By: Ernest Gurulé
It probably shouldn’t come as a surprise, but no one was quite expecting the audience the January 6th Hearings have so far garnered. Known formally as the United States House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack, the hearings have attracted audiences of as many as 20 million viewers. The hearings are on hiatus for the time being but are set to resume again in September and are very likely to become Fall’s ‘must see TV.’
For Democrats and a growing number of ‘no longer Trump’ Republicans, the hearings have been a boon, especially for Democrats with mid-term elections less than a hundred days away. The hearings have also introduced the nation to a bevy of fascinating witnesses, shined a spotlight on dubious behaviors of staunch never-say-die Trump acolytes and impeached previous statements by the former president while exposing dramatic fissures over the absence of leadership on that day in January.
The hearings have also elevated the status of the two Republican members of the committee. One, Wyoming Congresswoman Lynn Cheney, has put her own reelection at peril with her pragmatic and laser-like questioning of witnesses. Polls show her trailing by a wide margin as she seeks a fourth term in Congress. The other, Illinois Congressman Adam Kitzinger, has also distinguished himself for his role on the committee. Unlike Cheney, he has announced he will return to private life in January.
One person who has watched each of the eight hearings is former President of the Senate in the Colorado State Legislature, Morgan Carroll. Carroll, now Chairwoman of the Colorado Democratic Party, believes the hearings are both necessary, an illuminating civics lesson for all Americans, no matter which party one may belong to.
Carroll said that the hearings have shown that everyone has a stake in the proceedings. Nevermore was that underscored than by the testimony of two African American election workers in Georgia, a state Trump called asking its Attorney General “to find him 11,780 votes” in order to overturn President Biden’s win and put it squarely into the Trump column. The women, said Carroll, were “ordinary Americans who were targeted and defamed by the President.”
Trump and his attorney maliciously attacked the character of the two women who, like election workers anywhere, were simply doing their jobs. Trump referred to Ruby Freeman as “a professional vote scammer and hustler.”
His attorney, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, accused the woman of manipulating the vote by passing “USB ports as if they were vials of cocaine or heroin.” Both claims have been investigated and cleared the pair of any wrongdoing. “The President’s actions invited a mob to their grandmother’s house where people actually broke into her home to intimidate the election workers.
Carroll also had high praise for White House staffer, Cassidy Hutchinson, a 26-year-old assistant to Trump’s Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. Hutchinson, who has been compared to Watergate’s John Dean for her riveting testimony, including providing images of a petulant President who, when angry, has been known to throw food at the walls, testified with calm and confidence.
Carroll said Hutchinson’s portrait of not only Trump, but other members of his inner circle, painted a picture of almost sloth-like behavior of Trump doing essentially nothing as a mob of insurrectionists attacked the Capitol, and uncertainty bordering on panic by staff.
Cheney, who co-chairs the committee along with Mississippi’s Bennie Thompson, had been a loyal Trump House member who actually voted on Trump-approved legislation 93 percent of the time. It is a higher percentage than a number of Trump loyalists, including Matt Gaetz and Elaine Stefanik, the women who inherited Cheney’s leadership position after Cheney voted to convict Trump at his second impeachment trial.
The days of getting affirmative nods from Trump are over. Today, Cheney finds herself persona non grata in her own party and an almost sure also-ran come November.
Carroll, despite knowing Cheney’s arch-conservatism and previous unwavering support for party, believes the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, has earned respect for placing country over party.
People like Cheney, said Carroll, “are willing to face the angry mobs of the right to tell the truth to the American people.” Yes, said Carroll, Cheney was part of the. machinery that fed Trump’s voracious appetite for power, but “better late than never” in dealing with the nation’s reality.
The Trump apparatus, said Carroll, is both vengeful and “will retaliate against anyone who dares to speak against Trump.” It takes courage to speak against Trump, she said. “It is hard for any of us to admit that we were wrong, but it takes courage to do so and to do so publicly.”
Republicans in both the House and Senate have remained relatively silent on evidence introduced by the Committee. But they have complained that it has the markings of a ‘kangaroo court,’ only presenting one side. They have also said it is not a true ‘joint committee. But it has been pointed out more than once that the Committee’s makeup was all but ensured when Republican leader Kevin McCarthy pulled his choices, including Republican firebrand Jim Jordan and Pennsylvania Representative Scott Perry, from taking positions on it.
The next Committee hearings have only been announced as beginning in September. No specific date has been named but a number of Committee members have indicated that after the last hearing, a number of ‘interesting’ names have stepped up indicating a willingness to raise their right hand and share what they know about January 6th.
