Jan. 6 hearing not likely to change many minds

Jun. 11—The Jan. 6th Congressional hearings on the Capitol riot, which began on Thursday night, are not likely to change the minds of an electorate that is solidly divided along party lines, said two local university professors on Friday.

"My expectation is that a majority of Americans will tune out these hearings," said Robert Speel, associate professor, political science, Penn State University, the Behrend College. "Some of those Americans will read or hear bits or pieces of evidence afterward, and others will read and watch inaccurate perspectives of the events of January 6, 2021."

Like Speel, Susquehanna University political science associate professor Nick Clark does not think many minds will be changed by this.

Former President Donald Trump's supporters believe that the election was stolen and that the events surrounding the insurrection are being misinterpreted or exaggerated, Clark said. "Those who are not his supporters already likely believe that he was trying to overturn the results of the election.

"There may be some undecided Republicans who are less likely to support his candidacy in the primaries as a result, but I do not see any Republicans switching sides in the general election," Clark suggested.

Meanwhile, Speel believes it's still important to establish a historical record of what happened, for as long as American democracy survives, so that people can be aware of exactly what happened, what was attempted, and how to try to prevent such events from reoccurring.

Comparisons to Watergate

This investigation to some extent has been more thorough than Watergate, Speel said. But unlike the Watergate scandal, which involved cover-ups and difficulties in finding out what happened and who was involved, the 2021 attempt to overturn the election is all on camera, openly admitted, with plenty of known evidence.

There was never any video footage of the Watergate burglary, never any video footage of President Richard Nixon discussing all the crimes related to the Watergate scandal, Speel noted. "President Nixon never used social media to send a tweet asking for his vice president to overturn an electoral college vote."

Clark called the hearings "fairly unprecedented. Several prior presidents have been accused of wrongdoing and have had Congressional hearings that have investigated their conduct.

"But none were accused of trying to subvert the democratic process, which is a more severe offense. That is the core of the committee's argument: that he knew he had actually lost and that all his conduct was an effort to prevent the transfer of power," he said.

Not much was new

Some of the video evidence included top White House advisors, including the former president's daughter, acknowledging that Trump's claims of a stolen election were false and that the president had been told that repeatedly prior to Jan. 6, 2021.

"The video timeline presentation of the Capitol Hill riot of January 6 was horrifying to relive and see new footage. If all Americans watched that video timeline and didn't falsely dismiss it as 'fake news," the United States could be a very different country politically than it is now," Speel said.

Clark didn't think the hearings revealed much that was not already known.

"Some of the content from the first night was replaying arguments from the second impeachment hearing. Much of it has been leaked ahead of time," he said. "I wonder how much more they have to reveal because any bombshells would likely have been dropped on the first night when more people are likely to have tuned in.

If there is not any smoking gun beyond what we have already seen, Clark said, "it is unlikely the Department of Justice will take this up as a case."