Cipollone and others feared resigning would make things worse
As some Trump administration staffers resigned in the wake of Jan. 6, others were worried that leaving the president to his own devices would put the country at further risk, Kinzinger said.
The committee aired interviews with some of those people.
Cipollone said he considered resigning but had concerns that his replacement "might be somebody who had been giving bad advice."
Eugene Scalia, who was secretary of labor, said, "I thought that trying to work within the administration to steady the ship was likely to have greater value than simply resigning," adding that he would have been "powerless" to effect change within the administration if he resigned.
On the morning of Jan. 7, Scalia said he sought a meeting of the Cabinet, putting the request in a memo to Trump.
"I believe it is important to know that while president, you will no longer publicly question the election results," Scalia wrote in the memo, which was displayed by the committee.
Jason Miller said he disagreed with Trump on orderly transition statement
Jason Miller, a Trump campaign adviser, told the committee that after the joint session had resumed on Jan. 6, he heard nothing from Trump or the White House about assuring the country there would be a peaceful transfer of power.
Miller then decided to draft a statement and called the president at 9:23 p.m. to persuade him to release it.
Asked if Trump disagreed with what he wrote in the statement, Miller told the committee in video testimony aired during the hearing, "I’d say just that he wanted to say 'peaceful transition,' and I said, 'That ship’s kind of already sailed, so we’re going to say 'orderly transition.'"
"That was about the extent of disagreement or pushback from the conversation," he said.
Trump ended Jan. 6 by telling White House employee, 'Pence let me down'
At 6:27 p.m., just minutes after lauding the mob as "great patriots" on Twitter, Trump departed the White House dining room to go up to the residence for the night, Kinzinger said, as the panel displayed a photograph of Trump from that evening.
"As he was gathering his things in the dining room to leave, President Trump reflected on the day’s events with a White House employee," Kinzinger said.
According to Kinzinger, the employee had met Trump earlier in the day in the Oval Office after he returned from his speech at the Ellipse. During the evening encounter, Trump did not mention the riot, but instead the employee said the then-president said, “Mike Pence let me down.”
Matthews 'disturbed' by Trump's final video statement, called president's behavior 'indefensible'
Matthews said in live testimony that Trump's refusal to act and call off the mob on Jan. 6 was "indefensible" and she decided to resign that evening.
Matthews said she was "shocked" to see that Trump began his video statement at 4:17 p.m. "by pushing the lie that there was a stolen election."
"And as the video went on, I felt a small sense of relief because he finally told these people to go home," she said. "But that was immediately followed up by him saying, 'We love you. You’re very special.' And that was disturbing to me because he didn’t distinguish between those that peacefully attended his speech earlier that day and those that we watched cause violence at the Capitol."
"As a spokesperson for him, I knew that I would be asked to defend that and his refusal to act and call off the mob that day, and his refusal to condemn the violence was indefensible, and so I knew that I would be resigning that evening."
Kinzinger said Trump 'showed absolutely no remorse' in final Jan. 6 tweet
Kinzinger said that while everyone was working to get Congress back into session on the evening of Jan. 6, Trump "justified the violence" in his last tweet of the day.
"After officers engaged in multiple hours of hand-to-hand combat, with over a hundred of them sustaining injuries, President Trump tweeted at 6:01 and justified the violence as a natural response to the election," Kinzinger said.
A minute after the citywide curfew took effect, Trump tweeted: "These are the things and events that happen when a sacred landslide election victory is so unceremoniously & viciously stripped away from great patriots who have been badly & unfairly treated for so long. Go home with love & in peace. Remember this day forever!"
Kinzinger said that Trump "called the mob 'great patriots.' He told people to remember the day forever. He showed absolutely no remorse."
Herschmann says everyone at White House was 'drained'
After Trump recorded the video telling his supporters to leave the Capitol, White House lawyer Eric Herschmann said the White House basically closed up shop.
"When he finished his video, I think everyone was, like, day’s over. People were pretty drained," Herschmann said.
Asked to repeat how people were feeling by that point, Herschmann said, "Drained."
"There were people in the Capitol, but I believe by this stage, you know, law enforcement — I’d have to go back and look, but I believe law enforcement was either there or moving in, or going to take charge," he said. "I don’t think there was anything else to do. I’d just say people were emotionally drained by the time that videotape was done."
Committee plays new video of Schumer and McConnell calling DOD for help
With Trump refusing to do more, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., called acting Secretary of Defense Chris Miller for help, Luria said.
In video of their 4:45 p.m. call on Jan. 6, aired for the first time by the committee, McConnell told Miller: "We're not gonna let these people keep us from finishing our business. So, we need you to get the building cleared, give us the OK, so we can go back in session and finish up the people's business as soon as possible."
Schumer asked Miller when lawmakers could "safely resume" proceedings in the House and Senate chambers.
"I’d prefer to be on the ground, which I personally would prefer to be right now," Miller replied. "I would say, best case, we’re looking at four to five hours."
In recorded video, Trump ignored script telling rioters to leave Capitol
Trump's staff had prepared a script for him to record a video message in the Rose Garden calling on his supporters to immediately leave the Capitol, but "he refused to use it," Luria said.
An excerpt of the prepared remarks presented at the hearing and stamped "President Has Seen" said: “I am asking you to leave the Capitol Hill region NOW and go home in a peaceful way.”
The committee then played footage of Trump's speech in the Rose Garden, in which he omitted the line.
When asked if Trump had used any of the written remarks, Nick Luna, who served as Trump's personal aide and was present for the taping, said that to his knowledge, the president was "off the cuff."
Matthews says another Trump aide said condemning the violence would be 'handing a win to the media'
Sarah Matthews said in live testimony that a conversation unfolded in the White House press office on Jan. 6 about Trump's latest two tweets being insufficient.
"A colleague suggested that the president shouldn’t condemn the violence because they thought it would be 'handing a win to the media,'" Matthews said during the hearing.
"I disagreed. I thought that we should condemn the violence and condemn it unequivocally. And I thought that he needed to include a call to action and to tell these people to go home, and a debate ensued over it," she said.
Matthews said she became "visibly frustrated" and her colleagues were aware.
"I couldn’t believe that we’re arguing over this and in the middle of the West Wing," she said, about concerns over the politics of a tweet. "So I motioned up at the TV, and I said, 'Do you think it looks like we’re effing winning? Because I don’t think it does.'"