up to half a dozen Republican lawmakers who strongly supported the then president Donald TrumpFalse claims of ballot fraud in the 2020 election prompted him to apologize in the wake of the January 6, 2021, Capitol riots, according to evidence and evidence presented Thursday to the House Select Committee probing the attack.
Trump spoke about issuing a so-called blanket apology to his family members and White House staff before leaving office in January 2021, according to videotaped testimony by former White House aide John McEntee.
“The only reason I want to apologize is because you think you’ve committed a crime,” Rep. Adam Kizinger of Illinois, one of two Republicans on the panel investigating the Capitol riots, said at the end of the hearing. ,
According to videotaped testimony from Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Meadows, five members of the GOP House requested an apology from Trump through the office of White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows.
She identified them as Mo Brooks of Alabama, Matt Getz of Florida, Louis Gohart of Texas, Andy Biggs of Arizona, and Scott Perry of Pennsylvania.
Excerpts from an email by US Representative Mo Brooks (R-AL) to former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows apologizing to members of Congress are screened during the fifth public hearing for the US House Select Committee investigation Huh. January 6 Attack on the United States Capitol on Capitol Hill in Washington, US, June 23, 2022.
Jim Borg | Reuters
Hutchinson also testified that she heard Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene asked the White House attorney’s office for a pardon.
In a January 11, 2021, email to the White House, which was displayed at Thursday’s hearing, Brooks apologized not only to himself and Getz, but also to “every congressman and senator who rejected Arizona’s electoral college.” and Pennsylvania” five days ago, on January 6.
It was on 6 January that a special joint session of Congress was convened to ratify the President’s Electoral College victory. Joe Biden Trump was suspended for hours after a violent crowd of supporters, who made their way to the Capitol and swarmed through the halls of Congress.
According to Hutchinson, Getz began apologizing in December 2020, who said, “I’m not sure why.”
A video displays a discussion about a presidential pardon during the fifth hearing by the House Select Committee to investigate the January 6 attack on the US Capitol at the Canon House office building on June 23, 2022 in Washington, DC.
Alex Wong | Getty Images News | Getty Images
Former White House counsel Eric Hershman, in his own videotape, said of Getz’s request, “The general tone was ‘We can be prosecuted because we were in defense of the president’s position on these things.’ ,
“The apology he was requesting was as broad as you can describe, from the beginning of time to the present day, for any and all things,” Hershman said.
Getz, who is under criminal investigation by the US Department of Justice in an investigation related to possible sex trafficking of an underage girl, rebuked the January 6 committee in a tweet following the hearing.
But his office did not respond to NBC News when asked if he had apologized to Trump.
“The January 6th Committee is an unconstitutional political party,” Gaetz tweeted. “It is rapidly losing the interest of the American people and now resorts to enforcing federal law on political opponents.
Green’s office also didn’t explicitly deny whether he apologized, but referred NBC to a tweet he posted based on Hutchinson’s testimony.
Green wrote, ‘I heard’ means you don’t know. “Spreading gossip and lies is exactly what the Witch Hunt Committee of January 6 is about.”
A video of US Representative Mo Brooks (R-AL) is screened on June 23 during the fifth hearing by the House Select Committee to investigate the January 6 attack on the US Capitol at the Canon House office building in Washington, DC. , 2022.
Brendan Smilowski | AFP | Getty Images
McEntee was asked in his videotaped testimony whether Trump was considering issuing a blanket apology to anyone involved on Jan.
“I had heard that mentioned,” said McEnty.
Asked if he knew Trump had talks about potentially pardoning family members. Trump’s daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner were senior White House advisers.
“I know he indicated a blanket apology for January 6 for anyone, but I think he had it for all the staff and everyone involved,” McEnty replied. “Not with January 6th, but just before I left office, I know he talked about it,” McEnty said.