Summary
- The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released new guidance urging vaccinated Americans to wear masks indoors if they live in areas with high levels of Covid spread. “In areas with substantial and high transmission, CDC recommends fully vaccinated people wear masks in public, indoor settings to help prevent the spread of the delta variant and protect others,” CDC director Rochelle Walesnky said this afternoon. The new guidance comes amid a surge in coronavirus cases among unvaccinated Americans, due to the spread of the delta variant.
- Biden described the new mask mandate as “another step on our journey to defeating this virus”. “I hope all Americans who live in the areas covered by the CDC guidance will follow it,” the president said in a statement. “I certainly will when I travel to these areas.” Biden noted that he will lay out his administration’s new plans to increase the US vaccination rate on Thursday.
- Biden said he is considering instituting a vaccine mandate for federal employees, a move that would impact roughly 2 million Americans. Some local and state leaders, including New York mayor Bill de Blasio and California governor Gavin Newsom, have already announced similar mandates for their government employees.
- The January 6 select committee held its first hearing on Capitol Hill. The House panel’s members, seven Democrats and two Republicans, heard from four law enforcement officers who defended the Capitol on January 6, as a pro-Trump mob stormed the building.
- The four officers gave emotional testimony about the physical and emotional injuries they sustained because of the insurrection. “I was grabbed, beaten, tased, all while being called a traitor to my country. I was at risk of being stripped of and killed with my own firearm, as I heard chants of ‘Kill him with his own gun,’” Metropolitan Police Department officer Michael Fanone said. US Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn, who is Black, told committee members that insurrectionists repeatedly called him the “n” word.
Updated
California’s governor Gavin Newsom, who is facing a recall election in September, will have to motivate his base to show up to the poll sand save his seat, according to a new poll released today.
A poll from the Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies found that while 50% of likely voters said they’d vote to keep Newsom in office, 47% would seek to replace him. The 3 point gap falls within the poll’s margin of error.
Among registered voters, 51% said they’d vote to keep the Democratic governor and 36% would seek to replace him.
“The main factor contributing to these very different distributions is that, if current levels of interest and voting intentions persist, turnout is likely to be far higher among Republicans than Democrats and No Party Preference voters,” said poll director Mark DiCamillo. “And, since nearly all Republicans favor Newsom’s ouster, a larger proportion of likely voters are voting yes.”
Here’s some background info on the recall effort, which I wrote up a few months back:
Barack Obama has joined the National Basketball Association (NBA) Africa as a strategic adviser.
The former president will “support greater gender equality and economic inclusion” as part of the league’s efforts to boost access to basketball.
“In addition to his well-documented love for basketball, President Obama has a firm belief in Africa’s potential and the enormous growth opportunities that exist through sports,” said NBA commissioner Adam Silver.
President Obama will help advance the league’s social responsibility efforts across the continent, including programs & partnerships that support greater gender equality and economic inclusion. https://t.co/TtTM0Ze7Z5
— NBA (@NBA) July 27, 2021
Republicans poised to rig the next election by gerrymandering electoral maps
Ten years ago, Republicans pulled off what would later be described as “the most audacious political heist of modern times”.
It wasn’t particularly complicated. Every 10 years, the US constitution requires states to redraw the maps for both congressional and state legislative seats. The constitution entrusts state lawmakers with the power to draw those districts. Looking at the political map in 2010, Republicans realized that by winning just a few state legislative seats in places like Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and North Carolina, they could draw maps that would be in place for the next decade, distorting them to guarantee Republican control for years to come.
Republicans executed the plan, called Project Redmap, nearly perfectly and took control of 20 legislative bodies, including ones in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Then, Republicans set to work drawing maps that cemented their control on power for the next decade. Working behind closed doors, they were brazen in their efforts.
In Wisconsin, lawmakers signed secrecy agreements and then drew maps that were so rigged that Republicans could nearly hold on to a supermajority of seats with a minority of the vote. In Michigan, a Republican operative bragged about cramming “Dem garbage” into certain districts as they drew a congressional map that advantaged Republicans 9-5. In Ohio, GOP operatives worked secretly from a hotel room called “the bunker”, as they tweaked a congressional map that gave Republicans a 12-4 advantage. In North Carolina, a state lawmaker publicly said he was proposing a map that would elect 10 Republicans to Congress because he did not think it was possible to draw one that would elect 11.
This manipulation, called gerrymandering, “debased and dishonored our democracy”, Justice Elena Kagan would write years later. It allowed Republicans to carefully pick their voters, insulating them from the accountability that lies at the foundation of America’s democratic system. Now, the once-a-decade process is set to begin again in just a few weeks and Republicans are once again poised to dominate it. And this time around things could be even worse than they were a decade ago.
The redistricting cycle arrives at a moment when American democracy is already in peril. Republican lawmakers in states across the country, some of whom hold office because of gerrymandering, have enacted sweeping measures making it harder to vote. Republicans have blocked federal legislation that would outlaw partisan gerrymandering and strip state lawmakers of their authority to draw districts.
Read more:
The former White House press secretary Sarah Sanders has urged people in Arkansas to “pray about it” before considering whether to get the “Trump vaccine” against Covid-19.
Sanders is running for Arkansas governor. In an opinion piece for the Arkansas Democrat Chronicle headlined “The reasoning behind getting vaccinated”, she mostly used her platform to criticise Democrats and Anthony Fauci, chief medical adviser to Joe Biden. But Sanders did offer tentative encouragement to get the vaccine.
“To anyone still considering the merits of vaccination,” she wrote, “I leave you with this encouragement: Pray about it, discuss it with your family and your doctor.
“Filter out the noise and fear-mongering and condescension, and make the best, most informed decision you can that helps your family, community, and our great state be its very best.”
Sanders, well positioned to become Arkansas’s first female governor, said that “like many” Americans, she “had a lot of misinformation thrown at me by politicians and the media during the pandemic”.
Trump, Sanders’ former boss, was chief among the misinformants, variously suggesting people could be injected with “disinfectant” or blasted with “ultraviolet or just very powerful light”.
Skipping past that, Sanders said: “Dr Fauci and the ‘because science says so’ crowd of arrogant, condescending politicians and bureaucrats were wrong about more than their mandates and shutdowns that have inflicted incalculable harm on our people and economy.”
Atlanta spa shootings suspect pleads guilty to four counts of murder
The man charged with killing eight people, six of whom were Asian women, in a series of shootings at Atlanta-area spas has pleaded guilty to four counts of murder.
The AP reports:
Robert Aaron Long faces still faces the death penalty if convicted in four more shooting deaths in Atlanta, and faces charges of domestic terrorism with a hate crime enhancement in addition to murder. Long is white. Six of the victims were women of Asian descent.
Long walked through the massage business in Woodstock ‘shooting anyone and everyone he saw’, district attorney Shannon Wallace said on Tuesday.
A judge was hearing a prosecutor describe details of his crimes. The prosecutor said the 22-year-old defendant had signed a plea deal admitting to all of the charges in Cherokee county, where he was accused of malice murder, felony murder, attempt to commit murder and aggravated assault.
The eight victims of the shooting were Xiaojie “Emily” Tan, 49; Daoyou Feng, 44; Delaina Yaun, 33; Paul Michels, 54; Suncha Kim, 69; Soon Chung Park, 74; Hyun Jung Grant, 51; and Yong Ae Yue, 63.
National Nurses United (NNU) celebrated the CDC’s guidance today that vaccinated Americans should wear masks indoors in areas with high Delta spread, but urged officials to make the rules broader and easier to follow.
“As registered nurses, we always course correct when a care plan for our patient must be adjusted in order to promote optimal healing. We applaud the CDC for adjusting its care plan for this country by recommending a partial return to indoor masking for vaccinated people,” said NNU executive director Bonnie Castillo, said in a statement.
“But,” Castillo said, “because we all must be responsible for one another, the CDC should take the next logical step and urge indoor masking everywhere in the country.”
“Rather than making people figure out if they are in a substantial or high transmission area, or leaving public health up to the honor system, registered nurses recommend reinstating universal masking in all locations, regardless of vaccination status,” said NNU president Deborah Burger, added.
Updated
Biden could announce vaccination requirement for federal employees on Thursday – report
Joe Biden will announce a requirement that federal employees and contractors either get vaccinated against Covid-19 or get regular tests, CNN reports, based on an anonymous source.
The announcement will come in remarks where Biden is also expected to lay out a series of new steps, including incentives, in an attempt to spur new vaccinations as the Delta variant spreads rapidly throughout the country. It will also follow the decision by the Department of Veterans Affairs to require its frontline health care workers to be vaccinated over the course of the next two months.
While the specifics are still being finalized, the source said, federal workers would be required to attest to their vaccination status or submit to regular testing. The source said the proposal will be roughly similar to what is being implemented in New York City. Additional requirements for the unvaccinated could be added as agencies push to vaccinate their employees.
Asked by a journalist earlier today whether he was considering a vaccine mandate, Biden said: “That’s under consideration right now, but if you’re not vaccinated, you’re not really as smart as I thought you were.”
Updated
Trump officials can testify to Congress about his role in Capitol attack, DoJ says
Hugo Lowell in Washington reports:
Former Trump administration officials can testify to Congress about Donald Trump’s role in the deadly January attack on the Capitol and his efforts to subvert the results of the 2020 election, the justice department (DoJ) has said in a letter obtained by the Guardian.
The move by the justice department declined to assert executive privilege for Trump’s acting attorney general, Jeffrey Rosen, clearing the path for other top former Trump administration officials to also testify to congressional committees investigating the Capitol attack without fearing repercussions.
The justice department authorised witnesses to appear specifically before the two committees. But a DoJ official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, said they expected that approval to extend to the 6 January select committee that began proceedings on Tuesday.
Bennie Thompson, the chairman of the House select committee, told the Guardian in a recent interview that he would investigate both Trump and anyone who communicated with the former president on 6 January, raising the prospect of depositions with an array of Trump officials.
Rosen and Trump administration witnesses can give “unrestricted testimony” to the Senate judiciary and House oversight committees, which are scrutinising the attempt by the Trump White House to stop Congress certifying Joe Biden’s 2020 election win, the letter said.
The justice department’s decision marks a sharp departure from the Trump era, when the department repeatedly intervened on behalf of top White House officials to assert executive privilege and shield them from congressional investigations into the former president.
Read more:
Today so far
That’s it from me today. My west coast colleague, Maanvi Singh, will take over the blog for the next few hours.
Here’s where the day stands so far:
- The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released new guidance urging vaccinated Americans to wear masks indoors if they live in areas with high levels of Covid spread. “In areas with substantial and high transmission, CDC recommends fully vaccinated people wear masks in public, indoor settings to help prevent the spread of the delta variant and protect others,” CDC director Rochelle Walesnky said this afternoon. The new guidance comes amid a surge in coronavirus cases among unvaccinated Americans, due to the spread of the delta variant.
- Biden described the new mask mandate as “another step on our journey to defeating this virus”. “I hope all Americans who live in the areas covered by the CDC guidance will follow it,” the president said in a statement. “I certainly will when I travel to these areas.” Biden noted that he will lay out his administration’s new plans to increase the US vaccination rate on Thursday.
- Biden said he is considering instituting a vaccine mandate for federal employees, a move that would impact roughly 2 million Americans. Some local and state leaders, including New York mayor Bill de Blasio and California governor Gavin Newsom, have already announced similar mandates for their government employees.
- The January 6 select committee held its first hearing on Capitol Hill. The House panel’s members, seven Democrats and two Republicans, heard from four law enforcement officers who defended the Capitol on January 6, as a pro-Trump mob stormed the building.
- The four officers gave emotional testimony about the physical and emotional injuries they sustained because of the insurrection. “I was grabbed, beaten, tased, all while being called a traitor to my country. I was at risk of being stripped of and killed with my own firearm, as I heard chants of ‘Kill him with his own gun,’” Metropolitan Police Department officer Michael Fanone said. US Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn, who is Black, told committee members that insurrectionists repeatedly called him the “n” word.
Maanvi will have more coming up, so stay tuned.
The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr Rochelle Walensky, encouraged vaccinated Americans to wear masks indoors if they live in “areas with substantial and high transmission” of coronavirus.
So what qualifies as substantial and high transmission? This map, shared by a Washington Post reporter, shows the many parts of the US that will be affected by the new guidance:
CDC recommends vax’d folks wear masks indoors in places with “substantial” and “high” transmission.
— Dan Diamond (@ddiamond) July 27, 2021
“Substantial”: 50-100 cases per 100,000 people over seven days
“High”: More than 100 cases
If your county is orange or red on this map, it would qualify. https://t.co/nYNQ0Zacms pic.twitter.com/Co1ipTUbhJ
In his speech this afternoon to members of the intelligence community, Joe Biden underscored the threat that cyber attacks pose to the US and its allies.
Biden tells U.S. intelligence community it's likely that if the U.S. ends up "in a war, a real shooting war, with a major power — it's going to be as a consequence of a cyber breach of great consequence. And it's increasing exponentially, the capabilities" https://t.co/FaIGff2lZY pic.twitter.com/rQtHAikxNd
— CBS News (@CBSNews) July 27, 2021
“We’ve seen how cyber threats, including ransomware attacks, increasingly are able to cause damage and destruction in the real world,” Biden said.
He added, “I can’t guarantee this, and you’re as informed as I am, but I think it’s more likely ... if we end up in a war, a real shooting war, with a major power — it’s going to be as a consequence of a cyber breach of great consequence. And it’s increasing exponentially, the capabilities.”
Biden’s comments come on the heels of several high-profile ransomware attacks on major companies, which were carried out by hackers believed to be based in Russia.
New CDC mask guidance is 'another step on our journey to defeating this virus,' Biden says
Joe Biden has released a statement in support of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s new recommendation for vaccinated Americans to wear masks indoors if they live in regions with high levels of coronavirus spread.
The president described the new guidance as “another step on our journey to defeating this virus”.
“I hope all Americans who live in the areas covered by the CDC guidance will follow it,” Biden said. “I certainly will when I travel to these areas.”
The president once again encouraged all eligible Americans to get vaccinated as quickly as possible, saying that vaccines are “the most important protection we have against the Delta variant”.
Biden added that he will “lay out the next steps in our effort to get more Americans vaccinated” on Thursday.
“By following the science, and by doing our part by getting vaccinated, America can beat COVID,” the president said.
Updated
Mandated vaccines for federal employees is 'under consideration,' Biden says
Joe Biden has just wrapped up a speech to members of the intelligence community at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence in Virginia.
As he was walking away from the podium, the president took a couple shouted questions from reporters.
One journalist asked Biden whether he plans to mandate coronavirus vaccinations for federal employees.
“That’s under consideration right now, but if you’re not vaccinated, you’re not really as smart as I thought you were,” Biden said.
Some local and state leaders, including New York mayor Bill de Blasio and California governor Gavin Newsom, have already announced such mandates for their government employees.
Dr Rochelle Walensky wrapped up her press call by acknowledging that the new mask recommendation for vaccinated Americans is “not a welcome piece of news”.
The CDC director said that the new guidance “weighs heavily” on her. “This is not a decision that was taken lightly,” she said.
Walensky expressed empathy with Americans who are exhausted after enduring more than a year of pandemic-related restrictions, but she emphasized the importance of protecting the health of our communities.
The CDC director warned that, if the delta variant continues to spread at a high rate, the world may be “just a few mutations away” from a variant that renders the vaccines useless.
Updated
Dr Rochelle Walensky, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, shared some data that the agency has been collecting on the recent spread of coronavirus.
According to Walensky, the viral load in vaccinated Americans who have contracted the virus in recent weeks is similar to the viral load in unvaccinated Americans who have tested positive for the virus.
However -- and it is extremely important to keep this in mind -- all of the available data currently indicates that those who are vaccinated are much less likely to be hospitalized or die from coronavirus.
The CDC director also emphasized that almost all of the transmission the US is currently seeing is occurring among unvaccinated people.
Walensky noted the CDC has been tracking tens of thousands of breakthrough cases among vaccinated individuals in recent weeks, and the agency plans to soon release more of the data its experts have collected.
Vaccinated Americans in regions with high Covid spread should wear masks indoors, CDC says
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is recommending that fully vaccinated Americans wear masks indoors if they live in areas reporting high numbers of new coronavirus cases.
“In areas with substantial and high transmission, CDC recommends fully vaccinated people wear masks in public, indoor settings to help prevent the spread of the delta variant and protect others,” CDC director Rochelle Walesnky said in a press call moments ago.
Walensky added, “This includes schools. CDC recommends that everyone in K-12 schools wear a mask indoors, including teachers, staff, students and visitors, regardless of vaccination status. Children should return to full-time, in-person learning in the fall with proper prevention strategies in place.”
The new recommendation comes as the US is experiencing a surge in coronavirus cases among unvaccinated Americans, as the highly transmissible delta variant spreads across the country.
Maya Yang reports for the Guardian:
The Biden administration announced on Tuesday that it will allocate $121 million in grants to more than 100 community-based organizations to boost vaccinations in underserved communities.
The funding comes from the American Rescue Plan and will be distributed to groups such as local first responders and churches to help provide rural communities with more information regarding COVID-19 vaccines. The grants will also support Latino, African-American and tribal entities associated with church communities as part of the national campaign to address vaccine hesitancy.
“Today investments are part of the Biden-Harris administration’s efforts to strengthen equity and support organizations that focus on underserved communities as they work to increase vaccinations and keep people safe and healthy,” said Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra.
Public and nonprofit private organizations were allowed to apply for the funds, including local and regional community-based organizations that have experience in public health programs.
Last month, the Biden administration awarded $125 million in workforce grants for community-based efforts to bolster vaccinations in underserved communities.
As the highly-transmissible delta variant spreads across the country, the majority of new hospitalizations and deaths come from unvaccinated individuals.
Protesters disrupt Republicans' press conference as officers testify
Protesters disrupted a press conference held by a group of House Republicans who have falsely described Capitol insurrectionists as “political prisoners”.
As four law enforcement officers testified to a House select committee about the violence they encountered on January 6, several Republican lawmakers held an event outside the justice department to criticize the treatment of the insurrectionists.
The lawmakers were met with a loud group of protesters, who blew whistles and heckled the Republicans as they tried to deliver their remarks.
WATCH: Protesters interrupt news conference with Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene, Matt Gaetz and others on January 6th. Press conference ends.
— CSPAN (@cspan) July 27, 2021
Full video here: https://t.co/7tlY1ReDvO pic.twitter.com/qNU1EsPFGN
One protester’s sign read, “Traitors + Rapists: Sit down.” That appears to be a reference to the sex trafficking allegations against Republican congressman Matt Gaetz, who has denied claims that he engaged in a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old girl.
Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has been stripped of her House committee assignments for spewing extremist views, told the protesters, “We are not deterred.”
She added, “We will not back down. We will not stop asking questions. We are looking for the truth.”
But moments later, Greene and her colleagues wrapped up the press conference and abruptly left the event as protesters continued to yell at them.
As the group held their press conference, four law enforcement officers told House members about the physical, mental and emotional injuries they sustained as a result of the insurrection.
“I was grabbed, beaten, tased, all while being called a traitor to my country. I was at risk of being stripped of and killed with my own firearm, as I heard chants of ‘Kill him with his own gun,’” Metropolitan Police Department officer Michael Fanone said in his opening statement this morning. “I can still hear those words in my head today.”
This is Joanie Greve in Washington, taking over the blog again after a great assist from Martin Pengelly.
The new chief of the US Capitol Police, Tom Manger, has released a statement praising the USCP and MPD officers who testified before the January 6 select committee today.
— U.S. Capitol Police (@CapitolPolice) July 27, 2021
“I am proud of the officers who had the courage to share their stories in front of the House Select Committee and our entire country to describe the horrors and heroism on January 6,” Manger said in his statement.
“I am equally proud of everyone in this Department and our partner agencies who fought like hell to preserve our democracy.”
Manger was sworn in just last week, after the USCP had gone more than six months without a permanent chief. The former USCP chief, Steven Sund, announced his resignation a day after the Capitol insurrection.
Tony Blinken, the secretary of state, has released a statement about the discovery of a swastika carved into an elevator near the office of the special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism. (See previous block.)
The “hateful graffiti has been removed,” Blinken said, “and this incident will be investigated.
He added:
As this painfully reminds us, antisemitism isn’t a relic of the past, it’s still a force in the world, including close to home. And it’s abhorrent. It has no place in the United States, at the state department or anywhere else, and we must be relentless in standing up and rejecting it.
We also know from our own history and from the histories of other nations that antisemitism often goes hand-in-hand with racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia and other hatreds. None of those ideologies should have a home in our workplace or our nation.
To our Jewish colleagues, please know how grateful we are for your service and how proud we are to be your colleagues. And that goes for our entire diverse and dedicated team in Washington and around the world.
As headlines go, particularly in the immediate aftermath of an emotional hearing about hatred and political violence within the walls of Congress itself, this one from Axios is particularly alarming: “Swastika found etched into State Department elevator”.
The website says the vandalism, near the office of the special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism, was discovered on Monday. Axios has a picture to prove it.
An agency-wide notice, the site reports, said “hate has no place here at the state department” and urged employees “to commit in every way we can to oppose all forms of hatred”.
Secretary of state Tony Blinken is investigating.
Here’s more from Sidney Blumenthal, who has some thoughts about – and some questions for – Jim Jordan, the Ohio Republican who Nancy Pelosi would not allow a seat on the 6 January committee…
Jim Jordan is a wiry, hyperactive bundle of nerves who tosses off his suit jacket, coiled to leap into the ring and twist the arms of his opponents. The former college wrestling champion in the 134lb class represents the locker-room jock culture in the House of Representatives, snapping his towel in committee hearings to show off his primacy as an alpha big man on campus. Jordan’s political moves are drawn from his wrestling repertoire: the leg shot, the half-nelson and the slam…
…
Did Jordan speak with Trump on 6 January during the insurrection? Did he speak with him about it after about the event? Will Jordan cooperate with the select committee as a witness or will he stonewall it as he did the investigation into the sexual abuse at OSU? Will he honor a subpoena or force the sergeant-at-arms to wrestle with him to enforce it?
Thompson: No shrinking violets on committee
Chairman Thompson is speaking to reporters. He says the committee’s work is necessary, thanking its members as they stand with him. Liz Cheney speaks.
“This was an important opportunity to get some facts on the table and to hear from heroes who defended us on the day,” she said, commending the non-partisan nature of the committee.
Questions.
Cheney is asked about her demand to know about White House events on 6 January. Why is that important? Because the investigation will get to the bottom of everything that went on, she said. Thompson says, “We will follow the facts. As I look at the committee I don’t see any shrinking violets. I see one member who has a daughter named Violet but that’s about it.”
Some members, he says, will not enjoy the entire August recess – conceivably the committee could be back during that summer congressional break.
Kinzinger is asked if he fears losing committee assignments for participating in this investigation as a Republican, like Cheney.
“If people want to get petty, that’s fine,” he says. This is about defending democracy, not about his committee assignments.
Cheney is asked about how Republicans have protested the committee hearing today, including four protesting about the treatment of those arrested over 6 January.
Cheney says she can’t explain her party’s defence of the rioters, which she calls a disgrace, and again commends the committee for its non-partisan work.
Members of the committee start to peel off as Thompson answers one more question about the recess, which is that the timetable for the committee isn’t yet decided. As he walks away too, a reporter asks about the prospects of former Trump officials being sent subpoenas by the committee. Answer comes there none.
Hearing closes with appeals for political accountability
Chairman Thompson asks the three officers who did not earlier say what they want the committee to do, to say so.
Fanone says other committees have investigated various questions about the day, about security failures and more.
He says he does not believe it was a coincidence that a political rally preceded the riot, on the day Congress met to certify Joe Biden’s election victory.
He wants an investigation of “those actions and activities which may have resulted in the events of 6 January and whether there was collaboration between” politicians, their staff and the rioters.
“I think Fanone hit the nail on the head there,” says Hodges.
“I need you guys to investigate whether anyone in power had a role in this,” he says, because police can’t do it.
Dunn says no one is trying to make 6 January political, as some Republicans claim – it was and it is political.
So all three officers want this committee to investigate the politics of 6 January. So does Gonell, who makes his own appeal after asking Thompson’s permission.
Thompson sums up with a tribute to the four officers before him. “We on this committee have a duty … to get to the bottom of what happened that day,” he says. “We will not fail.”
Here’s Sidney Blumenthal on the very same question, and one Ohio Republican congressman in particular.
It’s a long read but Sidney is someone with both experience of congressional hearings with very high stakes and a historian with an inexhaustible appetite for research and a delight in forensic examination of evidence:
Updated
Elaine Luria of Virginia, a Democrat, is up. She asks Sgt Gonell about his oath as a police officer, and goes back to his experiences in Iraq and how they compare to his experiences at the Capitol on 6 January. He describes his dismay at seeing military insignia worn by some of the rioters.
Luria introduces “one more video” but tells viewers to listen to what is being said. The rioters in the footage shout variations on calling the officers “traitors”; a crowd chants “fuck the blue”; “You can’t even call yourself an American”; a woman shouts “Fuck you, you broke your oath today, 1776”.
Asked how he feels, Fanone takes a deep breath, settles himself and ponders the question a long time.
He says the politics of the crowd did not resonate with him at the time, but what did was that thousands of Americans were attacking police officers doing their jobs, and members of Congress doing their jobs.
In retrospect, he says, “it’s disgraceful that members of our government were responsible for inciting that behaviour and continue to propagate those statements. Things like this was 1776 and that police officers who fought and sometimes gave their lives were redcoats and traitors”.
Eg: On 6 January, Lauren Boebert, a Colorado Republican, tweeted: “Today is 1776.”
Such people are “representatives of the worst that America has to offer”, he says.
Luria quotes Hemingway, that such tests of America happen “gradually, then suddenly”, delivers a statement and yields. The quote is from The Sun Also Rises, as it happens.
Updated
Jamie Raskin of Maryland is next. A law professor, his descriptions of his experiences during the attack and management of the impeachment of Donald Trump that followed brought him to particular national attention:
“Those who attacked you and beat you are fascist traitors to our country,” Raskin says, adding that they will go down in history that way.
Raskin addresses Officer Dunn, who happens to be one of his constituents, and asks him about other political marches which did not deteriorate into violence as the pro-Trump march on the Capitol did.
“The people that were there even to this day think that they were right,” he says, “and that makes for a particularly scary recipe for this country.”
Raskin tells Fanone he has “given our committee our marching orders today, which is to hold the line”, and promises to do so.
He asks Fanone about the questions of weapons, claims that the rioters were unarmed. How does he feel about that?
Fanone says the rioters wielded weapons, and that firearms were recovered in Washington DC before and after the riot from participants or people who meant to participate in the protest.
Raskin asks about theories he was “mistaken for antifa” and thus beaten, as an anti-fascist counter-protester.
“I was in full uniform,” he says.
Fanone also discusses why he has campaigned to have 6 January properly investigated. It’s important that he does so, he says, whether he is a serving police officer or not.
Raskin turns to Hodges and asks about Republican claims the rioters were “not terrorists but tourists”. Hodges puffs out his cheeks: “Well, if that’s what American tourists are like I can see why foreign countries don’t like American tourists.”
There is laughter in the room – weak and nervous but laughter nonetheless.
He then reads the legal definition of terrorism.
“I came prepared,” he says.
Gonell makes a lengthy appeal for Americans to take this committee investigation seriously, decrying attitudes among Republicans in Congress.
Updated
Now we have Stephanie Murphy, a Florida Democrat, and more video, this time from Officer Hodges’ body camera.
There are clouds of smoke, police in riot gear, shouting, pushing. Hodges curls his lip as he looks up at the screen. One burly police officer is seen dousing his eyes with water, walking back through the police line. Now we have Officer Hodges stuck in a door, screaming. It is tough to watch.
“It’s important for the American people to see that,” Murphy says. As I mentioned before, this hearing is made for TV. How rightwing TV – Fox News, Newsmax and One America News – presents it remains to be seen (and relentlessly parsed, for sure).
Murphy describes her experience on 6 January, hiding in an office “at the centre of the storm”. She is also emotional too, paying tribute to law enforcement.
She asks Hodges to “walk us through” the video displayed. He does.
“I followed the noise to the tunnel,” he says. “They outnumbered us 50-something to one … we just had to hold on … until someone came to help.”
He said bracing against the doorframe “backfired” when police lost ground and he became stuck. The man in front of him beat him in the head, he said, ripped off his gas mask and split his lip open.
“I recognised that if I stayed there I was going to pass out from lack of oxygen and be dragged out into the crowd and end up like Fanone.”
Rescued by his fellow officers, he says, he recovered and then returned to the fight.
Murphy asks why.
“Democracy,” he says.
Now it’s the turn of Pete Aguilar, a Democrat from California. He focuses on Officer Hodges and Sgt Gonell, asking Hodges about discoveries of guns and explosives, about the gear rioters were wearing, and about how he and his fellow officers felt as they were fighting.
“I was wondering how many bombs are there,” Hodges says. “What’s the trigger? Is it a cellphone?”
Asking himself if police opening fire might have prompted rioters to fire back, he says: “That’s the reason why I didn’t shoot anyone and why others didn’t.”
The crowd was 9,000 strong, he says, and police did not know how many guns might be present. They did not want to start a firefight because it would have been “a fight we could not afford to lose”.
One rioter was shot dead: Ashli Babbitt, whom some on the right would now make a martyr, and from whose name some would seek to profit:
Aguilar introduces more video, then asks Sgt Gonell for more testimony about how he was attacked, and what with.
“Any items they could get their hands on,” he says.
A picture of Gonell’s bruised and sutured foot is shown – it was hit when someone threw a speaker. Gonell is asked to detail the injury and the treatment and therapy he has had since, which he does.
He is next asked about his own experience as an immigrant from the Dominican Republic. He says he was abused for the colour of his skin and told he wasn’t American.
“It takes time to process that,” he says.
Hodges is asked why he has called the attack a white nationalist insurrection. The crowd was overwhelmingly white and male, he says, and was hostile to officers who were not white.
“They tried to recruit me,” he says. “One of them came up to me and said, ‘Are you my brother?’”
“People who follow Donald Trump are more likely to subscribe to that kind of belief system,” he concludes.
Schiff introduces some more video.
From behind a riot shield, in bodycam footage, a protester is heard to shout “You’re going to die tonight.” Familiar chaos follows.
Schiff goes back to Gonell’s earlier testimony about thinking he was going to die, and asks him to relive it. He does.
“People need to understand the magnitude of what happened that day,” he says, saying the protesters were attempting a coup and adding that the “people who we protected that day” – meaning most of the Republican party in Congress – are now attacking their protectors.
Gonell details how he went home on 6 January, hugged his family and said he needed to get back to the scene. Those who defend the rioters are putting party before country, he says, referring to House Republicans – Louie Gohmert, Paul Gosar, Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene – who staged a press conference earlier asking that some arrested over the insurrection be released from custody.
“It’s pathetic and they shouldn’t be elected representatives anymore,” he says.
Schiff turns to Officer Dunn, who says “us Black officers believe we fought a different battle also”.
“I guess it is America,” he says. “It shouldn’t be but I guess it’s the way things are.”
He also says he is encouraged by the presence of Republicans – Cheney and Kinzinger – on the committee despite their leader’s opposition. Schiff is also emotional in response, and quotes Amanda Gorman, the young Black poet who spoke at Joe Biden’s inauguration: “We’re not broken. We’re unfinished.”
“God help us,” Schiff says, fighting tears. “I have faith because of folks like you.”
He also says his tears and Kinzinger’s “must be an Adam thing today”.
Kinzinger is emotional as he addresses the officers before him.
“You guys won,” he says, fighting tears. “You guys held.”
The committee’s mission, he says, is to determine what happened. He decries political division in the US and says he wants all Americans to trust the work this committee does.
“I’m a Republican, I’m a conservative,” he says. But he is here on a panel opposed by Republican leaders, he says, wanting to “learn the facts and defend democracy”.
Kinzinger is an air force veteran and an air national guardsman. He describes serving during riots last summer, during protests for racial equality. He condemns those riots he says but adds that they did not threaten the American system of governance itself.
Still close to tears, he decries the Trump supporters who assaulted the Capitol as a “violent mob” and again thanks the officers and hundreds of others for their work to defend Congress.
Kinzinger goes to the question of whether 6 January was an armed insurrection or not – that it wasn’t is one plank of pro-Trump opposition to this committee and other investigations. He asks the officers for their response to such attempts to downplay the attack.
Sgt Gonell: “Common things were used as weapons. Like a baseball bat, a hockey stick, rebar, a flagpole including the American flag … those are weapons. No matter if it is a pen. The way they were using these items, it was to hurt these officers.”
Kinzinger asks Hodges and Gonell if in their previous military service or as police officers they ever worked differently with fellow personnel based on politics. They say they did not. Kinzinger, fighting tears again, says that applies to this committee: its members are Americans first.
Adam Schiff of California next.
Updated
After being “violently assaulted from every direction”, Officer Fanone says, he “knew I was up shit creek without a paddle”.
He describes a rioter trying to grab his gun as people “yelled ‘Kill him with his own gun’ and words to that effect”.
He says he believes some in the crowd wanted to kill him or see him killed. “They tortured me, they beat me, I was struck with a Taser device at the base of my skull numerous times. They continued to do so until I yelled out that I have kids. And I said that hoping to appeal to those individuals’ humanity. Fortunately a few did step in and assist me.”
He was carried inside unconscious, he says, and was out for around four minutes.
Lofgren yields back. Adam Kinzinger, the second Republican on the panel, is next.
Fanone: 'They’d been fighting since 1pm. It was three o’clock'
Zoe Lofgren, a California Democrat, is up next. She begins with a tribute to all those who defended and staffed the Capitol on 6 January.
“You saved the day, you saved the constitution,” she says, before asking Sgt Gonell about his experience in a fight on the day.
He “apologises for his outburst” regarding going to “his house”, meaning Donald Trump’s residence, and demonstrating such “loving” behaviour as the former president claims the rioters showed the Capitol police. These are, of course, fraught times.
He details close-quarter fighting with those trying to get into the Capitol, the police outmanned and struggling, “getting trampled in the middle” of the scrum.
Lofgren shows a video clip of such struggles between the surging crowd and police in riot gear with shields, inside and outside the video. It is chaotic and distressing, soundtracked by screams and chants. Officer Hodges watches attentively. Officer Fanone watches too, eyebrows raised.
“Almost all of that was from your body camera footage,” Lofgren says.
Fanone details his experiences on 6 January, beginning in the Capitol crypt. He talks about discussing the situation with a colleague “blinded with bear mace”.
“They’d been fighting since 1pm,” he says. “It was three o’clock. Those guys had been fighting two hours, unrelieved.”
He describes seeing CS gas and realising he did not have his mask. He describes one commander as “looking like George Patton”, and how he came to realise the gravity of the situation.
“These guys looked beat to hell,” the Metropolitan officer says, of when he tried to offer assistance to Capitol police. He describes the rioters as terrorists, wearing political slogans and military-style clothing. When he told the rioters some officers were injured, he says, that “pissed them off” and began the surge showed in his body camera footage.
“I believe they would have trampled us to death,” he says, had they succeeded in breaking the police line.
The room is deadly quiet.
Updated
Thompson is using his questions to hit key emotional points in the testimony of the four officers. Such committee hearings are about TV too, remember – which is why Donald Trump may be unhappy that thanks to Kevin McCarthy’s choice to withdraw Republicans from the panel, he has no defenders here, beaming to screens around the country.
Officer Dunn is asked about his experience enduring racist abuse, seeing Confederate flags among the rioters and other such issues.
“It’s so overwhelming and disappointing and disheartening,” he says, that America contains people who would “attack you because of the colour of your skin”.
“My blood is red, I’m an American citizen, I’m a police officer and a peace officer,” he says. “I’m here to defend everybody.”
Liz Cheney, Republican of Wyoming and pariah in her own party, is next up. She asks Sgt Gonell about Trump’s claims that the crowd was full of “loving” people. He is not impressed.
“I’m still recovering from those hugs and kisses,” Gonell says, adding: “If that was hugs and kisses I wish you all go to his house and do the same to him.”
“All of them were telling us Trump sent us,” Gonell adds, dismissing Trump’s claim leftwing demonstrators or the FBI were behind the riot.
Officer Fanone is next to receive a question from Cheney. “The politics of that day didn’t play into my response at all,” he says.
Officer Hodges is asked to describe his experience in seeing protesters in military and tactical gear at the Capitol. Cheney asks Officer Dunn about what police expected on 6 January. “A couple arrests, name-calling, unfriendly people,” he says – but not close to what actually happened.
CDC to recommend vaccinated people wear masks indoors – sometimes
The Washington Post reports that the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will this afternoon recommend that vaccinated people wear masks indoors in certain circumstances. The paper, which tends to turn out to be reasonably well connected in the capital, says the announcement is coming at 3pm ET.
The CDC will revise guidance issued on 13 May, which said vaccinated individuals did not need to wear masks indoors.
As is the way of things, the administration’s view on whether mask advisories or mandates might return, as with the question of whether vaccinations should be made mandatory in any circumstances, has been a little opaque. But as press secretary Jen Psaki said yesterday, Joe Biden regards his scientific and medical advisers as his “North Star” on such matters, so here we are. Or will be, when the announcement comes later.
The highly infectious Delta variant of the coronavirus has fuelled steep rises in case numbers, particularly among unvaccinated Americans and amid struggles with disinformation and resistance, particularly on the political right.
Anthony Fauci, Biden’s chief medical adviser, discussed the possible need to return to advising mask-wearing over the weekend. Report here.
Speaking to the Post, Robert Wachter, chairman of the department of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, said: “Nobody wants to go backward but you have to deal with the facts on the ground, and the facts on the ground are that it’s a pretty scary time and there are a lot of vulnerable people.
“I think the biggest thing we got wrong was not anticipating that 30% of the country would choose not to be vaccinated.
“In June we were in this virtuous cycle, where cases were going down, people were getting vaccinated, everyone said happy days are here again, and let their guard down.”
Some further reading, from Jessica Glenza:
This is Martin Pengelly, taking over the controls from Joanie Greve for a while. In response to questions from Bennie Thompson, the committee chair, Sgt Gonell is currently describing his experiences in Iraq: “We could run over an IED and that’s it but at least we knew we were in a combat zone. Here, in our nation’s capital, we were attacked multiple times.”
He adds that police officers were “fighting for our lives” during the assault by the Trump supporters seeking to overturn the election result.
Updated
US Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn, who is Black, said he was repeatedly called the “n” word as he sought to protect the Capitol from pro-Trump insurrectionists on January 6.
“Nobody had ever, ever called me a [‘n’ word] while wearing the uniform of a Capitol Police officer,” Dunn said, actually saying the racial slur.
Dunn closed his testimony by expressing pride in his fellow USCP officers and encouraging them to protect their mental health as they deal with the fallout of the insurrection.
“There is absolutely nothing wrong with seeking professional counseling,” Dunn said.
Updated
US Capitol Police officers are closely watching the January 6 select committee’s hearing as some of their colleagues testify.
An NBC News reporter shared a photo of two USCP officers watching C-SPAN as it streamed the hearing:
As we hear the powerful stories from officers on Jan 6 can’t help but think of the entire USCP force, including those that lost their lives as a result of that day.
— Haley Talbot (@haleytalbotnbc) July 27, 2021
As you walk around the Capitol today officers are glued to the hearing, watching their colleagues testify. pic.twitter.com/ljw2Br7tk3
Metropolitan Police Department officer Daniel Hodges, who was nearly crushed against a door on January 6 as pro-Trump insurrectionists stormed the Capitol, delivered his opening statement to the select committee.
Hodges recounted how the insurrectionists attempted to gouge out his right eye as they gained access to the Capitol.
“To my confusion, I saw the thin blue line flag, a symbol of support for law enforcement more than once, being carried by the terrorists as they ignored our commands and continued to assault us,” Hodges said.
The police officer noted that he heard some of the insurrectionists saying, “Do not attack us, we’re not Black Lives Matter!”
“As if political affiliation determines when we use force,” Hodges said.
Metropolitan Police Department officer Michael Fanone recounted how pro-Trump insurrectionists attacked him on January 6.
“I was grabbed, beaten, tased, all while being called a traitor to my country. I was at risk of being stripped of and killed with my own firearm, as I heard chants of ‘Kill him with his own gun,’” Fanone said.
“I can still hear those words in my head today.”
"I was at risk of being stripped of and killed with my own firearm, as I heard chants of 'kill him with his own gun.'"
— The Recount (@therecount) July 27, 2021
— DC Metropolitan Police Officer Michael Fanone pic.twitter.com/4przZIOvVe
Fanone said that a fellow officer later transported him to a nearby hospital, where he was told he had suffered a mild heart attack.
Doctors also diagnosed Fanone with a concussion, a brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder.
Fanone went on to condemn those who attempt to downplay the violence of January 6. “The indifference shown to my colleagues is disgraceful,” the officer said.
Inside the Capitol, several US Capitol Police officers were seen watching the hearing on their phones to hear the testimony of their colleagues, according to a CNN reporter:
Walking through the Capitol just now — the very scene of the January 6 insurrection — and several police officers are glued to their phones, watching the testimony of their fellow officers.
— Melanie Zanona (@MZanona) July 27, 2021
'This is how I’m going to die': USCP officer recounts January 6
US Capitol Police sergeant Aquilino Gonell emotionally recounted the violent events of January 6 in his opening statement to the select committee.
At one point while responding to the attack, Gonell said he thought to himself, “This is how I’m going to die.”
Gonell told the committee that members of his family were frantically trying to reach him as the insurrection unfolded.
Once he returned home, Gonell had to stop his wife from hugging him because of the chemicals that were still on him after his encounters with pro-Trump insurrectionists.
“For most people, January 6 happened for a few hours,” Gonell said. “But for those of us who were in the thick of it, it has not ended. That day continues to be a constant trauma for us.”
The sergeant noted that many of his colleagues have “quietly resigned” in the months since the insurrection.
Updated
Committee must uncover what happened at the White House on January 6, Cheney says
Congresswoman Liz Cheney, one of just two Republicans on the January 6 select committee, emphasized that lawmakers have an obligation to uncover what happened on that violent day.
“We must know what happened here at the Capitol,” Cheney said.
“We must also know what happened every minute of that day in the White House -- every phone call, every conversation, every meeting leading up to, during and after the attack. Honorable men and women have an obligation to step forward.”
"We cannot leave the violence of January 6th and its causes un-investigated," Rep. Cheney says.
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) July 27, 2021
"We must also know what happened every minute of that day in the White House. Every phone call, every conversation, every meeting leading up to, during, and after the attack." pic.twitter.com/vX7Ybap6ON
The chairman of the committee, Democrat Bennie Thomspon, has previously raised the possibility of deposing congressional Republicans and senior Trump administration officials who spoke to Donald Trump as the insurrection unfolded.
“If those responsible are not held accountable, and if Congress does not act responsibly, this will remain a cancer on our constitutional republic, undermining the peaceful transfer of power at the heart of our democratic system,” Cheney said.
She concluded, “Our children will know who stood for truth, and they will inherit the nation we hand to them: a republic, if we can keep it.”
Thompson plays graphic footage of insurrection in opening statement
Bennie Thompson, the Democratic chairman of the January 6 select committee, played some graphic footage of the insurrection as part of his opening statement.
The footage included radio recordings of law enforcement officers requesting assistance and reporting multiple injuries at the Capitol as they responded to the insurrection.
“We need to know minute by minute how January 6 unfolded,” Thompson said. “And we need to figure out how to fix the damage.”
He concluded his statement by saying, “We cannot allow ourselves to be undone by liars and cheaters. This is the United States of America.”
Republican congresswoman Liz Cheney is now delivering her own opening statement. Stay tuned.
Bennie Thompson, the Democratic chairman of the select committee, began his opening statement by thanking the four law enforcement officers who are testifying today about responding to the Capitol insurrection.
“You held the line that day, and I can’t overstate what was on the line: our democracy,” Thompson said.
The Democratic chairman expressed dismay that the insurrectionists came dangerously close to succeeding in their goal of preventing the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s victory.
“And while our institutions endured, and while Joe Biden is the legitimately elected president of the United States, a peaceful transfer of power didn’t happen this year,” Thompson said. “It did not happen. Let that sink in.”
"And while our institutions endured, and while Joe Biden is the legitimately elected president of the United States, a peaceful transfer of power didn't happen this year," Rep. Thompson says during his opening statement of the Jan. 6 Select Committee. pic.twitter.com/HP8AAdYwY3
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) July 27, 2021
Updated
January 6 select committee begins first hearing
The January 6 select committee has now officially started its first hearing, with Democratic chairman Bennie Thompson kicking off the proceedings.
The four law enforcement officers who are testifying today -- US Capitol Police officers Aquilino Gonell and Harry Dunn and Metropolitan Police Department officers Daniel Hodges and Michael Fanone -- are seated at the witness table wearing their uniforms.
Thompson will now deliver his opening statement. Stay tuned.
Updated
The January 6 select committee’s first hearing is scheduled to begin in about five minutes on Capitol Hill.
An NBC News reporter shared a photo on Twitter of the set-up in the committee hearing room where this morning’s hearing will take place:
The first hearing of the January 6 Select Committee will gavel in at 9:30AM. The cmte will hear powerful testimony from Officers Harry Dunn, Aquilino Gonell, Michael Fanone and Daniel Hodges.
— Haley Talbot (@haleytalbotnbc) July 27, 2021
A look inside the room: pic.twitter.com/KzmcY63gYW
The select committee will hear testimony from four members of the US Capitol Police force and Metropolitan Police Department of Washington, who responded to the insurrection on January 6.
USCP officers Aquilino Gonell and Harry Dunn and MPD officers Daniel Hodges and Michael Fanone will provide their first-hand accounts of protecting the Capitol from the mob of pro-Trump insurrectionists.
The chairman of the select committee, Bennie Thompson, previewed some of the officers’ testimony in a Washington Post op-ed published yesterday:
Fanone voluntarily rushed to the Capitol with his partner when he heard about the attacks. As a result of his bravery that day, he suffered a traumatic brain injury and a heart attack. In a video that has now been shared widely, Hodges can be seen being crushed by the mob as he and his fellow officers sought to defend a narrow hallway leading to a Capitol entrance.
Dunn was one of the first officers to speak publicly about what law enforcement encountered when the rioters stormed the Capitol and the racial epithets he and others faced. Gonell, a veteran who had been deployed to Iraq, defended the Capitol against rioters who hurled chants of ‘traitor.’ While pulling an officer who had fallen to the ground away from the rioters, Gonell was beaten with a pole carrying an American flag.
The officers’ testimony will bring into focus individual acts of heroism by law enforcement that day. The officers will also speak to how, more than six months after the attack, law enforcement officers continue to deal with the physical, mental and emotional effects of that day. This conversation is an important step, as we look to bolster protection of the Capitol and our democracy.
The investigation into the 6 January attack has become a fiercely partisan issue in Washington.
The House voted in May for an independent investigation that would have been evenly split between Democrats and Republicans, but the Senate blocked the move.
Late last month, the House voted mostly along party lines to form the select committee.
Kevin McCarthy, the Republican House minority leader, picked five Republicans to sit on the committee, but speaker Nancy Pelosi rejected Jim Jordan and Jim Banks’ nominations, prompting McCarthy to withdraw all five nominees.
Liz Cheney, a Republican congresswoman from Wyoming, had already been named to the panel by Pelosi, and on Sunday Pelosi went around McCarthy again to appoint Representative Adam Kinzinger, who like Cheney is a critic of Donald Trump, to the committee.
Pelosi said Kinzinger “and other Republicans have expressed an interest to serve on the select committee. And I wanted to appoint three of them that Leader McCarthy suggested. But he withdrew their names. The two that I would not appoint are people who would jeopardise the integrity of the investigation, and there’s no way I would tolerate their antics as we seek the truth.”
January 6 select committee to hold first hearing
Greetings from Washington, live blog readers.
The select committee formed to investigate the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol will hold its first hearing today.
The committee will hear from four members of the US Capitol Police force and Metropolitan Police Department of Washington, who responded to the scene as pro-Trump insurrectionists stormed the Capitol.
The panel includes seven Democrats and just two Republicans, Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, both of whom supported Donald Trump’s impeachment earlier this year and were appointed by Democratic speaker Nancy Pelosi.
House minority leader Kevin McCarthy pulled his original appointees from the committee after Pelosi objected to two of his selections, Jim Banks and Jim Jordan, both of whom are staunch Trump allies.
In a statement last week explaining his decision, McCarthy said, “Republicans will not be party to their sham process and will instead pursue our own investigation of the facts.”
But the end result of McCarthy’s decision is that Trump will have no allies on the panel as members investigate exactly what happened on January 6.
The hearing will get underway soon, so stay tuned.
