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How the Jan. 6 committee wants to safeguard democracy: 11 recommendations

The House committee examining last year’s attack on the U.S. Capitol issued its long-awaited final report on Thursday night, marking the culmination of a historic investigation that’s captivated Congress and the country for the last 18 months.

The thrust of the committee’s argument has centered on the accusation that former President Trump, while still in the White House, sought to use his executive authority in an illegal effort to cling to power despite his 2020 election defeat. And the 845-page report aims to fill out the underlying details of investigative findings that were aired publicly over the course of 10 televised hearings that spanned seven months of this year. 

Largely excluded from those public forums, however, were any specific proposals to prevent another rampage like the Jan. 6, 2021, attack — recommendations that were an explicit responsibility of the Jan. 6 committee.

The final report filled that void, providing 11 reform proposals designed to ensure the peaceful transition between presidents that eluded the country in 2021. 

Here are those recommendations.

14th Amendment

One of the most striking proposals put forth by the panel aims to bar Trump from holding public office in the future under the 14th Amendment, which prohibits individuals from serving if they “engaged in insurrection.” The committee called on Congress to consider “creating a formal mechanism for evaluating whether to bar” individuals in the report from holding government office under the constitutional statute.

The report notes that Trump was impeached by the House for incitement of insurrection following the riot, that 57 senators voted to convict him of the charge, and that more recently, the committee referred the former president to the Justice Department for inciting, assisting or aiding and comforting an insurrection.

“The committee believes that those who took an oath to protect and defend the Constitution and then, on January 6th, engaged in insurrection can appropriately be disqualified and barred from holding government office — whether federal or state, civilian or military — absent at least two-thirds of Congress acting to remove the disability pursuant to Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment,” the report reads.

The recommendation is similar to legislation Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) introduced last week, which would prevent Trump from holding public office in the future under the 14th Amendment.

Subpoena enforcement

The Jan. 6 committee conducted more than 1,000 interviews with witnesses of all stripes, an overwhelming majority of whom appeared before the panel voluntarily. But a number of high-profile Trump allies declined to cooperate, even under subpoena from the panel, leaving large holes in the Jan. 6 narrative that may never be filled. 

The list included prominent figures with unique, first-hand knowledge of the events of the day, including Mark Meadows, Trump’s former chief of staff, and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), who spoke to Trump by phone in the midst of the riot.

In response, the committee is recommending that Congress grant itself greater powers to enforce its own subpoenas in federal courts. 

Protection for poll workers

Among the most compelling testimony through the Jan. 6 hearings came from poll workers who said their lives were upended after Trump’s allies accused them — falsely — of tampering with the elections to help Joe Biden. 

The attacks have sparked concerns that election workers across the country will be discouraged from pursuing those duties at the expense of the electoral process overall. 

The Jan. 6 investigators, aiming to prevent such attacks, are suggesting that Congress consider steeper penalties for threats to election workers, while establishing new safeguards to protect the identities of those employees. 

Tougher oversight of the Capitol Police 

The Jan. 6 attack took a devastating toll on the law enforcers charged with protecting the Capitol that day. And lawmakers in both parties have hailed the heroics of those officers in the nearly two years since.

Yet the forces on hand were wildly unprepared for the thousands of Trump supporters who marched on the Capitol — a crowd that ultimately stormed violently into the building, injuring more than 150 officers in the ensuing melee.

In response, the Jan. 6 committee is suggesting that Congress adopt a much more aggressive supervision role of the Capitol Police, to include “regular and rigorous oversight” of the agency, as well as new routine hearings with testimony from the Capitol Police Board. 

The panel is also recommending that “full funding for critical security measures” is “assured.” 

Role of media

Through its investigation, the Jan. 6 panel said it found that a number of individuals connected to the Capitol riot were galvanized by incorrect information regarding the 2020 presidential election that was amplified in legacy and social media.

The report, for example, makes several mentions of InfoWars host Alex Jones, at one point claiming that he “riled up crowds both in-person and online with incendiary rhetoric about the election” prior to Jan. 6, and that the radio show was “a platform for others in the election-denial coalition.”

The committee said that while individuals are responsible for their own conduct, Congress should continue to scrutinize “policies of media companies that have had the effect of radicalizing their consumers, including by provoking people to attack their own country.”

Insurrection Act

The Jan. 6 panel details multiple instances when members of the Oath Keepers — including the far-right milita group’s founder, Stewart Rhodes — called on Trump to invoke the Insurrection Act, which would have allowed the president to deploy an armed militia or federal troops to crack down on domestic rebellion or insurrection.

The committee said it was “troubled” by such evidence, and encouraged relevant congressional committees to “evaluate all such evidence, and consider risks posed for future elections.”

National Special Security Event

The select committee is recommending that the joint session of Congress convened to count electoral votes on Jan. 6 be designated a national special security event, which would require increased security protections and advance planning and preparation for the proceedings.

Events like the presidential inauguration and the State of the Union are labeled national special security events by the Department of Homeland Security.

“Until January 6th, 2021, the joint session of Congress for counting electoral votes was not understood to pose the same types of security risks as other major events on Capitol Hill,” the report reads. “Given what occurred in 2021, Congress and the Executive Branch should work together to designate the joint session of Congress occurring on January 6th as a National Special Security Event.”

Electoral Count Act

Top of the committee’s list of legislative recommendations is reforming the Electoral Count Act of 1887 in an effort to protect presidential elections from being overturned in the future.

To that end, the panel called on the Senate to take up the Presidential Election Reform Act, legislation crafted by Reps. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) that the House passed in September. The measure would clarify that the vice president’s role in certifying election results is strictly ministerial and increase the threshold for objecting to a state’s electoral votes, among other tenets.

The upper chamber, however, has instead approved its own version of the legislation — titled the Electoral Count Reform and Presidential Transition Improvement Act — which is largely similar to the House measure with a few minor differences. Senate leaders included the legislation in the end-of-the-year omnibus, which passed through the chamber on Thursday. The spending measure now heads to the House.

Combating violent extremism

While most of the Jan. 6 protestors were not affiliated with specific groups, several white nationalist organizations appear to have played an outsized role in the violence that defined the day, including leaders of the Oath Keepers, who have since been convicted of seditious conspiracy, and the Proud Boys, who are facing similar charges.

The Jan. 6 panel is suggesting that the federal government — including a host of intelligence agencies like the Secret Service — adopt “whole-of-government strategies” to address the violent threat “posed by all extremist groups.” 

The panel is also recommending that the various intelligence and law enforcement agencies better synchronize themselves in the delicate task of sharing information “on a timely basis.” 

More severe penalties for obstructing the transfer of power

Congress’s role in finalizing presidential election results is essentially symbolic: It OKs the electoral votes submitted by the states based on the election results. 

But the Jan. 6 rampage sought to upend that tradition. And the select committee is now suggesting that Congress expand existing federal criminal statutes — those aimed at punishing victim tampering — to include those who try to obstruct, influence or impede the counting of electoral college votes on Jan. 6.

The report specifically cites 18 U.S.C.§ 1512(c)2, which says individuals who obstruct, influence or impede official proceedings — or attempt to do so — should face a fine, prison for up to 20 years, or both.

The committee also recommended that Congress assess whether or not current statutes in place are strong enough to deter illegal actions that could thwart the peaceful transition of power.

Accountability measures

A major development in the investigation came Monday, when the committee accused Trump and a key ally — attorney John Eastman — of specific federal crimes and filed formal recommendations with the Justice Department that the agency investigate those accusations further. 

But the panel isn’t stopping there, asserting that federal law enforcers should also evaluate the activities of other Trump allies identified within the report in order “to ensure criminal or civil accountability for anyone engaging in misconduct described” in the document. 

The committee is also urging courts and local bar associations to disqualify any members of the legal profession who are found to participate in efforts to undermine democratic institutions. And it’s calling on the Justice Department to adopt guardrails ensuring that agency employee’s steer clear of “campaign-related activities.”

Source: TEST FEED1

Jan. 6 committee releases final report

The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol released its highly anticipated final report on Thursday, capping off the panel’s year-and-a-half probe.

The report, which spans 845 pages, was made public three days after the committee held its final meeting and unveiled several criminal referrals targeting former President Trump. During that presentation, members voted unanimously to adopt the expansive body of work.

“This report will provide greater detail about the multistep effort devised and driven by Donald Trump to overturn the 2020 election and block the transfer of power,” Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), the chair of the committee, wrote in a foreword in the report.

“Building on the information presented in our hearings earlier this year, we will present new findings about Trump’s pressure campaign on officials from the local level all the way up to his Vice President, orchestrated and designed solely to throw out the will of the voters and keep him in office past the end of his elected term,” he added.

The report was initially set to publish on Wednesday but the committee punted the release to Thursday. The panel did not give a reason for the delay, but the announcement came a few hours before Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky delivered an address to a joint meeting of Congress.

The committee did, however, release the transcripts of a number of witness testimonies, including two conversations the panel had with Cassidy Hutchinson.

During those discussions, the former aide to Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows detailed an effort by what she referred to as “Trump World” to lessen the effect of her testimony and hold back information from investigators.

The report is split into eight chapters and includes an executive summary, which the panel made public on Monday. Its release marks the final act of the committee’s sprawling investigation, which has been ongoing since the panel was created last summer.

The group held 11 public presentations, interviewed more than 1,000 witnesses and poured over thousands of documents to understand the events, before, on and after Jan. 6 over the past 18 months.

As a precursor to the publication of the report the panel made its final public presentation on Monday, during which members voted on criminal referrals to the Justice Department that target Trump.

The panel recommended that the agency investigate Trump for inciting, assisting or aiding and comforting an insurrection; obstructing an official proceeding; conspiracy to defraud the United States and conspiracy to make a false statement.

The referrals, while symbolic, do not have any legal heft because the Justice Department is not required to investigate recommendations from congressional committees.

But they nonetheless marked a significant moment in the committee’s quest to make its case to the American people that Trump was at the heart of a conspiracy to keep himself in the White House.

The referrals and release of the report come at a particularly tenuous moment for Trump, whose third bid for the White House is struggling to pick up steam amid poor polls and mockery over a new business venture involving digital trading cards.

— Updated at 10:13 p.m.

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House to vote on funding bill Friday

The House will vote on a $1.7 trillion government funding package Friday, one day after the Senate approved the measure and just hours before the midnight shutdown deadline.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) announced the vote on the House floor Thursday afternoon, shortly after the Senate approved the omnibus bill. He said a vote in the House was kicked to Friday because the meticulous process for preparing the bill — which spans 4,155 pages — to move from the Senate to the House would take hours

“I have been over in the Senate talking to those who will prepare the bill to be sent to this chamber. Unfortunately, the process takes a long time to do, and it will not be to us for a significant period of time. Meaning it will not be to us before midnight tonight,” Hoyer said. 

“As a result, I will announce to members that we will have no — I believe recorded votes, until at the earliest 9 a.m. tomorrow. And members have to be available at 9 a.m. and thereafter,” he added.

The majority leader said the House will proceed “as soon as we get the documents to process.”

The House on Friday will also take up a short-term continuing resolution that would kick the funding deadline to Dec. 30. That gives the bill time to process once passed without triggering a government shutdown. The Senate approved the measure by unanimous consent Thursday afternoon.

“So again, we will be having no further votes tonight, we will convene at 9 a.m., and votes will be conducted as soon thereafter as we are ready to do so,” Hoyer said on the floor.

The Senate passed the omnibus package Thursday afternoon. The measure, which will fund the government for the remainder of fiscal year 2023, also includes $45 billion in military and economic aid for Ukraine.

The legislation also allocates $38 billion for emergency disaster assistance, and it includes a bill to overhaul the 1887 Electoral Count Act.

The Senate added eight amendments to the bill during a marathon vote series Thursday, one of which was a provision that would give some groups of terrorism victims — including the families of Sept. 11, 2001, victims — access to a compensation fund.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Thursday spoke about the process required to move a bill from the Senate to the House, noting that it will take particularly longer for the omnibus because of the length of the measure.

“When you have the bill, you sit side by side and read everything in it so that it is — what is being written in the parchment is exactly what is the bill. That takes a long time for thousands of pages. Then when that is finished and we get the signal from the Senate that they want us to send the bill, you go to the Senate floor,” Pelosi told reporters during her weekly press conference.

“And it’s a beautiful thing. You go over to the Senate, and you take section by section by section by section, House and Senate, not as long as reading every word, but confirming the sections,” she added.

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Sean Hannity admits in deposition he didn't believe Trump voter fraud claims

Fox News host Sean Hannity admitted under oath that he “did not believe” for “one second” there was mass voter fraud in the 2020 election.

Hannity’s testimony was included in court depositions released on Wednesday in the Delaware Superior Court, according to The New York Times. The depositions were part of a $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News brought by Dominion Voting Systems.

Hannity was responding to a question in the deposition on whether he believed the false claims made by former President Trump’s attorney Sidney Powell in November 2020.

Powell told Hannity then that there was widespread fraud in the 2020 election and that voting machines manufactured by Dominion Voting Systems helped steal the election by switching votes.

“I did not believe it for one second,” Hannity said in the released deposition, according to the Times.

Dominion is suing Fox News for defamation, alleging the company spread false claims about its voting machines in the aftermath of the 2020 election, leading to financial loss.

Trump’s legal team and the former president’s allies did appear on Fox News and other conservative networks raising false claims about the voting machines, but Dominion would have to prove that Fox journalists knew the claims they made were false or that journalists acted with a reckless disregard for the truth.

Stephen Shackelford, an attorney for Dominion, made the case at the hearing that the company has strong evidence that Fox News journalists knew claims about mass voter fraud in the 2020 election were false but chose to amplify them anyway, the Times reported.

“Many of the highest-ranking Fox people have admitted under oath that they never believed the Dominion lies,” he said, according to the Times.

Those include Fox News hosts Meade Cooper and prime-time star Tucker Carlson, Shackelford said.

The case is slated to go to a jury trial in April. The depositions released on Wednesday were part of a hearing to address some issues involved.

Fox News is also facing another defamation suit filed by Smartmatic, another manufacturer of voting machines targeted by Trump allies after the 2020 election.

Source: TEST FEED1

These are the last-minute changes the Senate made to the $1.7 trillion omnibus

Senators on Thursday added a list of amendments to a sweeping 4,155-page government funding bill that now heads to the House.

During the hours-long voting session, senators voted on a series of 15 amendments, ranging from measures that sought to extend a Trump-era immigration policy to legislation aimed at expanding protections for breastfeeding workers.

The $1.7 trillion funding package passed the Senate in a 68-29 vote, and now heads to the House, where some top Democrats are hopeful of a swift passage. 

Below are some of the changes senators voted to adopt as part of the process:

The Pump Act

The Senate approved adding the Providing Urgent Maternal Protections for Nursing Mothers (PUMP) Act, which seeks to strengthen breastfeeding protections for workers, in a 92-5 vote.

Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), who cosponsored the bill, called its passage “a win that’s been years in the making” in a tweet moments after.

“Everyone should have the space and privacy to pump at work, and no one should be forced by their employer to stop nursing,” he said.

Compensation for victims of terrorism

Added into the package is a bill sponsored by Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) that will allow specific groups of victims of terrorism access to a compensation fund for terrorism victims from which these groups were previously excluded.

They include direct families of victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, victims of the 1983 bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, and the 1996 attack on the Air Force barracks in Khobar, Saudi Arabia. 

The bill, called the Fairness for 9/11 Families Act, had stalled amid opposition from Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) over it initially not including the Beirut victims. The compromise was offered as an amendment to the 2023 funding bill and passed the Senate 93 to 4.

Using forfeited property to help Ukraine

Another amendment that made the cut, offered by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), would “authorize the transfer of the proceeds of certain forfeited property to help Ukraine.”

That extends to property that was “possessed by, or was controlled by a person subject to sanctions and designated by the Secretary of the Treasury or the Secretary of State.”

The amendment, which was approved by a voice vote, comes months after Graham — along with Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), and Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) — introduced legislation aimed at allowing the assets of Russian oligarchs to be used to support efforts to aid Ukraine amid the ongoing Russian invasion.

Pregnant Fairness Workers Act

The Senate voted 73-24 to adopt an amendment brought by Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) to attach the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act to the omnibus. 

A release from the office of Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), who has also been pushing for the legislation, said the bill has a similar model to the Americans with Disabilities Act, and would “require employers to make reasonable accommodations to allow pregnant workers to continue working safely, such as additional bathroom breaks, light duty, or a stool to sit on if a worker stands all day.”

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) lauded the vote in a statement not long after, calling it “one of the most significant improvements to workplace protections in years.”

“The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act makes a simple assertion: if you are pregnant, if you are working during your pregnancy, you should have the right to basic workplace accommodations,” he said.

Payment for Navy Lt. Ridge Alkonis

An amendment to provide for the continuation of pay and benefits of Navy Lt. Ridge Alkonis also passed. According to Deseret News, his pay was cut while serving a three-year sentence in a prison in Japan after a car accident that killed two citizens.

Alkonis was determined by a judge in Japan to have been sleeping behind the wheel during the accident, but U.S. Navy investigators found “that Alkonis suffered from acute mountain sickness and lost consciousness accounts,” the report said.

The Senate approved the amendment, offered by Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), in a voice vote.

Laura Kelly contributed.

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Senate passes $1.7 trillion omnibus spending package

The Senate on Thursday voted to pass a $1.7 trillion omnibus package that funds the federal government through September, provides Ukraine with $45 billion in military and economic aid and sets aside $38 billion for emergency disaster assistance.

It also includes reforms to the Electoral Count Act in response to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, clarifying that the vice president does not have the power to overturn the results of a presidential election. 

The package passed with a large bipartisan majority, 68-29, wrapping up the Senate’s legislative business in the 117^th Congress a few days before Christmas. 

The omnibus bill represents one of several major bipartisan legislation accomplishments of President Biden’s first two years in office, along with the $1 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act; the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, to address gun violence; and the $280 billion Chips and Science Act, to improve U.S. competitiveness with China.  

It spends $858 billion on defense programs, a 9.7 percent increase, and $772.5 billion on nondefense, non-veterans-related programs, representing a 5.5 percent increase. 

It also includes $118.7 billion for Veterans Affairs medical care, a 22 percent increase, and $59 billion for programs authorized by the bipartisan infrastructure bill, which Congress passed last year. 

It provides $19.8 billion to arm and equip Ukrainian force and NATO allies and $12.9 billion to stabilize the Ukrainian economy and make up for shortfalls. Passage came a day after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky addressed a joint session of Congress to ask for continued American support. 

The House is expected to take up the legislation as soon as Thursday evening and vote to send it to Biden’s desk before government funding runs out at the end of Friday.  

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) hailed the bill as a victory for Republicans because it increased defense spending above the rate of inflation while boosting nondefense, non-veterans spending by less than inflation.  

“The world’s greatest military will get the funding increase that it needs, outpacing inflation. Meanwhile, nondefense, non-veterans spending will come in below the rate of inflation, for a real-dollar cut,” McConnell said on the Senate floor, touting GOP wins in the bill.   

The legislation passed early Thursday afternoon after senators raced through a series of amendments, staying seated at their desks to limit each vote to 10 minutes. 

Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) warned that failing to pass the bill would have risked a freeze of federal funding levels well into 2023 or even a government shutdown.  

“To go to a [continuing resolution] or even worse, a government shutdown, would be a huge disservice at any time, and particularly at holiday season, to the American people,” he said. 

The package left some key Democratic priorities on the cutting room floor, including a proposal to extend the enhanced Child Tax Credit and the SAFE Banking Act, which would prohibit federal regulators from penalizing financial institutions that do business with legitimate cannabis-related businesses.  

But Democrats also got many priorities included that they can tout to constituents back home, such as a $500 increase for Pell Grant awards, the largest increase in over a decade.  

Republicans, in turn, got a $275 million cut to the IRS’s budget and language prohibiting the transfer of detainees held at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, to the United States.  

Senators had hoped to wrap up the bill Wednesday or early Thursday so they could catch their flights home for the Christmas break before a massive winter storm paralyzed airports across the nation. 

As of mid-morning Thursday, more than 1,400 flights had been canceled nationwide.  

But the omnibus stalled Wednesday and appeared to be in danger of derailing completely when Schumer couldn’t strike a deal with Republicans on which amendments to vote on. 

He had to find a way to get around an amendment sponsored by Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) that would have cut funding for Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’s office unless the Biden administration reinstated the Trump-era Title 42 policy, which blocks migrants from entering the country on asylum claims.  

Lee’s amendment got a boost Wednesday when the Senate parliamentarian ruled it could be added to the omnibus with a simple-majority vote, instead of having to clear the 60-vote threshold that applies to many amendments.  

Democrats feared Lee’s amendment could pick up the support of a few centrists in their caucus, which would have allowed it to pass and endanger the chances of passing the omnibus through the House, where progressive Democrats oppose keeping Title 42 in place.  

Independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.) stepped in to break the partisan logjam Thursday morning by offering her own side-by-side amendment to boost funding for border security and extend Title 42 until the Biden administration puts in place “a proper plan” to handle the expected deluge of migrants once the health restriction is lifted.  

“Enough is enough. Stop using the border as a political tool. We are here to do our job. We must fund the government and we must solve our border crisis,” she said on the floor. 

It gave centrist Democrats enough political cover to agree to a vote on Lee’s amendment, knowing they had an alternative Title 42 proposal to support instead. 

Lee slammed Sinema’s amendment as “a ruse designed to provide political cover for people who recognize the crisis on the border and want to appear to be doing something about it.”  

It only got 10 votes but gave crucial cover to several Democrats facing competitive races in 2024: Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), who co-sponsored the proposal, Sen. Sherrod Brown (Ohio), Sen. Joe Manchin (W.Va.) and Sen. Jacky Rosen (Nev.). 

Sinema also voted for the measure, along with Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), who is working with her on immigration reform legislation, and Sens. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) and Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.). 

After that vote, Lee’s amendment failed on a straight party-line vote of 47-50. Three GOP senators missed the votes. 

Passage of the omnibus finishes Congress’s work on the 12 annual spending bills in one fell swoop after the Senate failed to pass a single regular appropriations bill before Thursday, well past the Sept. 30 end of the fiscal year. 

A large group of Senate Republicans ended up voting for the final package, but many of them expressed frustration that they had to vote on all the spending bills balled up in one package with only a couple of days to review the 4,155-page omnibus.  

“The process is a complete disaster,” said retiring Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), who voted against the legislation.  

House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) met with Senate Republicans Wednesday to ask them to work with House Republicans more closely next year to avoid another scramble to pass a massive omnibus spending bill before Christmas.  

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Cassidy Hutchinson transcript details efforts to downplay her Jan. 6 testimony

Newly released transcripts from the House Jan. 6 committee’s interviews with star witness Cassidy Hutchinson detail the efforts by what she referred to as “Trump world” to diminish the impact of her testimony and withhold information from investigators.  

The transcript details Hutchinson’s fraught journey in securing legal counsel after being subpoenaed by the panel in February. It details what pushed her to switch attorneys, a change that led her to be more forthcoming with the panel in her testimony. 

It also provides new information on efforts to contact her before her testimony that members of the panel publicly said they believed was witness intimidation.   

The two September transcripts came well after Hutchinson, an aide to both White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and former President Trump, offered explosive testimony about Trump’s efforts to reach the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 after speaking to a heavily armed crowd of supporters. 

Hutchinson described an early meeting with her first lawyer Stefan Passantino, who she said declined to tell her up front who was paying to secure him on her behalf.  

Hutchinson also said Passantino rebuffed her efforts to review her calendar and told the 26-year-old they would need to downplay her role at the White House – a line of arguments that would be echoed in subsequent GOP attacks on Hutchinson’s highly critical public testimony of Trump. 

“Look we want to get you in, get you out. We’re going to downplay your role. You were a secretary. You had an administrative role,” Hutchinson said Passantino told her, according to the transcript.  

“The less you remember, the better,” Hutchinson said Passantino told her. 

Passantino has reportedly taken a leave of absence from his firm and could not immediately be reached for comment.  

Hutchinson’s testimony also says Passantino encouraged her to not tell a second-hand story she had heard about Trump lunging at his security detail and grabbing for the steering wheel after being told he could not join his supporters at the Capitol.  

Passantino told her that was former Secret Service agent and White House deputy chief of staff Tony Ornato’s story to tell. Hutchinson had initially heard the story from Ornato, she told the Jan. 6 panel in one of the most stunning moments of her summer testimony. 

“No, no, no, no, no. We don’t want to go there. We don’t want to talk about that,” Hutchinson said Passantino told her, according to the transcript. 

At one point during her first round of depositions with the committee, Passantino encouraged her to say she didn’t recall entire events even if she was struggling to remember small details, Hutchinson states in the testimony released by the panel. 

“I don’t want you to perjure yourself, but ‘I don’t recall’ isn’t perjury. They don’t know what you can and can’t recall,” Hutchinson said Passantino told her. 

Hutchinson also describes the anxiety she felt in taking Passantino’s services pro bono, relaying how she explained to her mother why she was not relieved to be getting free legal advice through the Trump network. 

“I’m f**cked,” she told her mother. “I am completely indebted to these people….They will ruin my life, Mom, if I do anything they don’t want me to do.” 

She would go on to explain to the committee, “once you are looped in, especially financially with them, there’s no turning back,” according to the transcript. 

Hutchinson says a Meadows aide, Ben Williamson, called her before her testimony, telling Hutchinson that Meadows “knows you’re loyal and knows you’ll do the right thing tomorrow and that you’re going to protect him and the boss,” according to the testimony released by the panel. 

It is this call that members of the panel suggested publicly, without naming Williamson, could have been witness intimidation.  

“I think most Americans know that attempting to influence witnesses to testify untruthfully presents very serious concerns,” panel Vice Chair Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) said shortly after showing a portion of Hutchinson’s testimony about her call with Williamson. 

Williamson did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

DEVELOPING 

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House passes bill requiring presidential tax audits after revelation Trump skirted scrutiny

The House on Thursday passed a bill that would require annual audits of the president’s tax returns, codifying IRS policy after a congressional committee revealed that the agency did not audit former President Trump during two years he was in office.

The legislation, titled the Presidential Tax Filings and Audit Transparency Act, passed in an 222-201 vote.

IRS policy requires that sitting presidents are audited every year — which has been the case since 1977 — but the terms are outlined in the agency’s regulatory manual, not federal law. The bill at hand would codify those terms into law.

The House took up the bill after the House Ways and Means Committee voted on Tuesday to release the report of its investigation into how the IRS’s mandatory audit program was run under the Trump administration. The vote also greenlit the release of six years of Trump’s tax returns, but they have not yet been published because officials are making redactions.

The report revealed that the IRS did not audit Trump in 2017 and 2018, despite the agency’s mandatory audit program for occupants of the White House. The then-president filed tax returns in 2017 and 2018, but the agency first audited him in 2019. The agency opened the examination on April 3 of that year — the same day Rep. Richard Neal (D-Mass.), the chair of the committee, asked then-IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig for the president’s tax returns.

The legislation considered on Thursday specifically calls for audits of presidential tax returns and other entities controlled by the commander-in-chief to be carried out as quickly as possible after the information is filed. Additionally, the bill would mandate that the president’s tax returns are disclosed within 90 days of them being filed.

During debate on the House floor Thursday, Neal said his committee began probing the IRS’s mandatory presidential auditing four years ago to understand how the agency “was handling the stress of a president with complex finances.”

“The Committee expected to find that the mandatory examinations were conducted promptly, and that more staff had been dedicated to the program to meet the more rigorous demands. Instead, after years of stonewalling and litigation ending at the Supreme Court, the Committee found that, for all practical purposes, the mandatory audit program was dormant,” he said.

“It wasn’t just functioning poorly—it was not functioning at all,” he added.

The chairman said the “best available recourse” after the agency “failed to administer” its own policy “is for Congress to fill this void with legislation that eliminates the IRS’s discretion in the matter.”

“That’s what we are doing today,” he added.

Source: TEST FEED1

House GOP group vowing retribution on pro-omnibus Republicans grows

A group of House Republicans threatening to block priorities from GOP senators who vote for the $1.7 trillion omnibus funding bill has grown to 31.

The 31 current and incoming members signing an open letter led by Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) to Republican Senate colleagues on Wednesday marks an increase from a similar Monday letter that had 13 names.

The new copy also made a direct reference to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

“The released legislative text confirmed this omnibus is an assault on the American people. As such, we reiterate that if any omnibus passes in the remaining days of this Congress, we will oppose and whip opposition to any legislative priority of those senators who vote for its passage – including the Republican leader,” the letter said. 

“We will oppose any rule, any consent request, suspension voice vote, or roll call vote of any such Senate bill, and will otherwise do everything in our power to thwart even the smallest legislative and policy efforts of those senators.”

Additional Republicans signing on to the Wednesday letter include Reps. Diana Harshbarger (Tenn.), Barry Moore (Ala.), Lauren Boebert (Colo.) and Marjorie Taylor Greene (Ga.), and Reps.-elect Keith Self (Texas) and Eric Burlinson (Mo.). 

It also includes several departing members who will not have any power over Senate votes next year: Jody Hice (Ga.), Mayra Flores (Texas), Louie Gohmert (Texas) and Yvette Herrell (N.M.).

The second letter urging opposition to the omnibus comes after House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) endorsed the threat to thwart those bills on Tuesday, pledging that bills from GOP senators who vote for the omnibus would be “dead on arrival” if he is Speaker.

McCarthy is facing opposition to his candidacy for Speaker from many of those who signed the letter, though others support him.

Senators dismissed the threat on Tuesday.

“The reality is this kind of chest thumping and immaturity doesn’t instill confidence in their ability to lead. Now, maybe it helps Kevin get elected Speaker,” said Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.).

McCarthy attended a Senate GOP lunch on Wednesday to lobby against the omnibus, but sources told The Hill at the time that his rhetoric was largely toned down from his public statements.

Source: TEST FEED1