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The House panel investigating the January 6, 2021, riot is set to hold its seventh public hearing on Tuesday, with committee members expected to focus on the role of extremist groups in the storming of the Capitol.
The committee is expected to make the case that the Trump administration had connections to militia groups like the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys—whose leaders face seditious conspiracy charges—and that a tweet from former President Donald Trump was the "siren call" that catalyzed those groups to attempt to block the certification of the 2020 election.
"People are going to hear the story of that tweet, and then the explosive effects it had in Trump world and specifically among the domestic violent extremist groups—the most dangerous political extremists in the country at that point," Representative Jamie Raskin told CBS' Face the Nation on Sunday.
On December 19, 2020, Trump tweeted, "Big protest in D.C. on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!"
The hearing, which is being led by Raskin and Representative Stephanie Murphy, will take place at 1 p.m. ET and will be broadcasted on the committee's website under the "Watch Live" tab. Major broadcast and cable networks, including C-SPAN, CNN, CBS, ABC and NBC, have also been airing the ongoing hearings.
This week, the panel will present new testimony that was obtained from former White House counsel Pat Cipollone, who pushed back against Trump's efforts to overturn the election, during a Friday interview.
Cipollone's agreement to testify came after an explosive hearing featuring former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson, who said Cipollone had warned that "we're going to get charged with every crime imaginable" if Trump marched on the Capitol that day.
Raskin has also said that Tuesday's hearing will provide details about a December 18, 2020, White House meeting, during which Trump and his team allegedly discussed using the military to seize federally authorized voting machines.
In another major development for the committee, former White House strategist Steve Bannon made a last-minute offer to testify on Sunday after Trump waived executive privilege. The latest news from Bannon comes just days before his criminal trial for defying the panel's subpoena was set to begin.
The committee is scheduled to hold another hearing on Thursday during prime time.
Here are other key players to watch out for in this week's hearings:
- Roger Stone, longtime Trump ally
- Tony Ornato, former Trump adviser
- Sidney Powell, former Trump attorney
- Eric Herschmann, former White House lawyer
- Michael Flynn, former national security adviser
- Matt Graves, U.S. attorney for Washington, D.C.
- Bobby Engle, the special agent in charge Trump's secret service detail on January 6
- Nick Luna, Trump's body man on January 6
- Sarah Matthews and Judd Deere, former White House deputy press secretaries
- Ben Williamson and Max Miller, former White House aides
- Joseph Biggs and Ethan Nordean, Proud Boys leaders
- Kelly Meggs, Florida leader of the Oath Keepers
About the writer
Katherine Fung is a Newsweek senior reporter based in New York City. She has covered U.S. politics and culture extensively. ... Read more