Trump’s role in insurrection comes into view
WASHINGTON
— Donald
Trump’s hopes to run for president again in
2024 may be dashed by the accumulating evidence of his role in the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S.
Capitol.
More than 19 million Americans watched Thursday evening’s prime-time hearing held by the United States House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack. In this opener to the public phase of the congressional committee’s inquiry, Chair Bennie Thompson, DMississippi, and Vice Chair Liz Cheney, R-Wyoming, previewed evidence they believe shows that ex-President Donald Trump played a key role in encouraging supporters to attack the houses of Congress as members gathered to confirm the results of the 2020 election.
Thursday’s hearing also made the case that key Trump administration insiders — including the attorney general and the White House counsel — repeatedly informed Trump that his notions that the election was fraudulently denied to him were utterly unfounded. His own daughter testified that she did not believe the story that Trump told, which has come to be known as the Big Lie.
Concurrently, the U.S. Department of Justice is prosecuting hundreds of participants in the Jan. 6 insurrection. It has obtained a number of guilty pleas and has convinced many key witnesses to cooperate. A consistent theme of testimony from these participants is that they were there at the Capitol because Trump called them there.
Members of the paramilitary organizations the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers have been charged with seditious conspiracy. Key media figures in the Trump orbit, including Steve Bannon, Roger Stone and Alex Jones are strongly suspected to be under federal scrutiny as well, along with Trump’s personal lawyer Rudolph Giuliani. It’s clear the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers were executing a carefully coordinated plan to enter the Capitol on Jan. 6. It remains to be seen who in the administration, including the ex-president himself, was in on the planning.
Whatever legal jeopardy comes about for Trump personally — and there’s reason to believe it’s significant — the evidence publicized by the special committee and the Jan. 6 prosecutions will forever sully his reputation among Americans who cherish our constitutional order. At this point, it’s difficult to see how he recaptures the White House in 2024.
Meanwhile, President Joe Biden has stated his intention to seek reelection in 2024, his health permitting. At age 79 he is America’s oldest president, and he has already demonstrated the energy required as a hands-on chief executive. So far he has aggressively tackled the challenge of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, but he has been hobbled by the manner in which he withdrew U.S. forces from Afghanistan, and more recently by soaring inflation.
Biden has also received mixed public reaction to his selection of former California Sen. Kamala Harris as the first woman vice president. His efforts to give her considerable public exposure have fallen short in many critical eyes.
As for Biden himself, despite many energetic years in public service, doubts seem to remain regarding his informal style and a past history of verbal gaffes, raising questions about his “presidential” stature.
Finally, there is the matter of his standing in the public opinion surveys. Biden’s popularity has slipped into the low 40s, but the silver lining in all this is that the Republican Party is still in thrall to Trump, who is esteemed even less by the public.
As the select committee continues its work and informs the public — and even more so if the Justice Department sets its sights on Trump for prosecution — the disgraced ex-president will have a tougher time selling his Big Lie. Polls indicate fewer and fewer voters are buying it, and they don’t want another dose of him as president in 2024.