Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., a Jan. 6 committee member, appeared on “Face the Nation” Sunday.
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WASHINGTON — Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., a member of the Jan. 6 committee probing ex-President Donald Trump’s role in the Capitol attack and the run-up to it, will take a lead role in the Wednesday hearing, he said Sunday.
The next sessions start at 9 a.m. Chicago time on Monday and Wednesday.
The Monday hearing will focus on how Trump and his advisors knew he lost the election, yet launched a massive disinformation campaign to convince “huge portions of the U.S. population” that widespread fraud stole Trump’s victory and handed it to President Joe Biden.
Kinzinger told John Dickerson on CBS’ “Face the Nation” he will “delve” into the “moves” of Trump and the Justice Department.
Trump tried “to install his own people in Justice to do his bidding,” Kinzinger said on the program.
The panel’s first hearing, Thursday night, was an overview of how Trump tried to overturn the election results and, when that failed, his role in the events leading to the Capitol attack, where a mob tried to prevent Congress from finalizing Biden’s election.
Panel vice-chair Rep. Mary Cheney, R-Wy., with Kinzinger the only Republicans on the committee, previewed the Wednesday session when she said Thursday: “In our third hearing, you will see that President Trump corruptly planned to replace the Attorney General of the United States so the U.S. Justice Department would spread his false stolen election claims.”
Those Justice Department officials threatened to resign, and Trump never fired the top Justice officials in place after Trump lost the November election.
Kinzinger also said:
• Trump is flirting with a 2024 comeback bid and, if elected again, “there is no doubt in my mind, zero doubt,” he will screen people to install loyalists to him.
“I think the thing that’s most concerning to me is, nothing has changed. The only thing that has changed since January 6 is, now if they want to run that play again, they’re going to put more loyal people into the administration earlier on.”
“What matters, and the bottom line. is that we as a country recognize even when we’re on the receiving end of policy, even when we don’t get our way, if we follow through our oath, that basic compact of self governance will work — otherwise, it won’t.”
• The committee investigation and hearings are putting together the case that Trump’s inner circle knew there was no evidence to back Trump’s claims of widespread election fraud, but carried on a fight to overturn the election results nonetheless.
“I don’t really know many people around him that truly believe the election was stolen and told him so,” Kinzinger said. Trump “was surrounded by yes people” who told him “everything that pleases him.”
If Trump really believed the election was stolen, “he’s not mentally capable to be president. I think he didn’t believe it. I think the people around him didn’t believe it. This was all about keeping power against the will of the American people.”
Asked what evidence the committee had to prove what Trump really believed — and if he said things in private that he did not say in public, Kinzinger replied: “I don’t want to go into evidence we haven’t put out yet.”
At the Wednesday hearing, Kinzinger said, he also will handle the committee’s findings dealing with pardons. Cheney said on Thursday that “multiple” Republican congressmen sought “presidential pardons for their roles in attempting to overturn the 2020 election.”
from Chicago Sun-Times - All https://ift.tt/EuX2Ljq
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