After accumulating mountains of evidence since last summer and filing hundreds of witnesses behind its closed doors, the US House Committee tasked with shedding light on the January 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol is entering a of its final phases, with the holding of six public hearings, two of which will be broadcast during prime time.
An expected event that, like the broadcast of the Watergate Inquiry hearings in another era, could upend public perceptions of the real role played by ex-President Donald Trump in the coup attempt. State orchestrated that day.
“It is entirely possible that these public hearings will uncover new, more incriminating evidence and shed more light on the conspiracy being crafted by Trump administration officials to prevent the certification of the 2020 presidential vote results, said in an interview with the To have to American political historian John Mohr, who teaches at the University of Alabama. Certainly, what has already been uncovered by this commission indicates that the project was much more organized than previously thought. And if more were to come to light, then the risk of criminal prosecution for those involved in the violence of the January 6 events could increase. »
Trauma to the United States, the Capitol insurrection has left ex-President Donald Trump facing a second impeachment hearing, just a week after his supporters stormed the seat of legislative power. The crowd was thus seeking to illegally maintain the populist, who had been deposed at the ballot box, in office at the White House.
Trump was then accused of having orchestrated this anti-democratic and deadly riot – 7 people lost their lives – by organizing a political rally outside the dome of democracy, that day, and by calling on the crowd to “fight without respite” to have the elections annulled by falsely claiming for months that they were fraudulent. The Republican majority in the Senate, however, preferred to acquit him.
Since then, the parliamentary committee has succeeded in highlighting a concerted effort by those close to Donald Trump to have the results of the ballot box annulled. The plan, spearheaded by former populist strategist Steve Bannon and one of his national security advisers, Peter Navarro, even had a name, “Green Bay Sweep”, and aimed to find mechanisms and procedures to overturn the November 2020 vote.
Like Bannon, Navarro stubbornly refused to collaborate with the commission. On Friday, he was officially charged with contempt of Congress for refusing to appear there and arrested in the afternoon by the FBI.
Manipulation and force
Exchanges of text messages between Mark Meadows, ex-chief of staff of Donald Trump, and several political and media figures, obtained by the parliamentarians, also made it possible to highlight the seriousness of the attack on American democracy. One of these communications, implicating the ex-governor of Texas Rick Perry, for example, showed that the latter had drawn up a plan to replace the Democratic vote cast in states whose legislature was under Republican control, such as Georgia or Arizona, to make it a vote for Donald Trump.
Finally, on the ground, on January 6, this insurrection also counted on the cooperation of far-right groups to violently obstruct the procedures for certification of the vote by the American legislative power. The ex-leader of one of these groups, the Proud Boys, Henry “Enrique” Tarrio, was also arrested in the wake of the riots. He is awaiting trial and faces “conspiracy” charges.
Throughout the month of June, the broadcast of the work of the Commission of Inquiry into January 6, which will begin on Thursday at 8 p.m., could reveal even more, as was the case during Watergate, this attempt of the Democratic National Committee orchestrated by President Nixon in 1972.
We remember: the testimony, before America, of John Dean, former legal adviser to the White House, had made it possible to understand that the break-in into the offices of the Democrats had been personally authorized by the former prosecutor General John Mitchell and that White House advisers were aware of the company. Dean also confirmed that Richard Nixon was involved in the ensuing cover-up of events.
“It is the unknown on the eve of these public hearings: it is unclear to what extent the commission will attribute direct responsibility to Donald Trump as the instigator of the insurgency and accuse other individuals and groups” , drops Michael Traugott, a specialist in political communication at the University of Michigan.
“The committee will try to take advantage of the journalistic spotlight on it to maximize the impact of its findings,” adds Steven Webster, professor of political science at Indiana University. Both sides are playing big with these hearings, as Democrats want to avoid being seen as too vindictive and aggressive, and Republicans are afraid of the shock revelation damaging Trump, his allies, or the party as a whole. . »
In the footsteps of Richard Nixon, betrayed in part by the recordings of discussions on planned crime at the top of the state, the tapes of which were revealed during the public hearings of the commission of inquiry, Donald Trump, also seems to want hide damning evidence. At least that’s what the investigation committee’s discovery of a “hole” of 7 hours and 37 minutes in the official log of telephone calls from the office of the American presidency on January 6, 2021 illustrates. unfolding of the attack on the Capitol.
Evidence of a crime
“If enough incriminating evidence is accumulated against him, he could face criminal charges, says John Mohr, even if it would be unprecedented for a former president to face criminal charges for offenses committed during his mandate. There is nothing in the Constitution that prevents it, but politically it could be explosive, and this, in a country much more polarized than it was during the Nixon hearings. »
If the public hearings have the potential to bring back the spotlight on the authoritarian and undemocratic excesses of the former American president, they nevertheless remain a risky exercise for the Democrats, estimates the political scientist and professor of law James Gardner, of the University of Buffalo. , joined by The duty in New York State. “New revelations about crimes committed by Donald Trump during his presidency risk being perceived by his base as evidence of more than one relentlessness, baseless according to his supporters, against him, he said. And that will only mobilize them more, when they are already greatly mobilized. »
Passing through Wyoming a few days ago to support the candidacy of Harriet Hageman, facing Liz Cheney, Trump critic and rare Republican to sit on the committee responsible for investigating January 6, the populist has also given fuel to this review, again calling the Capitol insurrection a “hoax” and denouncing a “partisan, grotesque, false, fabricated and hysterical narrative”.
“Donald Trump’s supporters brought him to power knowing his flaws, and they voted for him again in 2020, undeterred by his four years in office and open disregard for the rule of law,” adds Mr. Gardner. The hearings and the report of the commission [attendu plus tard cette année] will not change minds. If Trump runs in 2024 and he is defeated, it will not be because his supporters have broken away from him, but rather because those who already oppose him will continue to do so and show up at the polls in many to express themselves. »