Former President Donald Trump on Friday fired back at the House Select Committee investigating the events of Jan. 6, 2021.
“There’s no clearer example of the menacing spirit that has devoured the American left than the disgraceful performance being staged by the unselect committee,” Trump said at a conference hosted by the Faith and Freedom Coalition in Nashville, Tennessee.
The committee has held three of the seven public hearings scheduled for this month, laying out what it says was a “sophisticated, seven-part plan” by Trump and his supporters to overturn his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden.
Trump was well aware of the fact that he lost, the committee argued using testimony from members of his inner circle. But he moved ahead anyway with an illegal plot to remain in power and raised millions of dollars in the process of pushing the “big lie.”
The latest hearing on Thursday zeroed in on the intense pressure Trump and others heaped on then-Vice President Mike Pence to single-handedly reject state electors and block the congressional certification of Biden’s win.
Former President Donald Trump speaks at a rally, May 28, 2022, in Casper, Wyo.
Chet Strange/Getty Images
The pressure campaign put Pence in danger, lawmakers and witnesses said, with the vice president forced to hide underground for more than four hours after coming within 40 feet of the mob of rioters at the Capitol.
When Pence refused to follow Trump’s plan, a “heated” phone call ensued the morning of Jan. 6, Ivanka Trump and other witnesses told the committee. Trump aides and family members in the Oval Office at the time recalled Trump mockingly referring to Pence as “wimp.”