The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol will hold its next hearing at 1 p.m. ET on Tuesday, June 21. Georgia and Arizona election officials are set to appear before the committee. The hearing will focus on former President Donald Trump’s attempts to pressure state officials to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
According to Jan. 6 committee aides, the testimony “will demonstrate that President Trump and his allies drove a pressure campaign based on lies.” Those claims put state and local election officials at risk.
Aides also said the hearing will show how the Trump campaign organized slates of false electors in states Trump lost to Joe Biden in an attempt to disrupt congressional proceedings to certify the election on Jan. 6, 2021.
Georgia and Arizona take center stage
Today’s hearing is the fourth in a series of hearings held by the committee over the past two weeks. The panel is attempting to make a case that Trump was responsible for the deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and Gabriel Sterling, chief operating officer at the Georgia secretary of state’s office, are among those scheduled to testify on Tuesday.
Raffensperger and Sterling, both Republicans, defended the state’s handling of the 2020 election under public and private pressure from Trump and his allies to overturn President Biden’s victory in Georgia. Raffensperger recorded a phone call he had with Trump in which the then-president told him to “find” enough votes to flip the state. Trump endorsed Georgia GOP Rep. Jody Hice in an unsuccessful primary bid against Raffensperger last month.
Another witness will be Shaye Moss, a Georgia election worker who was the target of a conspiracy theory spread by Trump and his lawyer Rudy Giuliani, along with her mother. Their family was inundated with violent and racist threats, NPR reports.
Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers, also a Republican, is expected to appear in person to tell how he came under direct pressure from Trump and Giuliani. The committee said former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows will also come under scrutiny. Other witnesses may also appear on video.
Rep. Adam Schiff, D-California, is expected to lead the hearing.
Trump claims videos ‘doctored’
Clearly upset by the testimony coming out of the select committee’s hearings, Trump on Friday called the investigation “fake and phony” and claimed the video interviews presented so far had been “doctored.” He made his commets during a speech at the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s policy conference on Friday.
The past three hearings focused on how Trump knew that the voter fraud conspiracies were false but pursued claims that the election was stolen anyways, as well as his pressure on then-Vice President Mike Pence to refuse to certify the electoral votes on Jan. 6.
In-person and video testimonies so far have featured mostly Republicans, including Trump aides and allies like former Attorney General Bill Barr, former impeachment attorney Eric Herschmann and conservative lawyer and former federal judge Michael Luttig. The committee has also shared taped testimony from Trump’s daughter Ivanka and her husband Jared Kushner.
The committee is expected to release a comprehensive report on its findings in September.
How to watch hearing
Tuesday’s hearing may be viewed on all major television and cable news networks and will be livestreamed by the Jan. 6 House select committee starting at 1 p.m. The livestream may be viewed above or directly on the committee’s YouTube channel by clicking here.
