Takeaways from Day Four of the January 6 U.S. Capitol Riot Hearings

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WASHINGTON — The fourth day of hearings on the January 6, 2021, assault on Capitol Hill by supporters of former President Donald Trump in the US Congress featured testimony from election officials from the states of Arizona and Georgia .

Here are five takeaways from the fourth select committee of the US House of Representatives on the hearings on January 6 of this month:

TRUMP CLAIM REJECTED

About an hour before the hearing began, Trump attacked Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers, a Republican who had supported Trump in the 2020 election, in a statement. Trump lost Arizona to Biden.

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Trump said that during a phone call in November, Bowers “told me the election was rigged and I won Arizona.”

Bowers, speaking forcefully, refuted Trump’s statement.

“I had a conversation with the president. It’s certainly not that,” Bowers told the committee. “Anyone, anywhere, anytime said that I said the election was rigged, that would not be true.”

GIULIANI: THEORIES BUT NO EVIDENCE

Bowers also recounted attempts to get state lawmakers to hold public hearings on the rigged ballot.

Bowers said that during a meeting with officials in Phoenix after Biden was certified as winning Arizona, Trump’s attorney, Rudolph Giuliani, said, “We have a lot of theories, we just don’t have the evidence” to prove voter fraud.

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An attorney for Giuliani did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“I didn’t feel the evidence, in its absence, was worth a hearing and I didn’t want to be used as a pawn,” Bowers testified. He added: “You are asking me to do something against my oath and I will not break my oath,” he said he told Giuliani.

At another point in the hearing, the committee played a video of Giuliani saying that Trump’s camp had evidence of illegal immigrants and dead people casting ballots in Arizona.

Witnesses said they never received evidence to support those allegations.

TARGETED POLL WORKER

Wandrea ArShaye “Shaye” Moss, a former Georgia poll worker, told the committee she faced repeated threats after Trump and his associates accused her of participating in a “stolen” election cover-up.

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“Many threats, wishing me dead, telling me that I will be in jail with my mother… Be glad it is 2020 and not 1920… Many of them (the threats) were racist. A lot of them were just obnoxious,” Moss said.

He said Trump used his name 18 times in a call with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. “I felt horrible. I felt like it was all my fault,” he said. She regretted choosing to be a poll worker.

TRUMP CRIMES?

One remaining question is whether the select committee after the hearings will recommend criminal charges against Trump for his role in the events leading up to the Jan. 6 riot on Capitol Hill.

At Tuesday’s hearing, the committee expanded its case on possible criminal activity, such as conspiracy to defraud.

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He featured testimony from Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, who recounted a conversation with Trump.

McDaniel said Trump mostly turned the call over to John Eastman, a Trump adviser, who spoke about the importance of the RNC helping the campaign rally “contingent voters” in states where Trump was challenging the results. Committee members have characterized them as “false” voter lists.

“I think more just helping them communicate and bring them together, but my understanding is that the campaign took the lead and we were just helping them in that role,” McDaniel said in describing the RNC’s role on Trump’s behalf.

Representative Adam Schiff, a Democratic member of the panel, quoted federal judge David Carter as saying that Trump likely violated several federal laws, including conspiracy to defraud the United States.

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DELIVERING FALSE ELECTORS?

The committee showed text messages from an aide to Republican Senator Ron Johnson to an aide to then-Vice President Mike Pence saying the senator wanted to hand-deliver a fake voter registration certificate to Pence.

When asked for comment, Johnson’s spokeswoman, Alexa Henning, referred to a tweet she wrote:

“The senator was not involved in creating an alternative list of voters and did not know in advance that it was going to be delivered to our office,” Henning said on Twitter.

US Rep. Bennie Thompson, chairman of the Jan. 6 committee, said “pressuring public servants to betray their oath was a critical part of the playbook” to ensure Trump’s victory. (Reporting by Richard Cowan, Patricia Zengerle, Doina Chiacu, Rose Horowitch, and Karen Freifeld; Editing by Scott Malone and Cynthia Osterman)