It is the duty of every American to watch the House January 6 Select Committee’s hearings on the attempted coup that Donald Trump and his followers instigated in an attempt to thwart the peaceful transfer of power to the duly and lawfully elected candidate, Joe Biden.
The first of eight planned hearings aired on Thursday, June 9. It served as an opening statement, detailing the actions that Trump took – and in some instances, the actions that he didn’t take – in an attempt to overthrow the seat of American government and the will of the American people. If you missed the first three hearings, I will link to YouTube videos of each.
I’m writing this because we are at a crisis point in American democracy. If you’ve been paying attention, the first congressional hearing probably didn’t tell you much which you didn’t already know. But it also featured revelations about the failed coup that the committee kept secret until now.
There were new clips of sworn testimony by those in Trump’s innermost circle, like his attorney general, Bill Barr, and his own daughter, Ivanka Trump, which the public had never before seen. There was shocking and disturbing new footage showing events on the ground on the day of January 6, mostly coming from Nick Quested, a British documentary filmmaker.
Quested was embedded with the Proud Boys, an American far-right, neo-fascist organization, for months leading up to the political violence of January 6, in his efforts to make a documentary about the group and the divisiveness of American politics in general. According to the committee’s findings, the Proud Boys, in concert with another fascist organization, the Oath Keepers, had a coordinated plan of attack to keep Donald Trump in power, despite his losing the election.
When I was a boy, probably in 6th or 7th grade, I learned a phrase which stuck with me. It’s a phrase I’ve been thinking about again and again for the last year-and-a-half. That phrase is “peaceful transfer of power.” I have a notoriously bad memory – hence the name of my website – but, as my wife can tell you, if something really catches my attention or imagination, I never forget it.
I heard that phrase, peaceful transfer of power, and I learned about the first instance of it, when our second president, John Adams, peacefully and without incident, willingly handed over the reins of government – and the power that comes with holding it – to his political opponent. Our first president, George Washington, laid the groundwork for this tradition when he willingly handed over command of the then-fledgling country’s army back to Congress. He easily could have used that army to wrest complete power for himself after the events of the American Revolution.
Both of these events were watershed moments for the idea that a nation’s people would decide who would lead them, as opposed to political violence or corruption determining who would lead.
Learning about this – what Ronald Reagan called “nothing less than a miracle” in his first inaugural address – sparked a sense of wonder in me. Washington had power – what would have become absolute power in the hands of a petty despot – and he gave it up voluntarily. He knew that the American experiment in self-governance – admittedly, an experiment with no shortage of flaws – was more important to preserve than a vainglorious lust for power.
That extraordinary example of selflessness and the traditions and customs that sprang up around it have been followed by every successive American president, save one: Donald Trump. Through the committee’s presentation, they detailed how Trump was told again, and again, and again, and again by his closest advisers that the voter fraud and rigged election claims he was broadcasting via tweets and rally appearances after the election, in an effort to whip his supporters into a frenzy, were categorically and unambiguously false. Bill Barr, Trump’s own attorney general, called Trump’s idea that the election was stolen from him “bullshit” in a clip from his sworn testimony to the committee.
I used the word presentation in the above paragraph, because the select committee investigating the attempted coup on January 6 have set up their hearings as multimedia events. Through carefully selected clips of witness testimony and video of the politically motivated violence on January 6, they are shaping a narrative that, in a just world, would captivate and horrify every American citizen.
There has been a lot of talk about how our crumbling education system – which is, in part, crumbling because of a concerted right-wing effort to sabotage it – and our insatiable need to be entertained has led to a dumbing-down of our society. (For more on this, read Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman, or, for a more comical – I’m loathe to use the word entertaining – take on the subject, watch Idiocracy by director Mike Judge.)
We need the cold facts weaved into a narrative in order for them to hold our attention.
That isn’t a symptom of a weak society – although, an intellectually healthy society would be able to inform itself even without the trappings of a movie or novel. Humans are first and foremost storytellers. We have been since our ancestors left the trees to do the work of forming human society. Storytelling – through our unique characteristic of spoken and written language – is what makes us uniquely human. It is part of the reason I love the art of filmmaking as much as I do.
The January 6 Select Committee has decided, in a stroke of genius, to turn its findings into a limited-series event. They have turned all of the facts discovered in their investigation into an eight-episode TV show. I applaud them for their attempt to meet the American people where they are. Their strategy is to tap into our insatiable need for true crime podcasts, documentaries, and series.
Whatever works to save our democracy is worth the trying.
This is our last hope to wake up those who have been sleeping on the existential threat to our country and our way of life. From Committee Chair Bennie Thompson opening with a moving recounting of Abraham Lincoln planning his own peaceful transfer of power during the Civil War should he lose the election of 1864, to the in-person testimony of two witnesses of the attempted coup on January 6, every second of the hearings so far have been riveting.
Watching the events of January 6 unfold – in video never before released to the public – was also sickening. I began shaking and felt the urge to vomit as I watched the MAGA traitors storm the Capitol Building. They chanted “Hang Mike Pence” – Trump lambasted Pence again and again in the rally immediately preceding the attack in an effort to get his Vice President to overturn the legitimate results of the election. They chanted “Nancy” over and over again in a slow, taunting sing-song that was meant to terrify Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.
The only thing that every successful coup d'état in human history has in common is that before it succeeded, there was a previous failed attempt. Would-be future coup leaders learn from those failed attempts in order to make the next one a success. We are not free from the specter of tyranny. I deeply believe that Donald Trump will run for president again in 2024, and that this time, he means to take power and never relinquish it.
His idea is to become the Vladimir Putin of America.
Already, Trump sycophants in the halls of power are trying to muddy the waters when it comes to what Donald Trump did to our republic. Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan tweeted in the aftermath of the first hearing, “Where’s the primetime hearing on President Biden’s botched Afghanistan withdrawal?”
This is a pathetic attempt at whataboutism. As if a failed withdrawal from a foreign war is in any way comparable to the attempted violent overthrow of the American government and the rule of law.
Please Mr. Jordan, have you no sense of decency?
We should all be incensed at what Trump and his supporters did on January 6, 2021. If you aren’t, you need to ask some hard questions of yourself about what you believe when it comes to democracy and freedom.
Below are links to the first three congressional hearings of the January 6 committee, which took place on Thursday, June 9; Monday, June 13; and Thursday, June 16. The hearing that was originally scheduled for Wednesday, June 15 was postponed until further notice. I urge you in the strongest possible terms to watch them all, as well as the future hearings. The dates for the upcoming hearings are as follows:
Tuesday, June 21, at 1:00 p.m.
Thursday, June 23, at 1:00 p.m.
As of the time of this publication, the dates and times for the final two hearings (plus the postponed hearing) are TBD.
Congressional Hearing: Day 1
Congressional Hearing: Day 2
Congressional Hearing: Day 3