The house committee is continuing its investigation into the January 6 attack on the US capital, focusing on former President Donald Trump’s false election fraud claims in 2020.
Monday, June 13, 2022 marked day two of the January 6 public hearings. Key witness and former Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien was not in attendance because his wife was in labor. In his absence, the committee presented some parts of his previous testimony.
Bill Stepien, Former Trump Campaign Manager, said, “I didn’t think what was happening was necessarily honest or professional at that point and time.”
Stepien’s testimony was used to support the committee’s argument as further evidence that former President Donald Trump had already begun the narrative spreading false information about the 2020 election — before any proper investigation could be conducted for evidence of the voter fraud allegations.
The committee says when Trump was advised that he lost the 2020 election, he refused to listen to his legal team and chose to run with the conspiracy of a stolen election instead.
Many local election officials were in attendance including Philadelphia’s former City Commissioner Al Schmidt, who investigated the fraud claims.
Al Schmidt, a former Republican City Commissioner in Philadelphia, said, “Not only was there not evidence of 8,000 dead voters voting in Pennsylvania, there wasn’t evidence of eight.”
The committee is using the testimonies of the former President’s closest allies to build a case that Trump incited violence and was essentially responsible for the attack on Capitol Hill on January 6th.
