The Jan. 6 committee focused its fifth hearing on then-President Donald Trump's efforts to pressure the Justice Department to aid in his campaign to overturn the 2020 election.
The efforts, public and private, culminated in an Oval Office meeting just days ahead of the Jan. 6 riot in which top Justice officials threatened to resign if Trump went through with a plan to install Jeffrey Clark atop the agency because he was willing to assist in Trump's plans.
Three former senior Justice Department officials who rebuffed Trump at the time testified live: Jeffrey Rosen, the acting attorney general; Richard Donoghue, the acting deputy attorney general; and Steven Engel, who led the department’s Office of Legal Counsel.
Thursday's hearing is the last one this month after the committee decided to push the final scheduled hearings into July, a move lawmakers said would allow more time to process new information.
Key highlights from Day 5:
- At least five House Republicans — including Reps. Mo Brooks of Alabama, Matt Gaetz of Florida, Andy Biggs of Arizona, Louie Gohmert of Texas and Scott Perry of Pennsylvania — asked Trump’s White House for presidential pardons after the Capitol riot, according to testimony from former White House officials, aides and attorneys shown by the Jan. 6 committee.
- Donoghue testified that Trump told him and Rosen in December to "just say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressmen.”
- Donoghue's testimony puts GOP Rep. Scott Perry at the center of effort to elevate Clark.
Kinzinger: ‘Allegation of a stolen election was a lie’
Trump hits back against committee
During Thursday's hearing, Trump took to his Truth Social platform to slam the committee and its methods.
"Has there ever been a time in Congress where a member is allowed, without any cross examination of any kind, to read lengthy and often untruthful statements, not from notes or other papers, BUT FROM A TELEPROMPTER?" Trump posted.
"This is a Kangaroo Court the likes of which we have never seen in this Country!" he added.
Trump also repeated false and disproven claims about voter fraud and referred to the movie “2000 Mules.”
"Such lies by the Unselects!" he wrote.
Sen. Ron Johnson blames GOP congressman for texts between top staffer and former Pence aide
Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., on Thursday addressed texts between his chief of staff and an aide to then-Vice President Mike Pence about an alternate slate of electors.
Earlier this week, after the committee revealed the text message exchange, Johnson said he didn't know where the alternate slate of electors came from. But in an interview with a local conservative radio show on Thursday, Johnson said he was able to "refresh" his memory.
"We found out now this came from Pennsylvania Congressman Mike Kelly’s office. We couldn’t even remember who delivered this to us," Johnson said. "We didn’t know what it was, we thought it was documents involved in the electors. Once we got it, again I didn’t know it, I was probably already up in the Senate. OK? So they found out they were the alternate slate of electors. Not only from Wisconsin, but from Michigan, which is odd. You know."
Matt Knoedler, Kelly's press secretary, however, quickly denied having anything to do with the alternate slate of electors.
"Senator Johnson’s statements about Representative Kelly are patently false," Knoedler said in a statement Thursday. "Mr. Kelly has not spoken to Sen. Johnson for the better part of a decade, and he has no knowledge of the claims Mr. Johnson is making related to the 2020 election."
GOP Rep. Brooks, who allegedly sought Trump pardon, says he would sit for deposition — if committee meets his conditions
Rep. Mo Brooks, R-Ala., who sought a presidential pardon from Trump, according to committee testimony revealed Thursday, said after the hearing that he would agree to sit for a deposition if the panel meets certain conditions.
Brooks said that the deposition must be held in public and that the scope of questions posed to him must be relevant to and limited to events surrounding the attack on the Capitol.
He also said he would only accept a deposition in which questions are asked by members of Congress who serve on the committee and not by staffers or people who aren't lawmakers.
"If a deposition is important enough to demand the time of a Congressman who is deposed, then it is similarly important enough to also demand the time of Committee Congressmen," he said in a press release.
Brooks further said that the committee would need to provide him with documentation of any statements or communications the committee would want to ask him about at least seven days beforehand and said that any deposition must take place on a day that votes are being held on the House floor, when he'll be in Washington.
The Republican said he would only sit for a deposition if all of his conditions were met.
In closing remarks, Cheney pleads with Republicans to 'accept Trump abused your trust'
In closing remarks, Kinzinger said Trump's efforts to replace Jeffrey Rosen with Jeffrey Clark were "a power play to win at all costs — with no regard for the will of the American people."
"Facts were clearly just an inconvenience," he added.
Cheney praised the witnesses and then turned her attention to the millions of Americans who voted for Trump.
"In these hearings so far, you have heard from more than a dozen Republicans who have told you what actually happened in the weeks before January 6th," she said. "It can be difficult to accept that President Trump abused your trust. That he deceived you. Many will invent excuses to ignore that fact. But that is a fact. I wish it was not true. But it is."
Gaetz, Gohmert, Biggs, Brooks, Perry: GOP lawmakers who allegedly sought pardons from Trump revealed in testimony
At least five House Republicans — including Reps. Mo Brooks of Alabama, Matt Gaetz of Florida, Andy Biggs of Arizona, Louie Gohmert of Texas and Scott Perry of Pennsylvania — asked Trump’s White House for presidential pardons after the Capitol riot, according to testimony from former White House attorneys and aides shown by the Jan. 6 committee Thursday.
The White House discussed providing blanket pardons for any members who objected to the election results, according to testimony to the committee.
Five days after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, Brooks wrote an email to the White House, obtained by the committee, that said “pursuant to a request from Matt Gaetz” he requested pardons for himself and “every congressman and senator who voted to reject the electoral vote submissions from Arizona and Pennsylvania.”
The committee also showed video of testimony from Herschmann who, when asked if Gaetz requested a pardon, replied, “I believe so.”
The committee also showed another video of Cassidy Hutchinson, an aide to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, saying that Gaetz, Brooks, Gohmert, Perry and Biggs had requested pardons. She said that Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, had “talked about” pardons … but he never asked me for one.”
She said that Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., never contacted her but that she’d “heard that [Greene] had asked White House Counsel’s Office for a pardon.”
Summing up that turn of events, Kinzinger said: “The only reason I know to ask for a pardon is because you think you’ve committed a crime.”
NBC News has reached out to all six Republican members of Congress who allegedly sought pardons for comment.
When asked to confirm testimony that he sought a pardon, Gaetz's office pointed to a tweet the Florida Republican sent Thursday calling the committee an "unconstitutional political sideshow." His office did not say whether or not he sought the pardon.
Greene's office also pointed to a tweet. "Saying 'I heard' means you don’t know," Greene tweeted, accusing the committee of spreading "gossip and lies."
Trump DOJ officials detail Oval Office meeting just before Jan. 6
On Jan. 3, top Justice Department officials such as Jeff Rosen and Richard Donoghue were summoned to the White House to meet with Trump in the Oval Office.
The meeting was entirely focused on changing the leadership at the Justice Department, Donoghue said. Jeffrey Clark was there as well, and he was advocating for a change that would lead to him running DOJ.
Donoghue said making such a change would hurt both Trump and the country. He said he repeatedly made the point that Clark was not qualified to run the Justice Department.
Trump seemed to back off when the Justice Department officials said there would be mass resignations if Clark was installed at the top.
Rosen, Donoghue said they did not speak to Trump on Jan. 6
Rosen and Donoghue said during their live testimony that they didn't speak to Trump on Jan. 6.
Rosen said that he spent the day at the Department of Justice and spoke to DOJ officials, Cabinet officials, officials from the Departments of Homeland Security, Defense and Interior, congressional leaders and members of Congress. He also said he spoke to then-Vice President Mike Pence twice that day.
"I received calls from Speaker Pelosi, from Leader McCarthy, from Leader Schumer, Leader McConnell’s chief of staff called, a number of other members of Congress, as well," he said. "And you know, the basic thrust of the calls with members of Congress was — there’s a dire situation here and can you help."
Rosen said that DOJ sent more than 500 agents from the FBI, ATF and U.S. Marshals to "assist with restoring order to the Capitol."
Donoghue said he was at the Capitol to help reconvene the joint session at the Capitol on Jan. 6 and confirmed he also didn't speak to Trump that day.
Donoghue says he asked DOJ official in national security division not to participate in mass resignation plot
During a phone call that occurred before the contentious Jan. 3 White House meeting, Donoghue said that a group of assistant attorneys general all agreed they would resign en masse if Trump replaced Rosen with Clark. Donoghue said that he directed the assistant attorney general of the national security division, John Demers, not to resign.
Donoghue said the assistant attorneys general said they would resign “without hesitation” and that they would leave the department if Trump fired Rosen. He said that he told Demers not to resign because his position was too important to be left open.
Rosen: 'I wasn’t going to accept being fired by my subordinate'
Rosen described an unusual scenario in which Clark, knowing Trump wanted him to replace Rosen as attorney general, threatened to fire Rosen if he didn’t sign a fraudulent letter to elected officials in Georgia warning about voter fraud.
Rosen refused to sign the letter, and on the next day, Jan. 3, Clark told Rosen he’d accepted the president’s offer to be the new attorney general — a move Rosen objected to.
“I wasn’t going to accept being fired by my subordinate,” Rosen testified Thursday.