After a year-long investigation, a US House Committee investigating the January 6 Capitol Hill insurrection has revealed new video footage that showed a number of former President Donald Trump's trusted aides and advisers, including his daughter Ivanka Trump, explaining that they knew the election was not stolen.
In a piece of video evidence shared during the hearing, Ivanka, also the former president's one time White House adviser, is asked for her reaction to then-Attorney General William Barr saying that the 2020 election was not stolen.
"It affected my perspective. I respect Attorney General Barr so I accepted what he said," Ivanka Trump testified. The clip was the first time the committee presented any testimony from Ivanka Trump, though more is expected.
The former Attorney General was also seen noting that Trump's claims of a stolen election were "bullsh**."
"I had three discussions with the president that I can recall," Barr said in his testimony.
"...I made it clear that I did not agree with the idea of saying the election was stolen and putting out this stuff, which I told the president was bullsh**. And I didn't want to be a part of it and that's one of the reasons that went into me deciding to leave when I did. I observed, I think it was Dec. 1, that you can't live in a world where the incumbent administration stays in power based on its view, unsupported by specific evidence. that there was fraud in the election," he said.
The chairman of the congressional panel probing the deadly 2021 US Capitol attack by Trump supporters opened the hearing on Thursday.
The committee will hold six hearings, where it intends to detail a conspiracy by Donald Trump to overturn the election that ultimately led to a violent insurrection meant to stop Congress from certifying the 2020 election results.
The hearings could lead to prosecutions and new laws to strengthen election security going forward.
One of the two Republicans on the committee, its vice-chair Representative Liz Cheney, opened by blaming Trump for the violence that followed his false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him.
"Those who invaded our Capitol and battled law enforcement for hours were motivated by what President Trump had told them: That the election was stolen and that he was the rightful president," Cheney said. "President Trump summoned the mob, assembled the mob and lit the flame of this attack."
January 6 committee also aired violent, previously unseen footage of rioters beating US capitol police and smashing way into the building.
( With inputs from ANI )
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