As Donald Trump watched rioters storm the Capitol on television on January 6, 2021, one of the president’s top aides drafted Trump’s first tweet that urged protesters to remain peaceful, ABC News reported.

Last year, a congressional panel investigating Trump’s role in the January 6 events outlined how the former president was reluctant to call in additional law enforcement to stop rioters during the first few hours of the Capitol breach and instead spent much of his time watching television or making calls to his attorney and Republican allies.

New details of what went on inside the White House during that time show Trump needed the hand of Dan Scavino, who was his deputy chief of staff and is now senior advisor to Trump’s reelection campaign, to try to calm protesters.

    • jballs
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      11 months ago

      Thanks for posting this much better article. It makes it clear how Trump really didn’t give a fuck that democracy was crumbling all around him, and his family and most senior aides were begging him to put a stop to it. Rather than trying to stop it, he continued (and still does to this day) to fan the flames.

      • nilloc@discuss.tchncs.de
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        11 months ago

        I still wonder if all those Trump aides testifying the way they are is to try and convince juries that Trump really did believe he won.

        It’s clear he knew he lost, because otherwise he wouldn’t have needed fake electors and for Georgia to “I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have”

        He fucking knew he lost (dementia aside), and no amount of bullshit testimony can change his own admissions on recorded phone calls.

        • jadelord@discuss.tchncs.de
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          11 months ago

          I just listened to the recorded phone call where Trump mentions this. Yes, he knew that he lost, but he was (at least back then) on a delusion that somehow the votes were either forged/miscounted etc. … all based on rumours from Trump media.

  • Nougat@kbin.social
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    11 months ago

    The point here is that Trump cannot claim, in this instance, that he wanted the insurrectionists to “stay peaceful” - because Scavino wrote and posted that on Trump’s Twitter account, and it took a half hour of pleading to get Trump to “allow” it to be posted. And you know that that was not the first text suggested; they wanted to tell everyone to disperse, and Trump prevented that.

  • EatATaco@lemm.ee
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    11 months ago

    I hate the “But trump told them to be peaceful!” angle as pretty much every seditious criminal when asked why they were in the WH that day, they said they thought it was because Trump wanted them there. From the horses’ mouths.

    It comes as no surprise that Trump didn’t actually send this tweet. It’s clear he wanted it, and it’s clear his cultists got the memo.

  • aelwero@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    Ya know, I read an article yesterday, and I saw the specific comment about scavino having posted that, and I recalled trump pulling a printout of that very tweet out of his pocket during an interview, and this exact thought occurred to me… That it wasn’t even actually his tweet…

    I didn’t really think much of it tbh, but here it is as it’s own headline lol.

    Y’all know what interview I’m talking about right? Dude definitely claimed that tweet in his defense in that interview… Sham…

    Edit- I found it… https://youtube.com/shorts/_wH-CDWZ7Wg

    Sketchy…

    • profoundninja
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      11 months ago

      It is hilarious what a pathological liar he is.

      Looks at notes “Before 2:30”

      The article time stamps the first response on Jan 6th at 2:38. Like, why even…?

  • merc
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    11 months ago

    Nobody’s ever prosecuted for a successful coup.

    If you successfully take power, you’re not going to prosecute yourself. Only failed insurrections can be prosecuted, so it’s always going to be a matter of judgement as to how close they came, how determined the leaders were, etc. This is different from virtually every other crime where the more serious version is a successful X, but you can often be prosecuted for attempted X.

    To me, it seems pretty clear that Trump was attempting a coup. He wanted a mob at the capitol, he was aware they were armed, and wanted them to be armed (“They’re not here to hurt me”). He let things go for as long as possible to see if he could successfully take power by force, and only allowed messages to be sent on his behalf and recorded a video once it was clear that the mob wasn’t going to succeed in taking hostages, etc.

    Also, as an aside, in retrospect the departing president having all their presidential powers for months on end after they lose an election seems ridiculous. In the past, the worst thing that would typically happen is some minor corruption like pardons for friends of “friends” and big donors. But, technically the president has all the power of the executive branch at their disposal, and they’re given presidential immunity for just about anything they can justify as being vaguely within the scope of the job.

  • AutoTL;DR@lemmings.worldB
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    11 months ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:


    Last year, a congressional panel investigating Trump’s role in the January 6 events outlined how the former president was reluctant to call in additional law enforcement to stop rioters during the first few hours of the Capitol breach and instead spent much of his time watching television or making calls to his attorney and Republican allies.

    Scavino was one of dozens of witnesses interviewed by special counsel Jack Smith’s team as part of the Justice Department’s probe into the former president’s actions on January 6.

    As the Capitol breach unfolded, a small group of people around Trump, including Scavino, tried to persuade him to send a forceful message to the protesters, sources told ABC News.

    They told ABC News that the tweet shocked several aides, including Scavino, the only other person with access to Trump’s Twitter account.

    Around 2:38 p.m. local time, a tweet was posted on Trump’s Twitter account: "Please support our Capitol Police and Law Enforcement.

    ABC News sources said Scavino told federal investigators that Trump remained reluctant about putting out more messages on Twitter.


    The original article contains 473 words, the summary contains 177 words. Saved 63%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!