchison has changed attorneys since her previous depositions. The difference between the earlier recorded videos and today’s was striking.

During the MSNBC recap show last night, I attempted to discern which attorney was representing her in which interviews. The only time I could find a face on screen, it was the new guy, Jody Hunt. I suspect all of her videoed interviews were with him as counsel.

[Akimbo]

Tony Ornato is a Secret Service official familiar (and a trumper). Perhaps he or one of his buddies is the source. If the Secret Service wants to testify that there was nothing in the day logs about it (I’m sure trumpers would include it in their day logs ) or in a discussion with the Secret Service Ornato and Engel revealed…, that’s fine.

This is what the Secret Service said officially:
““The United States Secret Service has been cooperating with the Select Committee since its inception in spring 2021, and will continue to do so, including by responding on the record to the Committee regarding the new allegations surfaced in today’s testimony,” Secret Service spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi said in a statement to CBS News.”
ETA Link:

Secret Service plans to respond to Jan. 6 committee regarding Trump's...

None of that, however, is Ornato and Engel under oath saying that Ornato didn’t tell Hutchinson that story (which is what is at issue here).

[Hatmama]

I missed the year grammer was drilled into us – 8th grade. Mea culpa. I never knew that rule. I still use apostrophes to indicate single and plural possession, and in contractions. Not after numbers, symbols, or single letters. I am an Oxford comma user. And, I still use two spaces after a sentence. I’m old school.

But, I appreciate your direct, and completely reasonable (non-snarky) correction. I get that same courtesy from @thunderclapnewman about word usage, too. Namaste .

[tecmage]

@txlawyer

I suspect all of her videoed interviews were with him as counsel.

I can’t believe that her first lawyer, who is connected to Trump, would have advised her to give a deposition or testify.

[dryheat]

@knut

So get the body cam footage from the agents or the inside of the car. There’s no way that this isn’t being recorded 8 ways up the wazoo. The president doesn’t just get to disappear into a black hole when on official duty.

Unfortunately, I don’t think Secret Service agents wear body cams when riding with the President.

Here’s an article that implies that they are just now thinking about buying some. But I doubt (for privacy reasons) that they will ever use them inside the President’s vehicle.

Secret Service members may soon wear body cameras in the line of duty, according to a request for information from vendors.
Secret Service wants 2,000 body-worn cameras (fedscoop.com) (2/19/21)

[dryheat]

@ajm

Non-denial denial – she never said [Tony Ornato] told her anything. She said she was told in his presence by other people what had gone down in the Beast.

I thought she based her statements entirely on what Tony Ornato told her.

According to Hutchinson, Ornato recounted Trump screaming, “I’m the f__king President. Take me up to the Capitol now.” Trump then “reached up toward the front of the vehicle to grab at the steering wheel,” Hutchinson remembered learning. She added that, according to Ornato, the former President used his other hand to “lunge” at Engel.
Trump lunged at Secret Service and steering wheel when told he couldn’t go to Capitol, aide says she was told | CNN Politics

[chelsea530]

Whatever he did, it was bad. He touched him roughly. It may be fine if you’re a dictator, but POTUS?

Absolutely not. And they’ll never be able to soften that image of him doing that. Disgusting creep.

[chelsea530]

@godwit

At the end Cheney confirmed with the witness that Engel was in the room when Ornato told the story and didn’t dispute it at the time. And that neither Ornato or Engel had at any point afterward told Hutchinson that any part of it was untrue

Thanks for the reminder.

Wasn’t Ornato demoted after Trump left office?

[castor_troy]

@dryheat

Here’s an article that implies that they are just now thinking about buying some. But I doubt (for privacy reasons) that they will ever use them inside the President’s vehicle.

That’s for the public security side, the folks standing guard outside the WH on the uniformed wing of the SS. Explicitly not going to the suit-and-tie folks protecting the president.

[godwit]

@trnc

He pushed and pushed and pushed for months starting before the election. If he hadn’t pushed it for all that time, it’s hard to imagine anyone else pushing it to the point where we wind up with an armed crowd ready to storm the capital.

The hearings so far have done a really good job of showing this. The violence was pre-planned. By a conspiracy that included the president. The speech that morning was only the final piece.

[thunderclapnewman]

@deuce

My childhood favorite(s) was Freddy the Pig

I read every one of them in 4th and 5th grade.
Great books for kids.

[old_guru]

And we are depending on Garland to bring an indictment of Trump to get this country back on track. I do understand that it is a grave step to take to indict and try a former President, but if we do not bite the bullet and do it to this humongous crook and traitor, we can never claim to be a democratic republic again. If the Rethug party does not finally get pulled up short and shown clearly that being mean, vile lying assholes will not be tolerated, they will just get worse and worse. We have tolerated their machinations long enough, and they have proven that they are not fit in any way to govern. Trump needs to be imprisoned for his particular crimes, but it is really the entire Republican party that needs to be penalized for aiding and abetting, and the members of Congress who have todied up to Trump need not be iimprisoned along with the false idol that they have worshiped.

[YouCrane]

@chelsea530

And put his other hand on the guy’s clavicle. Wow.

I believe this is her describing Ornata’s account. Ornata’s hands on his clavicle.
She’s an excellent witness, exact in her phrasing. She did not say that Trump reached for the driver’s clavicle. I would assume Trump went for the throat and missed.

[chelsea530]

Yes, she was repeating what Ornato told her.

[fgs]

There were no masks to be had for months on end. Rump didn’t invoke war powers to kickstart production. Jared and FEMA were diverting PPE shipments to Republican states and districts where only praise of The Rump could be heard.

We the people were left to strap severed bra cups on our faces, and I hardly blame my rightist neighbors for wondering what good it did.

[Anarchy_Bunker]

@fgs

We the people were left to strap severed bra cups on our faces, and I hardly blame my rightist neighbors for wondering what good it did.

Hopefully without a severed… well…