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Ahead of Thursday’s Jan. 6 hearing, a couple of news items suggest we could be in store for some riveting revelations.
The Washington Post reported Wednesday morning that the committee is planning to reveal surveillance footage and emails obtained from the Secret Service that corroborate claims that former President Donald Trump knew his supporters were prepared to commit violence on Jan. 6.
According to the Post, the emails are among more than 1 million pages of records the committee has received from the Secret Service after the agency claimed that text messages exchanged by its agents on and around Jan. 6 had been permanently (and conveniently) deleted.
I didn’t buy that excuse at the time. Still don’t. But the Post said many of the records the committee received from the Secret Service were handed over voluntarily — including documents the committee didn’t even ask for. According to the Post, the records and surveillance footage appear to support parts of testimony from staffers like former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson, who claimed Trump demanded that armed supporters be allowed into a secure location during his pre-riot speech and also said Trump was enraged by Secret Service officials refusing to drive him to the Capitol.
The Post report coincides nicely with remarks made by Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., on CNN on Tuesday. During an interview, the Jan. 6 committee member hinted that Thursday’s hearing will touch on “close ties between people in Trump world and some of these extremist groups,” including details Lofgren said she found “pretty surprising.” Notably, her remarks come after a former member of the Oath Keepers extremist militia, which has members facing sedition charges related to Jan. 6, testified at trial that the organization’s founder was in contact with the Secret Service ahead of the attack on the Capitol.
For months, it looked like the Secret Service would be an obstacle preventing the committee from getting to the bottom of Trump and his team’s anti-democratic scheming. But now it seems the committee’s engagement with — or pressure on — the agency might be bearing fruit.
The House Jan. 6 committee is holding its ninth public hearing on Thursday, Oct. 13, at 1 p.m. ET. Get expert analysis in real time on our live blog at msnbc.com/jan6hearings.