‘Deliberate, planned and premeditated’
House prosecutors lay out evidence against former President Trump
WASHINGTON — With graphic footage of the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol and repeated use of former President Donald Trump’s own words, House impeachment managers laid out their case Wednesday, accusing him of engaging in a “deliberate, planned and premeditated” effort to incite a mob to attack Congress.
The riot was foreseeable and intentional, House prosecutors said. In the words of one of the impeachment managers, Rep. Ted Lieu, D-calif., it came about because “President Donald J. Trump ran out of nonviolent options to maintain power.”
The prosecutors capped their arguments with previously unseen footage from Capitol security cameras and police body cameras, showing how close the mob came to catching members of Congress during the attack. One video showed Senate Democratic leader Charles E. Schumer of New York and his security detail evacuating up a hallway in the Capitol complex, then abruptly turning and scrambling the other way after officers realized they were heading toward the mob.
Another showed Capitol Police Officer Eugene Goodman stopping Sen. Mitt Romney, Rutah, who was running down a Capitol hallway in the wrong direction toward the rioters. A few moments later, Goodman diverted rioters away from the Senate chamber, an act for which he has been widely hailed as a hero.
Romney told reporters that he learned only during the video presentation that Goodman was the officer who may have saved his life. The two were later seen by reporters talking on the Senate floor.
The rioters “were just feet away from one of the doors of this chamber, where many of you remained at that time,” House Delegate Stacey Plaskett of the Virgin Islands told senators as she presented the video.
During the opening minutes of the attack, Vice President Mike Pence, who had been evacuated from the Senate chamber, was in a room less than 100 feet from the attackers, Plaskett said as she played videos of rioters shouting, “Hang Mike Pence.”
The day’s arguments, and the video testimony in particular, served two purposes: reminding senators of how much Trump’s incitement of the mob put them and their staffs in personal danger, and shaping how the wider public sees the dramatic events.
Within the Senate, the video clearly had an impact. Earlier in the afternoon, some senators had read paperwork or doodled on notebooks as House impeachment managers spoke, but during the video presentations, many stared intently at the screens set up in the chamber.
“It was extremely quiet. You could have heard a pin drop,” Sen. Susan Collins, R-maine, said.
“The House managers are making a very strong case,” Sen. Lisa Murkowski , Ralaska, said when the Senate recessed for dinner after seeing the videos. “The evidence that has been presented thus far is pretty damning.”