Big question for Jan. 6 committee: Did Trump aide Mark Meadows help stop – or fuel – the insurrection?

WASHINGTON – As an angry mob of Donald Trump supporters attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and came close to violently overturning the 2020 election, there was one person standing between the president and the many people desperately trying to get him to call off the insurrection.

That person, Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, has fought tooth and nail to avoid testifying before the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol and turning over documents and records that the investigative panel has subpoenaed from him.

But at tonight’s hearing – the eight scheduled by the committee – the actions taken by Meadows during the key events of Jan. 6 are likely to beas front and center as those of Trump himself.

The committee confirmed Wednesday that the hearing set for primetime at 8 p.m. will focus on what happened at the White House during the 187 minutes between Trump ending his speech calling on armed supporters to march on the Capitol and when he issued a videotaped statement asking the rioters to go home.

Today's Jan. 6 hearing - follow live: Jan. 6 hearing to dig into Trump's actions during attack. Kinzinger, Luria leading - live updates

“I think you'll probably hear about Mr. Meadows. I think you'll probably hear about a number of the president's closest aides who were with him and who were in the West Wing that day,” said a committee staffer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal committee matters. “I'm not going to get into too many more specifics but of course, as someone who was a key aide to the President and a senior White House official, certainly what was going on in the West Wing would involve him.”

Live timeline of Trump's actions during the Capitol attack: On Jan. 6, Trump was out of public view as aides urged him to act. A breakdown of those 187 minutes.

Why does the committee want to talk to Meadows?

As committee vice chair Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., noted recently, Meadows was the president’s gatekeeper, and the conduit between Trump and those trying to reach him that day. That includes members of Congress, high-ranking administration officials, senior West Wing staff and White House counsel.

It also includes Secret Service officials in charge of protecting Trump, who have confirmed that he angrily demanded to be driven to the Capitol that day to accompany the mob intent on breaching it and stopping the transfer of power. Citing security concerns, they instead drove him from the Ellipse, where he had given a speech to supporters, back to the White House.

Text messages, phone logs and other information released by the committee show that Meadows was bombarded with pleas from people trying to get Trump to call off the attack on the Capitol so that Congress and Vice President Mike Pence could continue certifying the electoral college vote. But Trump waited at least two hours more before releasing a video at 4:17 p.m. to his supporters.

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Some committee witnesses have suggested Meadows knew about the planning of the assault on the Capitol days beforehand, and during the morning hours of Jan. 6 when Trump inserted inflammatory rhetoric into his speech on the ellipse. Ultimately, Trump used that speech to urge his supporters, many of whom were armed, to “fight like hell (or) you’re not going to have a country anymore. So we are going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue … and we are going to the Capitol.”

Meadows also would have been privy to other key conversations. Those include Trump’s repeated efforts to pressure Pence into illegally refusing to certify the electoral vote as part of a plot to submit an alternate slate of electors loyal to Trump.

Why isn’t Meadows cooperating with the Jan. 6 committee hearings?

Meadows initially cooperated with the Select committee, providing thousands of documents. He then refused to cooperate further and turn over more documents. On Sept. 23, the committee subpoenaed him for his communications with Trump on Jan. 6 and with organizers of a rally where the president spoke before the mob attacked the Capitol.

The committee also sought information from Meadows about any efforts to contact Trump loyalists in the Justice Department to order investigations into election fraud in several states and to encourage several state officials to investigate allegations of election fraud.

More: In 'combustible' testimony, Cassidy Hutchinson, surprise Jan. 6 witness, quietly drops bombshells

Meadows has refused to comply with the subpoena, citing executive privilege to keep confidential his communications with Trump. When he continued to rebuff efforts to compel him to testify, the committee cited him with contempt. Such citations need to be enforced by prosecutors in the Justice Department.

In all, the House panel has cited four Trump supporters for refusing to comply with subpoenas. So far, DOJ has brought criminal contempt charges against two of them: former White House strategist Steve Bannon and former Trump trade advisor Peter Navarro. Bannon’s criminal trial began this week in federal court in Washington, D.C.

Contempt: Feds rest in Steve Bannon contempt case

But the Justice Department has declined to charge Meadows or former deputy chief of staff Dan Scavino with contempt. That has forced the committee to conduct its investigation into Trump – and Meadows – by interviewing those around them on and before Jan. 6.

Meadows’ aides have deeply implicated him

Much remains unknown – at least publicly – about what Meadows did and didn’t do during the siege of the Capitol and in the days leading up to it. But testimony before the committee, and text messages and other communications it has disclosed, suggest that Meadows is perhaps the most important figure in the events of Jan. 6 after Trump.

A top aide to Meadows, Cassidy Hutchinson, testified that Meadows appeared to know four days before Jan. 6 there would be violence stemming from Trump’s plan to march on the Capitol with his supporters. “There's a lot going on Cass,” she says he told her in a nighttime conversation on Jan. 2. “Things might get real, real bad on January 6th.”

Hutchinson also testified that security officials had briefed Trump and Meadows before his morning speech on Jan. 6 that many of his supporters were armed, including carrying AR-15-style rifles and Glock-style pistols. But she said Trump still demanded that they be let into the secured area where he was giving his speech because “they’re not here to hurt me.”

And she testified that she was told Trump tried to grab the steering wheel of his limousine, and lunged at his top Secret Service agent, to force them to drive him to the Capitol, and perhaps help him get inside the building while the certification was underway. They refused.

More: Trump lunged at a security chief on Jan. 6, demanded to go to Capitol, aide tells hearing: recap

Key questions remain, some could be answered tonight

What Meadows knows about that day is critical to the committee’s entire investigation, the committee staffer said. He suggested that more would be revealed about Meadows’ actions as well as Trump's.

"You will hear a lot of new information tomorrow, some of it indeed recently obtained by the Select Committee," the staffer said during a Wednesday briefing with reporters. "You will hear witness testimony. And you will see other evidence presented."

More: Ketchup, regrets, blood and anger: A guide to the Jan. 6 hearings' witnesses and testimony

The staffer did not say how much of that would involve Meadows. But text messages and phone logs show that he was instrumental in acting as an intermediary between Trump and Republicans in Congress, Fox News commentators and others who were trying to get the president to stop the riot during the 187 minutes on Jan. 6.

When several lawmakers contacted Meadows to press Trump to act, he said he was trying his best. As the mob raged through the building just before 3 p.m., Donald Trump Jr. texted Meadows to convince his father to “condem this s---. Asap.” Meadows responded, “I am pushing it hard. I agree."

Whether Meadows did anything to try to reign in Trump has not been revealed publicly. But testimony suggests he didn’t do much.

More: Jan. 6 takeaways: An angry Trump pushed to go to Capitol, counsel warned of 'every crime imaginable'

Just after the mob breached the Capitol after 2 p.m., White House Counsel Pat Cipollone ran down the hallway to get Meadows and “see the president now,” Hutchinson testified. “And Mark looked up at him and said, 'he doesn't want to do anything, Pat.'”

Hutchinson told the committee Cipollone responded by saying, “Mark, something needs to be done. People are going to die and the blood is going to be on your f---ing hands. This is out of control. I’m going down there.”

Hutchinson also said she overheard Trump, Meadows and Trump's lawyers in the White House discuss the chants of “Hang Mike Pence” as rioters attacked the Capitol on Jan.6.

She recalled Cipollone telling Meadows, “We need to do something.”

“You heard it, Pat,” Meadows said, according to Hutchinson. “He thinks Mike deserves that. He doesn't think they're doing anything wrong. To which Pat said something to the effect of, 'This is f---ing crazy.'"

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Did Mark Meadows help Trump try to overturn the election on Jan. 6?