heard he doesn t think they re doing anything wrong. the stunning details of an out of president, who wanted to join the mob. the president said something to the effect of, i am that i think president, take me up to the capitol now. the president reached up towards the front of the vehicle to grab at the steering wheel. mr. engel grabbed his arm, and said, sir, you need to take your hand off the steering wheel. we are going back to the west wing. we re not going to the capitol. the president of the united states is chief of staff, his closest advisers, preparing for the violence, and then, trying to save themselves. i recall hearing the word, oath keepers. and hearing the word, proud boys, closer to the plan of the january 6th rally, with mr. giuliani s. white house chief of staff mark meadows, did he ever indicate that he was interested in receiving a presidential pardon related to january 6th? yes, ma am. tonight, one of the members of the january 6th investig
i think, i didn t care that they have weapons. they re not here to hurt me. i remember him saying to the effect of, mark needs to do something more, literally calling the vice president and mark responded something to the effect of, you heard, he doesn t think they re doing anything wrong. the stunning details of an out of touch president, who wanted to join the mob. the president said something to the effect of, i am the effing think president, take me up to the capitol now. the president reached up towards the front of the vehicle to grab at the steering wheel. mr. engel grabbed his arm, and said, sir, you need to take your hand off the steering wheel. we are going back to the west wing. we re not going to the capitol. the president of the united states, his chief of staff, his closest advisers, preparing for the violence, and then, trying to save themselves. i recall hearing the word, oath keepers. and hearing the word, proud boys, closer to the plan of the janua
today s hearings, was at the close. it came after the conclusion of the witness testimony, but dovetailed, neatly, with an expectation from the chairman. it came from republican vice chair of the investigation, liz cheney. thompson was there telling witnesses, don t hide the truth, we will find it out, but liz cheney basically said, through a megaphone, aimed at the justice department, hey, look over here. we have evidence on the trump side, they have been tampering with witnesses in this investigation, intimidating witnesses in this investigation, and by the way, it s a crime. our committee has seen many witnesses, including many republicans, testify fully, and forthrightly, this has not been true of every witness. we have received evidence of one particular practice, that raises significant concern. our committee, commonly, asks witnesses connected to mr. trump s administration, or campaign, whether they have
the hearing today. so, who else was he talking to that was more important than learning in the first instance, in realtime, while he s getting in the car that s about to move, that the capital is being violently overrun? who was more important to continue talking to in that moment? i think that s what they re connecting. so, who are these operational people? the fact that some people who should have known better, or still actually concerned by how back it was, does weed credibly. but you cannot throw yourself a surprise party. yes. [laughs] if you know what you re doing, and mark meadows, donald trump, and a few others, according to the evidence, did not seem surprised because this was either the direct plan, or the thing that they saw as a distinct eventuality of possibility. the other point i want to share with you, rachel, is, there have been parts of this whole investigation that have been very concerning, that go to government malfeasance and street level violence. today is
seen, a very public notice of, we have evidence of further witness tampering. three, the doj can act, on its own. congress can, also, refer. this is the type of crime, with a lot of discussion about whether you refer the specific situation, for what i would call, substantive crimes. coups, election fraud, elector fraud, that kind of thing. this is what they call a process crime. but, the process this committee can confirm by letter, or statement, these kinds of things. mueller went far, it was very strict on this, and did what was called process crimes. the mueller report, also, referring to the fact that as far as they re concerned, they had evidence of crimes that they thought, also, interfered with the probe. it is an open question how this is dealt with, but i do think the justice department has to put politics, and optics aside, and figure out, if there is tampering going on, and other process crime, beyond the two people you indicted, do you act on that? you need to act quickly