In a time of corrosive polarization and blinkered partisanship, America needed a dose of selflessness and courage. Cassidy Hutchinson provided it.
The former Trump White House aide pulled back the curtain on an unhinged president who cared only about self-image and self-preservation, a commander-in-chief willing to goad armed supporters to march on the Capitol because, as she quoted him as saying, “They’re not here to hurt me.”
She exposed Donald Trump for what he is — a dangerous narcissist who imperiled not only the lives of lawmakers, staffers and police at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, but democracy itself.
But she did much more. She reminded Americans that civic duty doesn’t have to, and should never, come second to political fealty.
Who knows what blowback from Trump World is in store for the 26-year-old Hutchinson, whether it’s an undermining of her political future, character assassination or whatever else. If the ramifications for doing the right thing were weighing on her mind, she certainly didn’t show it in two hours of riveting testimony that every American needed to hear.
In a calm, soft-spoken voice, Hutchinson, who at the time was a top aide for Trump’s chief of staff, Mark Meadows, explained how key figures in the White House, including Meadows, Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani and Trump himself, were aware about the potential for violence at the Capitol, and refused to act.
Some of the most damning testimony centered on the lead-up to the Jan. 6 rally at the Ellipse, where Trump had been informed that attendees were carrying weapons, including guns, knives and flagpoles fashioned into spears. Visibly angered, Trump told his team to take down security checkpoints outside the rally. His only concern was to amass as large of a crowd as possible. “Let my people in. They can march to the Capitol from here,” Hutchinson recounted Trump as saying.
Hutchinson came across as credible, earnest and detail-driven. When she did show emotion, it packed a punch. She spoke of her disgust with Trump’s Twitter post attacking Vice President Mike Pence while the insurrection was happening. “It was un-American,” Hutchinson said about Trump’s tweet. “We were watching the Capitol building get defaced over a lie.”
What’s paramount now is that Hutchinson’s revelatory testimony moves beyond the realm of spellbinding television and becomes a springboard for accountability.
It should lead to other key players in the events before and on Jan. 6, then-White House counsel Pat Cipollone and deputy chief of staff Tony Ornato, for example, to testify to corroborate — or refute, if warranted — her account. Cipollone has been subpoenaed by the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack, and to the extent that his testimony would not compromise attorney-client privilege, he should comply.
Moreover, if Hutchinson’s testimony helps the Justice Department determine any criminal culpability on the part of the former president or members of his circle, then so be it.
Trump and his team should be especially worried about suggestions from GOP Rep. Liz Cheney, the committee’s vice chairwoman, that someone within Trump’s camp may have engaged in witness tampering in an attempt to interfere in the committee’s work. If true, such an effort could lead to criminal prosecution.
As stunning as Hutchinson’s account was, it’s only one piece of a larger, unfolding mosaic from the committee that depicts Trump’s persistent attempts to subvert the results of the 2020 presidential election. At previous hearings, America learned that while Trump repeatedly had been told he lost the election, he continued to order loyalists to concoct schemes aimed at invalidating results in key states. He also tried to enlist the Justice Department in his quest to overturn the election.
All of this, with Hutchinson’s revelations, should become embedded in the minds of voters as they weigh candidates in upcoming November midterm elections, and in 2024.
Republican voters, in particular, must absorb the mounting evidence and decide what their party stands for.
Is it still anchored by blind loyalty to a reckless leader who actively worked to undermine the peaceful transition of power? Or are Republicans recommitted to the kind of patriotism and allegiance to American ideals that Hutchinson displayed on Tuesday?
For the sake of the Republican Party, and the future of American democracy, we hope it’s the latter.
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