Today’s congressional hearing about the Capitol attack just gave something away
Former Trump Defense Secretary Chris Miller kept changing his congressional testimony on the fly today. He couldn’t seem to make up his mind whether or not Donald Trump incited the January 6th insurrection. He put one thing in writing, then said another, which is so rare that it always means something more is going on.
It feels like Miller expects there to be criminal indictments against Trump and other leaders for the Capitol attack, and he’s panicking about what to say or not say, for fear of making it worse for himself.
Palmer Report is fond of pointing out that while little ever actually happens or gets resolved during a congressional hearing, that’s not the point. The point of a congressional hearing is to either pressure witnesses into coming clean beforehand so that there is no hearing and they don’t have to testify, or to get them to trip up during their testimony so that prosecutors can do something with it afterward.
It feels like we saw that yet again today. The hearing itself was frustrating and didn’t resolve anything. But now the Department of Justice knows that if it’s looking to bring incitement charges against key Trump regime leaders, it can zero in on pressuring Chris Miller to flip on the others, because he’s clearly vulnerable and panicking. This is valuable information to prosecutors, and it’s why hearings like this are put on to begin with.
