Newly-released transcripts of secret testimony at the January 6 Committee show that a witness testified then-President Donald Trump had not wrestled with a Secret Service agent, and had indeed requested troops to protect the Capitol.
The transcript of a closed-door interview with Deputy Chief of Staff Anthony Ornato and then-Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) on January 28, 2022, was hidden by the committee, as it played up sensational claims that the testimony refuted.
In particular, Cheney boosted the accusations by former Trump aide Cassidy Hutchinson, who claimed publicly — and to great media fanfare — that Trump had tried to commandeer his presidential vehicle to drive to the Capitol riot.
As Breitbart News and others noted at the time of Hutchinson’s dramatic testimony in June 2022, several people — including Ornato — were prepared to testify publicly to refute her claims (which were debunked in other ways as well).
But Cheney and the other members of the committee did not take up Ornato’s offer, repeating the tactic that member Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) had used during the first impeachment inquiry of leaving inconvenient witnesses behind.
Moreover, Cheney and the committee claimed in their final report that there was no evidence Trump had requested 10,000 National Guard troops to protect the Capitol. In fact, Ornato had testified hearing Trump doing exactly that.
Mollie Hemingway of the Federalist reported on the existence of the Ornato transcript, which was unearthed by the House Administration’s Subcommittee on Oversight, led by Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-GA). Hemingway reported:
Former Rep. Liz Cheney’s January 6 Committee suppressed evidence that President Donald Trump pushed for 10,000 National Guard troops to protect the nation’s capital, a previously hidden transcript obtained by The Federalist shows.
Cheney and her committee falsely claimed they had “no evidence” to support Trump officials’ claims the White House had communicated its desire for 10,000 National Guard troops. In fact, an early transcribed interview conducted by the committee included precisely that evidence from a key source. The interview, which Cheney attended and personally participated in, was suppressed from public release until now.
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Asked if he ever heard anything about Trump deciding to go to the Capitol that day, Ornato said he hadn’t. Ornato said Trump had driven by a previous rally, had flown over another, and that handlers had previously decided against him joining the day’s events.
Loudermilk, who was also targeted unfairly by the January 6 Committee with false accusations that he had given a tour to Capitol rioters before the event, found earlier that the committee had destroyed much of the evidence it collected.
It did so despite being told by then-incoming Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (D-CA) in late 2022 to preserve all of the evidence it had collected.
Ironically, Trump still faces federal charges of mishandling government documents.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
