We’ll show Trump knew he lost the election, say Jan. 6 panel leaders

The second public hearing of the special House committee on the Jan. 6, 2021, siege of the U.S. Capitol will show that former President Donald Trump knew he lost the 2020 election, contrary to his claims, according to panel leaders.

The hearing, set to start at 10 a.m. on Monday, also will look at the spread of disinformation used to fuel the violent attack, they said.

“We’re going to examine the lies that convinced those men and others to storm the Capitol to try to stop the transfer of power,” said committee Chairman Rep. Bennie Thompson at the initial hearing Thursday.

“We’re going to take a close look at the first part of Trump’s attack on the rule of law when he [lit] the fuse that ultimately resulted in the violence of Jan. 6,” the Mississippi Democrat said.

As in the first hearing, the next installment is likely to include previously unseen excerpts from more than 1,000 interviews investigators conducted behind closed doors.

“In our second hearing, you will see that

Donald Trump and his advisers knew that he had in fact lost the election,” Rep. Liz Cheney, the committee’s vice chairwoman, said at the first hearing.

“But despite this, President Trump engaged in a massive effort to spread false and fraudulent information to convince huge portions of the U.S. population that fraud had stolen the election from him,” said the Wyoming Republican.

Expected to testify are former Trump campaign manager William Stepien and former Fox News political director Chris Stirewalt, as well as election lawyer Benjamin Ginsberg and former Philadelphia City

Commissioner Al Schmidt.

Also expected to testify is Byung “BJay” Pak, who reportedly told investigators he resigned as U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Georgia in January 2021 because he believed Trump was going to fire him.

A third hearing, set for Wednesday morning, will focus on Trump’s efforts to install an attorney general who would back his false claims of election fraud, Cheney said.

She said four more hearings are likely after that, but they have not yet been scheduled.