Donald Trump is still publicly raging about Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide in his presidential administration who publicly testified last week to the House committee investigating the Capitol riot. At that point, she’d already privately spoken to the panel several times.
“So Cassidy Hutchinson was all set and ready to go to Florida with the Trump Team long after January 6th,” Trump ranted on Truth Social this Sunday morning. There’s no apparent indication there’s any legitimacy to that claim. “She knew I did nothing wrong. She was a big Trump fan – but my people didn’t want her. What happened? Why did she so dramatically change? All lies. I guess even she didn’t believe her own bull….!” the former president angrily added. Trump has essentially spent days publicly going after Hutchinson, as though he’s publicly attempting to engage in what’s essentially witness intimidation.
“How did the Great State of Arkansas ever have a total RINO Stiff like Asa Hutchinson as their Governor. Any relationship to Lyin’ Cassidy Hutchinson, another real loser?” Trump added Sunday. The governor, a Republican, recently stated he wouldn’t support Trump in 2024 in the event he runs for the presidency.
A message shared at the end of the recent public hearing featuring Hutchinson displayed an apparent attempt at witness intimidation targeting Hutchinson. During the hearing, panel members didn’t identify who received the message, but later reporting identified the target as Hutchinson. “[A person] let me know you have your deposition tomorrow. He wants me to let you know that he’s thinking about you. He knows you’re loyal, and you’re going to do the right thing when you go in for your deposition,” the message said. The referenced person — whose identity was excluded in the panel’s public presentation of the message — was reportedly former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, with whom Hutchinson worked.
Hutchinson apparently received that message before her private March 7 appearance to the January 6 committee. During her more recent public appearance, Hutchinson — and the committee, using footage of past testimony she provided — revealed an array of startling details about what went on inside the Trump administration around the time of the Capitol riot. She says she personally witnessed a conversation where then-President Trump acknowledged and basically accepted the threat posed by weapons in the pro-Trump crowd in D.C. on January 6. According to Hutchinson, he wanted magnetometers used in the security screening process for his January 6 rally removed, remarking that attendees could head to the Capitol from the place the rally unfolded. Something along those lines would implicate Trump in inciting violence he apparently knew could be even more dangerous, considering the weapons.
Trump, Hutchinson helped reveal, was also apparently extremely intent on going to the Capitol on January 6 (which he never did). According to the former aide, then-White House counsel Pat Cipollone was concerned about potential criminal charges including something along the lines of obstructing justice if Trump went. It’s unclear what precisely the then-president might have done there, had he gone. Meeting with members of Congress in an attempt to influence their vote on whether to certify the 2020 election outcome would’ve probably been on the agenda, one could imagine.
