Mr. Schiff, for an opening
statement.
Rep. Schiff: Thank you.
On November 3, 2020, Donald
Trump ran for reelection and he
lost.
His opponent, Joe Biden finished
ahead in the key battleground
states of Arizona, Michigan,
Wisconsin, Georgia, and
elsewhere.
Nevertheless and for the first
time in history, a losing
presidential candidate fought to
hold onto power.
As we've seen in previous
hearings, he did so through a
variety of means.
On election day he sought to
stop the counting of the vote,
knowing that the millions of
absentee ballots elections
officials would be counting on
election day and thereafter
would run strongly against him
and deliver victory to Joe
Biden.
When he could not stop the
counting he tried to stop state
legislatures and governors from
certifying the results of the
election.
He went to court and filed
dozens of frivolous lawsuits
taking unsubstantiated claims of
fraud.
When not too failed, he mounted
a pressure campaign directed at
individual state legislators to
try to get them to go back into
session and either declare him
the winner, decertify Joe Biden
as the winner, or send two
slates of electors to congress,
one for Biden and one for him,
and pressure vice president
pence to choose him as the
winner.
But the state legislatures
wouldn't go along with the
scheme and neither with the vice
president.
None of the legislatures agreed
to go back into special session
and declare him the winner.
No legitimate state authority in
the states Donald Trump lost
would agree to appoint fake
trump electors and send them to
congress.
But this didn't stop the trump
campaign either.
They assembled groups of
individuals in battleground
states and got them to call
themselves electors, created
phony certificates and
transmitted these certificates
to Washington and to the
congress to be counted during
the joint session of congress on
January 6.
None of this worked.
But according to federal
district judge David Carter,
former president trump and
others likely violated multiple
federal laws by engaging in this
scheme, including conspiracy to
defraud the United States.
You will hear evidence of the
former president and his top
advisers' direct involvement in
key elements of this plot or
what judge Carter called a coup
in search of a legal theory.
For as the judge explained,
president trump's pressure
campaign to stop the electoral
count did not end with vice
president pence.
It targeted every tier of state
and federal elected officials,
convincing them to certify
competing election -- electors
was essential to stop account
and ensure his reelection.
As we have seen, running through
this scheme was a big lie that
the election was plagued with
massive fraud and somehow stolen
.
You will remember what the
president's own attorney general
bill Barr said he told the
president about these claims of
massive fraud affecting the
outcome of the election.
>> And I told him that the stuff
that his people were shoveling
out to the public was bull---
the claims of fraud were bull --
rep. Schiff: His lies were and
are a cancer on the body of
politic.
If you convince Americans they
cannot trust their elections and
if they lose it is illegitimate,
then what is left but violence
to determine who should govern?
This brings us to the focus,
when state officials refused to
stop account, Donald Trump and
his campaign tried to put
pressure on them.
When state officials failed to
certify him in states he lost,
they applied more pressure.
When they refused to go back in
session, he amped up the
pressure yet again.
Anyone who got in the way of
Donald Trump's continued hold on
power after he lost the election
was the subject of a dangerous
and escalating campaign of
pressure.
This pressure campaign brought
angry phone calls and texts,
armed protests, intimidation,
and all too often threats of
violence and death.
State legislators were singled
out.
So too were statewide elections
officials.
Even local elections workers
diligently doing their jobs were
accused of being criminals and
had their lives turned upside
down.
As we will show, the president's
supporters heard his claims of
fraud and false allegations he
made against state and local
officials as a call to action.
>> Stop the steel!
Stop the steel!
You are a threat to democracy.
You are a threat to free and
honest elections.
>> We love our rights and our
freedom.
>> You are a tyrant.
You must turn yourself in.
>> And then about 45 minutes
later we started to hear the
noises outside my home and
that's when my stomach stop --
sunk and it's me.
We don't know.
The uncertainty of that was what
was the fear.
Are they coming with guns?
Will they attack my house?
I am here with my kid, trying to
put him to bed.
That was the scariest moment
just not knowing what was going
to happen.
Rep. Schiff: This pressure
campaign against state and local
officials spanned numerous
contested states as you will see
in this video produced by the
select committee.
>> My name is Josh, and
investigative counsel for the
house select committee to
investigate the January 6
account -- attack.
The president and his lawyers
started appearing before state
legislators, urging them to give
electoral votes to trump even
though he lost the popular vote.
>> I represent president trump
along with Jenna Ellis.
This is our fourth or fifth
hearing.
>> This election has to be
turned around because we won
Pennsylvania by a lot and we won
all of these swing states by a
lot.
>> This was a strategy with
practical and legal elements.
The committee obtained in email
from two days after the election
in which a campaign lawyer asked
another lawyer John Eastman to
write a memo justifying the
idea.
>> When do you remember this
coming up as an option in the
postelection period for the
first time?
>> Right after the election.
It might have been before the
election.
>> Eastman prepared a memo to
justify the strategy was
circulated to the white house,
Rudy Giuliani's team and state
legislators around the country,
and appeared before the state
legislature to advocate
publicly.
>> You could do what the Florida
legislator is supposed to do,
elect a slate of electors
yourself.
When you add in the technical
anomalies and evidence of
outright election fraud, I don't
think it is your authority to do
that but I think you have a duty
to do that, to protect the
integrity of the election here
in Georgia.
>> Republican officials in
several states released
statements recognizing president
trump's proposal was unlawful.
Governor Brian Kemp called the
proposal unconstitutional while
rusty bowers wrote that the idea
would undermine the rule of law.
The pressure campaign to get
state legislators to go along
with the scheme intensified when
he invited delegations from
Michigan and Pennsylvania to the
white house.
>> Did you make the point to the
president you were not going to
do anything that violated
Michigan law?
>> I believe we did.
Whether or not it was those
exact words, I think the words
that I would have more likely
used was we are going to follow
the law.
>> Nevertheless, the pressure
continued.
President trump tweeted "
hopefully the courts and/or
legislatures have the courage to
do what has to be done to
maintain the integrity of our
elections and the United States
of America itself.
The world is watching." He
posted multiple messages on
Facebook listing contact
information for officials and
urging supporters to "Demand a
vote on decertification."
President trump disclosed a
personal phone number to
millions of followers.
>> All I remember is receiving
over -- just shy of 4000 text
messages over a short period of
time, calling to take action.
Then there was a loud noise,
loud consistent case of, we hear
that the trump folks are calling
and asking for changes in the
electors and you guys can do
this.
They were believing things that
were untrue.
>> These efforts involved
targeting research to state
legislators.
>> My name is Angela calling
from the trump campaign in
Washington.
You do have the power to reclaim
-- and send a slate of electors
that will support president
trump and vice president pence.
>> When president trump's
lawyers and from trump himself
-- >> I've become friendly with
legislators I did know four
weeks ago.
>> Pennsylvania house speaker
Brian Cutler received daily
voicemails from trump's lawyers.
>> This is Rudy Giuliani and
Jenna Ellis calling you together
because we would like to discuss
obviously the election.
>> Hello, Mr. Speaker, this is
Jenna Ellis here with mayor
Giuliani.
>> Hey, Brian, it's Rudy.
I have something important to
call your attention that I think
really changes things.
>> Cutler felt the outreach was
inappropriate and asked his
lawyers to tell Rudy Giuliani to
stop calling but he continued to
reach out.
>> I understand you don't want
to talk to me now.
I just wanted to bring some
facts to your attention and talk
to you as a fellow Republican.
>> December 30, Steve Bannon
announced a protest at Cutler's
home.
>> We are getting on the road
and going to Cutler, offices and
homes and let them know what we
think.
>> There were multiple protests.
I don't remember the exact
number, at least three I think,
outside either my district
office or my home.
You are correct, my then
15-year-old son was home by
himself.
All of my personal information
was online.
It was my personal email,
personal cell phone, home phone
number.
We had to disconnect our home
phone for about three days
because it would ring all hours
of the night and would fill up
with messages.
>> Brian Cutler, we are outside.
>> Facing felony charges in
Michigan, poll watchers denied
access.
>> These ads were another
effort.
The trump campaign spent
millions running ads online and
on television.
>> The evidence is overwhelming.
Paul and demand they inspect the
machines.
>> Public pressure often grew
dangerous in the lead up to
January 6.
>> [Chanting "Let us in"]
>> [Chanting "Special session"]
>> We will light the whole thing
on fire.
>> What can we do?
I am not advising that but what
else can we do?
>> The punishment for treason is
death.
Rep. Schiff: The state pressure
campaign and the danger it posed
to state officials and the state
capitols around the nation was a
dangerous precursor to the
violence on January 6 at the
U.S. Capitol.
You will hear from rusty bowers,
the Republican speaker of the
house of representatives and
will tell us about his
conversations with Rudy Giuliani
and John Eastman, and what they
asked of him and how his oath of
office would not permit it.
You will then hear from Brad
raffensperger, Republican
secretary of state of Georgia
who trump erected to "Find
11,780 votes" that did not
exist, just the number needed to
overtake Joe Biden.
He will also hear from Gabriel
sterling, his chief operating
officer of the spurious claims
of fraud in the election in
Georgia and who responding to a
cascading set of threats to his
team warned the president to
stop, that someone was going to
get killed.
And you will hear from wandrea'
moss, a former elections worker
in Fulton county, Georgia, about
how all of the lies impacted the
lives of real people who
administer our elections and
still do.
You will hear what they
experienced when the most
powerful man in the world, the
president of the United States
sought to cling to power after
being voted out of office by the
American people.
The system held but barely.
The system held because people
of courage, Republicans and
Democrats like the witnesses you
will hear today, but their oath
to the country and constitution
above any other consideration.