Un-Hiatus (Briefly)

The U.S. House Select Committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol held its fifth public hearing on Thursday. Seth Abramson, the author-journalist who knows more about the insurrection and its myriad tangents than anyone not sitting on the Committee, more or less had his mind blown.

Abramson live-tweeted the two-hour hearing, reporting what was being said while also offering context and essential background information. He could hardly believe what he was hearing: "This is insane", "Scary, unhinged stuff", "This story is way wilder than I thought", "This is batsh*t", "This hearing is absolutely astonishing me", and "This conspiracy is so complicated and encompassing". When it was over, he admitted: "I cannot count how many bombshells we just heard. I am practically shell-shocked right now." 

This was the Committee's last public hearing until mid-July. It's not known how many hearings will be held next month; there are also reports of additional hearings scheduled for September. The Committee wants to review the "deluge of new evidence" it has recently received, including more than 10 hours of behind-the-scenes footage of Trump and his family and inner circle (including numerous post-election discussions and interviews). The fact of this footage being turned over to the Committee apparently "blindsided" Trump's inner circle ("What the fuck is this?"). (P.S. What's up with Trump wearing a stained shirt that says "President Donald Trump" on it?)

From Abramson's 137-tweet commentary, as the hearing progressed (my emphasis):

9/ Had DOJ falsely declared the 2020 election fraudulent—when Trump's own internal election watchdog, CISA, had declared it the most safe and secure in America’s history—the *Pandora’s Box* it would have opened is beyond anything most Americans can possibly imagine. . . .

20/ [The FBI raid on Jeffrey Clark's home] is the *second* time this week that DOJ has taken an investigative action only at or around the time Congress began discussing an issue in public (the other is the fake-elector plot). Why is DOJ waiting for Congress?

21/ This raid should have happened almost a year and a half ago. The subpoenas for fake electors should have been sent almost a year and a half ago. . . . DOJ has moved at a *glacial* place and it's inexcusable. . . .

31/ We have already had a *number* of HJ6C hearings—all of them explosive—and entire topics have barely been mentioned even a single time: Stop the Steal; the Oath Keepers; Women for America First; the Pentagon; Roger Stone’s fundraising; Trump’s January 2 conference call... . . .

40/ Cheney is noting in *her* opening statement that *much* more evidence is coming in hearings, *and* that the ultimate HJ6C report will have evidence we don't get in the hearings. She's summarizing all Trump's misconduct—even going back to his post-election fundraising scam.

41/ Stunning! Cheney just clearly said the RNC *conspired with Trump* in his "fake-elector" scheme. She is saying that the Republican Party as an *institution* was a coup co-conspirator. No wonder Republicans are trying to destroy her career and crazies are threatening her life. . . .

45/ Now stunning deposition video from former AG Bill Barr saying that if this Trump-Clark plot at DOJ had succeeded, "I'm not sure we would have had a transition [to a Biden administration] at all."

46/ Note that former federal prosecutor Barb McQuade has said on MSNBC that if Rosen had been fired, *100+ top federal prosecutors*—US attorneys and leading AUSAs—were going to resign their jobs immediately in what would've been the most historic revolt by lawyers in US history. . . .

61/ Videos are being shown of a Fox News host, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX), Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ), Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ), Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) , Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) and Trump falsely telling America there was fraud after they knew DOJ had found *none*.

62/ This is *by far* the most direct accusation the Committee has ever made against sitting members of Congress. It's on, apparently. . . .

70/ Holy cow! First mention of the big December 21—2020—meeting in the Oval Office with Trump's congressional allies. PROOF has talked about this a lot. Greene, Gohmert, Gaetz, Jordan, Hice, Perry, all the insurrectionists were there. Wow, the HJ6C is really going after Congress. . . .

83/ . . . I wonder how many major-media journalists now discussing the HJ6C hearing realize how close we just came to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas's wife Ginni Thomas being directly implicated in a criminal conspiracy on national television. . . .

95/ Folks, I am struggling to keep up. So many bombshells. Trump was like an octopus with his tentacles *directly* in all of this. *Many* GOP members of Congress had their tentacles in this. . . . [The] Department of Justice was under major attack from *so many directions*. . . .

99/ Trump apparently *ordered* the Department of Homeland Security to seize voting machines—directly ordered Ken Cuccinelli, head of DHS. OMG. This is f*cking terrifying. That would have plunged us into autocracy. DOJ had never told Trump that DHS could seize voting machines. . . .

109/ Clark comes off as a madman in this hearing, quite honestly. So do Trump and even Meadows, not to mention Perry, Eastman, and Klukowski. . . . This hearing is absolutely astonishing me. I mean... my God. . . .

115/ So then-President Donald Trump said to the room, "What do I have to lose?" Absolutely chilling that he even said this. He had no thought of the country or the rule of law whatsoever. Trump was being told how dangerous this would be and how *unqualified Clark was* to be AG.

117/ It appears the only thing that stopped Trump was that Donoghue told Trump, "You’re going to lose your entire Department leadership." Donoghue then described for Trump a *total collapse of the Department of Justice across the entire United States*. Read that sentence twice. . . .

124/ . . . Trump was AWOL on January 6—that is, after he'd incited an armed mob to march on our government.

125/ We're now covering the pardon issue. Brooks asked for a pardon for himself, Gaetz, and many others. Eric Hershmann (Trump attorney) says Gaetz and others believed they might be criminally prosecuted for their role in January 6. They wanted *blanket, massively broad pardons*. [Allan Note: Gaetz was asking for a pardon to cover "from the beginning of time up until today, for any and all things". He apparently started begging for a pardon shortly after it was reported that he was under federal investigation for child sex trafficking.]

126/ Holy ****—Brooks wanted a blanket pardon for EVERY MEMBER OF CONGRESS IN THE OVAL OFFICE ON DECEMBER 21, 2020. Do people realize how long that list is? Biggs wanted a pardon. Gohmert. Greene. Hice. Perry. The list goes on and on. All believed they might've committed crimes. . . .

130/ Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, and others were *fed* rank nonsense by men whose names haven't been said at these hearings—and that nonsense went *immediately* to Trump and almost led to the collapse of American democracy and the birth of a new neo-fascist authoritarian regime.

131/ REP. ADAM KINZINGER (R-IL): "I'm still worried that not enough has changed to prevent this from happening again." I agree. . . .

133/ Every time she speaks, Rep. Cheney underscores *how much more evidence* is coming. I appreciate that she does this and I know she is correct. . . .

136/ Thompson says the January 6 mob was Trump's "backup plan." The mob was supposed to enact a violent coup if Trump couldn't enact a "political coup." This is a means of preparing America and the Committee for its July hearings—which will apparently focus on *January 6 itself*.

Later, Abramson tweeted:

Why do I now believe Trump will be indicted? Because if you watched the hearing the House January 6 Committee just conducted, you understand that the current DOJ is *never* going to allow Trump to run the DOJ again. And Trump plans to announce that he's running for POTUS in 2024.

I won't believe it until I see it. And even then . . .

Also: Abramson will be publishing more "breaking news about Ginni Thomas" on Friday:

(PS) I'll simply say that there's no longer any doubt that the January 6 insurrection—which is ongoing—is the most extraordinary *domestic* political event in US history since the Civil War. (I'm treating WWI/WWII as largely overseas events, and the Great Depression as economic.

(PS2) I will also say that—like Adam Kinzinger—I do not at this point fully know how America gets itself out of the hole it is in without some measure of civil unrest. . . .

(PS3) . . . Practicing lawyers better start thinking hard—and daily—about the constitutional crisis we're about to enter because of Clarence Thomas, Ginni Thomas, the 2022 and 2024 elections, and a new crop of GOP insurrectionists.