On June 16, 2015, Donald Trump descended that famous golden escalator, unleashed a cacophonous presidential campaign, violated every rule of politics, and invaded, welcome or not, the soul and psyche of every American.
Exactly seven years later, damaging democracy, the former president was still doing so on Thursday, dominating the political scene, his savagery and extremism still threatening to tear the country apart.
In the Capitol Hill Hearing Room, the focus was not on the anniversary of the Trump Tower, when then-property tycoon and reality TV star set out to win power, but on January 2021, when he nearly led the American political system, the a corrupt effort to cling to that power.
The House of Representatives’ election committee, which is investigating the uprising, has told a stunning story about Trump pressuring then-Vice President Mike Pence to illegally give him a second term in spite of his election losses. It revealed that members of a mob that had sworn to hang Pence had approached him 40 feet during the attack on the US Capitol. And by making an argument that seems to bring Trump closer than ever to the legal implications of his coup attempt, the commission cited a case where he and his conservative lawyer, John Eastman, knew the plan was illegal, but despite that’s what they did.
In any normal political age, such a testament would traumatize the nation to the core, turn the former president into a national pariah, and cause his party to renounce him as a disgrace to the republic. That made the burglary on the Democratic National Committee 50 years ago today and the subsequent cover-up that toppled President Richard Nixon at Watergate half a century ago seem almost strange by comparison.
Yet it is a measure of how Trump has shattered political conventions, carved out vicious divisions and thrived on the anxiety that has caused the commission’s incredible revelations unlikely to bring him such a fate. It has long been a cliché that nothing brings down Trump. Millions of Americans who believe his lies about election fraud and prefer his version of history are likely to ignore the televised hearings of the House of Representatives committee. Trump is already the leading candidate for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination in 2024. And after seven years of strikes from his strangeness, the other half of the country may have long since passed the point of shock.
As the commission assembles its damn case, it is already struggling with a major mystery that has long been used in Trump’s business and political careers. How can this natural force, which throughout its life has resisted responsibility, creating greater and greater violations of accepted behavior and the rule of law, ever be forced to pay a price for its actions?
There is a growing debate in Washington over whether the former president or officials could face a criminal investigation by the Justice Department into their role in the uprising after the committee closed. But the history of using constitutional means and government checks and balances to break Trump’s impunity has rarely been successful. The historic stain of two impeachments for gross abuses of power did not. Nor his rejection by voters after one term.
And while Trump is clearly outraged by the dizzying account of his coup attempt by the commission, his instinct, as always, is to fight. In fact, CNN’s Gabi Orr announced the shocking news on Thursday – given what is happening in Washington – that Trump is already campaigning to announce his presidential campaign in 2024 before the midterm elections in November. His resurgent political aspirations and his unlimited popularity among ordinary conservative voters are likely to be shown when he addresses the Coalition for Faith and Freedom in Nashville on Friday.
The impatience of the former president to return to the White House gave a stupid warning to the conservative retired judge J. Michael Lutig at the Witness Table on Thursday a chilling resonance.
“Donald Trump and his allies and supporters are a clear and present threat to American democracy,” Lutig said in a quiet hearing.
New revelations
One of the challenges facing the elected committee was to find a new way to impress the horrors and aftermath of the January 6, 2021 uprising in the minds of voters who watched much of it live on television. It brings together a mosaic of evidence that creates a new perspective for these events and increases the pressure on the Ministry of Justice to consider prosecution.
In its first televised hearing last week, the commission recreated the terror and chaos of a mob attack instigated by Trump against the Capitol, and showed that he had been repeatedly told that his allegations of electoral fraud were untrue. But he continued, urging supporters who besieged the building as lawmakers met to attest to President Joe Biden’s election victory. On Thursday, the commission added more pieces to a puzzle that uncovered Trump’s abuse as never before.
- According to testimonies of people around the then vice president and elsewhere in Trump’s political and election machine, the then president was told that Eastman Pence’s plan to simply declare he had won a second term or accept alternative electoral groups from the United States was illegal. Still, he tried to keep going. This certainly ranks as one of the boldest and most harmful attempts to seize presidential power in US history.
- Former Trump White House lawyer Eric Hershman told the commission in a video testimony that Eastman told him he was ready to accept violence to cancel the election.
- After the uprising, Eastman emailed Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, asking to be included in the list of potential recipients of a presidential pardon. In his own testimony before the commission, he cited his rights under the Fifth Amendment against self-incrimination 100 times, according to the commission.
- Pence, despite his four years of kneeling before Trump, never seriously considered carrying out the then president’s plan and appeared as a hero in the committee’s presentation. His challenge to the boss and the mob allowed the American tradition of transferring presidential power to remain intact, even if the process was not as peaceful as before.
Committee chairman: Trump’s threat to democracy is unlimited
The longer the committee hearings last, the darker the picture of Trump’s attempt to cling to power.
In another extraordinary development Thursday, commission chairwoman Benny Thompson, a Mississippi Democrat, said the investigation had asked to speak to Ginny Thomas, a conservative activist who is the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. The committee’s request follows reports Wednesday that the committee has e-mail correspondence between Ginny Thomas and Eastman. Ginny Thomas has been criticized for her efforts to promote lies and conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, and some Democrats have accused the couple of a conflict of interest, given the consequences of justice responsibilities.
This latest turn in history on January 6, 2021 underscores the unusual reality of a presidency that still shakes Washington more than a year and a half after its lost re-election. And this underscores that attempts to isolate the democratic system from its threat are still urgent. While many observers after Biden’s inauguration expressed satisfaction that the insurance policies of the political system against extremism had been delayed, Thompson was much more cautious in the light of subsequent events. He warned on Thursday that the US constitutional government “almost failed” under pressure from Trump.
Although no one could see it all coming, warning signs flashed as soon as Trump exploded on the political scene. As early as June 16, 2015, CNN’s political commentator SE Cupp reacted to Trump’s violent statement by saying, “There’s no way to describe what happened.”
Seven years later, and despite the commission’s efforts, it is still missing.
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