1/6 Committee to Show Outtakes of Trump’s January 7th Speech Meant to Ensure Orderly Transition

Tonight, the Select Committee will show outtakes from Trump’s January 7th speech to the nation in the aftermath of the attack.

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Very few of us even remember a January 7th speech, one in which Trump first promised an orderly transfer of power and warning against any further violence from his supporters. Of course, for two days, the nation lay in a bit of a stupor, and it wasn’t a memorable address. After all, unlike what Americans have come to expect from a presidential address with such gravity, the address wasn’t made live. Evidently, White House staff believed a live speech to be highly risky. Smart, because Trump still maintained that he won the election and struggled to even give an adequate taped address.

The taped speech ultimately worked in Trump’s favor in that it quelled some talk of immediate invocation of the 25th Amendment. But tonight, during the primetime hearing, the Committee will show outtakes of an unrepentant Trump, fighting the admission, trying to avoid responsibility, and perhaps harming himself further, even at that point, even after a failed insurrection and coup.

According to the Washington Post:

The public could get its first glimpse of outtakes from that recording Thursday night, when the committee plans to offer a bold conclusion in its eighth hearing: Not only did Trump do nothing despite repeated entreaties by senior aides to help end the violence, but he sat back and enjoyed watching it. He reluctantly condemned it — in a three-minute speech the evening of Jan. 7 — only after the efforts to overturn the 2020 election had failed and after aides told him that members of his own Cabinet were discussing invoking the 25th Amendment to remove him from office.

Tonight’s hearing may contain moments of horror in new revelations, news with a similar impact as that of Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony, moments that take one’s breath away. The outtakes from above? Perhaps the outtakes will provide a respite, a few minutes of comic relief, a brief period where one can toss some popcorn in and laugh at Trump’s own haplessness and insecurities.

Jason Miciak

@JasonMiciak believes a day without learning is a day not lived. He is a political writer, features writer, author, and attorney. He is a Canadian-born dual citizen who spent his teen and college years in the Pacific Northwest and has since lived in seven states. He now enjoys life as a single dad of a young girl, writing from the beaches of the Gulf Coast. He loves crafting his flower pots, cooking, and currently studies philosophy of science, religion, and non-math principles behind quantum mechanics and cosmology. Please feel free to contact with any concerns.