Capitol riot probe should uncover what occurred at Trump White Home, Cheney says

U.S. Representative Liz Cheney (R-WY) delivers an opening statement during the opening hearing of the U.S. House (Select) Committee investigating the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., July 27, 2021.

Jim Bourg | Reuters

Republican Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming said Tuesday that the House select committee investigating the deadly invasion of the Capitol must uncover everything that happened in former President Donald Trump’s White House on Jan. 6.

Investigators must figure out “what happened every minute of that day in the White House — every phone call, every conversation, every meeting leading up to, during and after the attack,” Cheney said in opening remarks at the committee’s first public hearing.

“Honorable men and women have an obligation to step forward. If those responsible are not held accountable, and if Congress does not act responsibly, this will remain a cancer on our Constitutional Republic, undermining the peaceful transfer of power at the heart of our democratic system,” Cheney said.

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The remarks from Cheney, one of two Republicans on the nine-member panel, came after she suggested that the investigation might subpoena Trump and House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy.

“It could,” Cheney told ABC News on Tuesday morning. “The committee will go wherever we need to go to get to the facts.”

DC Metropolitan Police Department Officers Michael Fanone (L) and Daniel Hodges (R) arrive to testify before the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 attack on US Capitol on July 27, 2021 at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, DC.

Jim Lo Scalzo | Getty Images

The House committee, whose members were all appointed by Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, was created after Senate Republicans voted down an independent, “9/11-style” commission to study the invasion.

In its first hearing, lawmakers heard testimony from four police officers who responded to the attempted insurrection on Jan. 6, when a mob of hundreds of Trump’s supporters stormed the Capitol in an attempt to overturn Joe Biden’s presidential victory.

U.S. Representative Bennie Thompson (D-MS), chairman of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, presides during the opening hearing of the U.S. House (Select) Committee investigating the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., July 27, 2021.

Jim Bourg | Reuters

“This threat hasn’t gone away. It looms over our democracy like a dark cloud,” said House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., in his opening remarks.

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