Let the truth be known

**bsm2** · 06-29-2022

**bsm2** · 06-29-2022

Let the people in’
How much did President Donald Trump and his top advisers know ahead of the Jan. 6 attack about the potential for violence? Until the past few weeks, the answer to that question had been unclear.

But the Jan. 6 committee hearings have removed much of the doubt: Trump and his aides knew that the rally he held near the White House that day was likely to escalate into an attack on the Capitol.

Yesterday, testimony from Cassidy Hutchinson — a former aide to the White House chief of staff — offered the clearest evidence yet that Trump knew violence was possible. He learned early on Jan. 6 that some rally attendees were armed, but wanted security to let them in, Hutchinson said. “They’re not here to hurt me,” she recalled him saying.

Hutchinson also said yesterday that:

Mark Meadows, Trump’s chief of staff at the time and Hutchinson’s boss, told her on Jan. 2 that “things might get real, real bad on Jan. 6.”
The White House knew that the Proud Boys, a far-right group with a recent history of political violence, planned to be in Washington on Jan. 6. Hutchinson heard the group discussed before Trump’s rally, when Rudy Giuliani was present, and Giuliani said on Jan. 2 that Jan. 6 would be “a great day.”
Tony Ornato, another aide, told Meadows and Trump before the attack that some Trump supporters had come to hear his speech outside the White House armed with knives, bear spray and other weapons.
Trump wanted the Secret Service to let armed supporters into his rally. “Take the f-ing mags away,” Hutchinson overheard Trump say, referring to the magnetometers used to screen attendees. “They can march to the Capitol from here. Let the people in.”
Trump wanted to join the protesters at the Capitol after his speech. After learning he was instead being driven back to the White House, Hutchinson testified, Trump cursed at his security detail and tried to wrest the steering wheel from his driver. Trump denied the story yesterday, and Secret Service officials said agents would testify that he did not reach for the wheel.