A resolution to provide for related procedures concerning the article of impeachment against Donald John Trump, former President of the United States.

Mr. President, distinguished Senators, you just heard from my colleagues about the harrowing events that happened here at the Capitol on January 6 and saw that very disturbing video, and now I would like to turn your attention to what was happening on the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue at the White House.

The truth is, the facts are that on January 6, Donald Trump did not once condemn this attack. He did not once condemn the attackers. In fact, on January 6, the only person he condemned was his own Vice President, Mike Pence, who was hiding in this building with his family in fear for his life.

In the first crucial hours of this violent attack, he did nothing to stop it, nothing to help us.

By all accounts, from the people that were around him, he was delighted. And here is the last thing Donald Trump said that day, and you might remember this from my motions presentation earlier in the week.

At 6 p.m. on January 6, after all the destruction that you just saw, Capitol Police and the National Guard fighting to secure this building, here is what Donald Trump tweeted:

These are the things and events that happen when a sacred

landslide election victory is so unceremoniously & viciously

stripped away from great patriots who have been badly &

unfairly treated for so long. Go home with love & in peace.

Remember this day forever!

He got what he incited, and according to Donald Trump, we got what we deserve. Donald Trump's incitement of this insurrection, including his dereliction of his duty as Commander in Chief to defend the Capitol and the people in it, his complete refusal to condemn the attack while it was going on, and his continuing to incite the violence during the attack require impeachment.

Now, let's turn to then-President Trump's conduct that day. I want to start at the beginning, when he addressed his thousands of great patriots, as he called them that morning. Around noon, Donald Trump began speaking at his rally just down Pennsylvania Avenue. Even before Donald Trump finished speaking, his supporters began to walk down toward the Capitol, and they were already starting to chant ``stop the steal'' and ``storm the Capitol'' and ``invade the Capitol'' and ``fight for Trump.''

And by 12:53 p.m., they had violently forced their way through the barricades here at the Capitol. Now, about 1 o'clock that day, with this chaos just starting, Speaker Pelosi, as the Constitution requires, formally commenced the process by which this Chamber certifies election results.

Within 10 minutes, at 1:11 p.m., as if almost on cue, Donald Trump concluded his speech with his final reminder to the thousands gathered there: It was time to go to the Capitol.

Let's watch.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

President TRUMP. We're going to the Capitol, and we're

going to try and give--and we're going to try and give our

Republicans--the weak ones because the strong ones don't need

any of our help--we're going to try and give them the kind of

pride and boldness that they need to take back our country.

So let's walk down Pennsylvania Avenue.

I want to thank you all. God bless you, and God bless

America.

Thank you all for being here. This is incredible. Thank you

very much.

(People chanting: ``Fight for Trump.'')

Now, you have seen what happened when these supporters, following his orders, arrived here at the Capitol. But we want to look at what happened next. Now, you will recall, during the speech, President Trump said, ``We're going to the Capitol,'' sort of suggesting he was going to go with this crowd. Of course, that was not true. But let's hear what he said.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

President TRUMP. Now it is up to Congress to confront this

egregious assault on our democracy. And after this, we're

going to walk down, and I'll be there with you. We're going

to walk down. We're going to walk down.

Any one you want, but I think right here. We're going to

walk down to the Capitol.

This, of course, was not true. He did not go with them to the Capitol. He left and went back to the White House, and while he was en route to the White House, violence began to grow here at the Capitol.

And within minutes of Donald Trump's speech ending, there were significant reports of escalating violence that began to surface. Buildings around the Capitol were starting to be evacuated, and by 1:15, an explosive device had been found at the DNC, and a pipe bomb had been found at the RNC about 15 minutes earlier. The House Sergeant at Arms had called for immediate assistance. At 1:34 p.m., the mayor of Washington, DC, called for additional National Guard troops.

I won't go through all of the details of violence that unfolded here. You just saw that. But as we walk through what our Commander in Chief did that day, I want to be very clear about exactly what was happening here at the same time.

For 40 minutes, while buildings were being cleared, pipe bombs were being found, and his supporters were literally breaching the perimeter of the Capitol and overwhelming law enforcement. You saw the violence that was occurring. We heard nothing from the President of the United States. We didn't hear anything from Donald Trump until 1:49 p.m., when, while all of this is unfolding, President Trump sent out a tweet.

This was the first thing he did when he learned the U.S. Capitol, with all the Members of Congress and his own Vice President, was under violent attack. What was that tweet? Nearly an hour after the rioters breached the Capitol perimeter at 1:49, Donald Trump released a propaganda reel of his ``Save America'' speech that he had given an hour before.

I want to be clear. The events I just described--the rioters breaching the Capitol, attacking law enforcement, the violence that is being broadcast all over the television for the whole world to see, including the President of the United States--I want to show you: This is what is happening right before Donald Trump sends that video out again and as he does it.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

President TRUMP. Our country has had enough. We will not

take it anymore and that's what this is all about. And to use

a favorite term that all of you people really came up with:

We will stop the steal. Because you'll never take back our

countr with weakness. You have to show strength, and you have

to be strong.

Even if President Trump claims he didn't know the extent of the violence that would follow his speech, it was now happening in plain view, broadcast on television. His supporters were attacking law enforcement. The mayor and the police chief were calling for help. Members of Congress and the Vice President were inside scared for their lives.

He doesn't send help, and he doesn't try to stop it. He doesn't even acknowledge the attack. Instead, our Commander in Chief tweeted the video of the speech that he had given before, that included language like ``our country has had enough. We will not take it anymore and that's what this is all about. . . . You have to be strong.''

Those around Donald Trump--this was later reported--were disgusted. His close aides, his advisers, those working for him, former officials, and even his family were begging him to do something. Kellyanne Conway, the President's close adviser, called to ``add her name'' to the chorus of aides urging Donald Trump to take action. Ivanka Trump, the President's own daughter, went to the Oval Office ``as soon as'' the rioting escalated, and as was confirmed by Senator Graham, ``trying to get [Trump] to speak out, to tell everyone to leave.''

Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy called Jared Kushner, ``pleading with him to persuade Trump to issue a statement'' or to do something. And Kushner, too, went down to the White House after that call.

And it wasn't just the people at the White House. Members of Congress from both parties, who were trapped here, were calling the White House to ask for help. Some Members even appealed directly to Donald Trump. These Members who had ``been loyal Trump supporters and were even willing to vote against the electoral college results, were now scared for their lives.''

Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy repeatedly even got into a screaming match as the attack was under way,

demanding that Mr. Trump do something, issue a statement denouncing the mob.

I imagine many of you sitting here today picked up your phone and tried to reach somebody at the White House to ask for help. This wasn't partisan politics. These were Americans from all sides trying to force our Commander in Chief to protect and defend our country. He was required to do that.

Now, the extent of how many people tried to reach the President to get him to act is not known. But what is clear, what we know without any doubt, is that from the very beginning, the people around Donald Trump lobbied him to take command. What is also clear is what Donald Trump, our Commander in Chief, did in those initial hours to protect us. Nothing. Not a thing. He knew it was happening. The attack was on TV. We all know that President Trump had the power to stop these attacks. He was our Commander in Chief. He had the power to assess the security situation, send backup, and send help.

He also had incited these violent attacks. They were listening to him. He could have commanded them to leave, but he didn't.

The first critical hour and a half of this bloody attack, Donald Trump tweeted his rally speech and did nothing else. And we know why. We know his state of mind that prompted his utter, complete refusal to defend us. It was reported by those around him.

The President, as reported by sources at the time, was delighted. As he watched the violence unfold on television, President Trump was reportedly ``borderline enthusiastic because it meant the certification was being derailed.''

Senator Ben Sasse relayed a conversation with senior White House officials that President Trump was ``walking around the White House confused about why other people on his team weren't as excited as he was.''

Mr. Trump's reaction to this attack, reportedly, genuinely freaked people out. I understand why. We just suffered a very serious attack, an attack on our country. And we saw them--the people around him--do it. But when Donald Trump saw it, he was delighted.

Now, what President Trump did next confirms why he was so delighted, why he wanted this, because it shows that his singular focus that day-- the day we were attacked--was not protecting us, was not protecting you, was not protecting the Capitol, but it was stopping the certification of the election results.

The evidence is clear. Shortly after 2 p.m., as the siege was fully under way, then-President Trump made a call. This is the first call that we are aware he made to anyone inside the Capitol during the attack. He didn't call the Vice President to ask how he could help defend the Capitol. He didn't call the next two in line to succession of the Presidency to check on their safety or well-being.

Instead, he attempted to call Senator Tuberville. He dialed Senator Lee by accident.

(Text deleted.)

Let's be clear. At roughly 2 p.m., when Donald Trump was walking around the White House watching the TV delighted and spent 5 to 10 minutes talking to Senator Tuberville, urging him to delay the election results, this is what was happening in the Capitol.

(Video presentation.)

You saw Senator Lankford stop speaking and leave the floor quickly in that clip because the insurgents had broken through the barricades and entered the building. And as these armed insurrectionists banged on the doors, Members of Congress were told to put on their gas masks, to put bags over their heads for safety, and prepare to evacuate. And Donald Trump was calling to ask the Senator to delay the certification process. Let that sink in.

Donald Trump didn't get to finish that call. It was cut off because the Senators had to move to another location, for your security. And thank God they did because as the call was occurring, the rioters got closer to the Senate Chamber, and as we all know now, but for the heroism of Capitol Police Officer Eugene Goodman and other law enforcement officers who took them in a different direction to the police line, they very likely would have gotten here.

Think about that. Armed insurrectionists with guns, weapons, zip ties, brass knuckles, they were coming for us. They were inside the United States Capitol, trying to stop the certification process. The police were outnumbered. And but for the grace of God, they would have gotten us, all of us.

And our Commander in Chief makes a call about an hour after the siege began, not to preserve, protect, and defend you and our country and the Capitol but to join forces with the mob and pressure a Senator to stop certification. We just can't get numb to this kind of behavior.

There can be no doubt as to the purpose of Donald Trump's call, that he was not calling to assess the security threats or to check on the well-being of you or anyone else. Indeed, later on that evening, while all of the destruction and damage still continued, dozens of officers were being treated for serious injuries. Deaths were confirmed. About 7 p.m., the President's personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, made a call, and just in case you don't think there was some coordination, he also called Senator Lee's phone trying to reach Senator Tuberville. We don't have to guess as to what Rudy Giuliani said in that voicemail because we have it recorded. So let's listen to what the President's personal lawyer said on the night of this attack.

(Text of audio presentation.)

Mr. GIULIANI. Senator Tuberville--or I should say Coach

Tuberville, this is Rudy Giuliani, the President's lawyer.

I'm calling you because I want to discuss with you how

they're trying to rush this hearing and how we need you, our

Republican friends, to try to just slow it down.

This was the singular focus of Donald Trump during this bloody, violent attack on the Capitol: stopping the certification.

Look, as I mentioned, I was a trial lawyer for 16 years. Sometimes, you have to ask a jury to use reasonable inferences to piece together a defendant's state of mind. We don't have to do this here. While our country was violently attacked by an armed mob, President Trump not only refused to stop the attack or even address the attack at all, he made clear his focus was on the same goal of the attackers he incited: to stop the certification process and prevent the peaceful transition of power. The only action we know that he took an hour into this attack was to call Senator Tuberville to ask him to delay the certification. This is as clear evidence as I have ever seen of what Donald Trump really cared about that day.

Now, look, the certification process, as we all know, includes debate and objections. Some of us disagreed, but we came here on January 6 to formally administer the certification process pursuant to our constitutional duties. At the end of it, Congress certified the results to ensure that we continue to be a country with leaders who are elected by the people for the people.

Donald Trump's objections to the certification are not on trial, but what is on trial is, while we were under armed attack and being evacuated, while our law enforcement officers were fighting for their lives, our Commander in Chief was calling not to determine how to best secure the building and the people in it but to continue to pressure Senators to stop the certification process and a peaceful transfer of power, just as he incited the mob to do earlier in the day. This was a breathtaking dereliction of his duty and a violation of his oath as our Commander in Chief.

Senators, before I hand this over to Manager Castro to walk through the rest of the day, please let me make one final point. These attackers stood right where you are. They went through that rostrum. They rifled through your desks, and they desecrated this place. And literally, the President sat delighted, doing nothing to help us, calling one of you to pressure you to stop the certification.

It can't be that the Commander in Chief can incite a lawless, bloody insurrection and then utterly fail in his duty as Commander in Chief to defend us from the attack, to defend our law enforcement officers from that attack, and just get away with it. Donald Trump abdicated his duty to us all. We have to make this right, and you can make it right.

Mr. Manager CASTRO of Texas. My fellow manager David Cicilline showed you what President Trump did and did not do in thos first critical hours of the attack.

He sent a tweet at 1:49 p.m., where he reposted a video of the speech that incited the attack, and he called a Senator to ask him to delay the certification as the Senator was being evacuated for his own safety.

We left off around 2:15 p.m. At this point, insurgents were inside the Senate and the House, and the Senate had been evacuated for everyone's safety. As you saw, Vice President Mike Pence and his family even had to be evacuated for their safety.

Now, you will recall Donald Trump had made Vice President Pence a target. He attacked the Vice President at the rallies, in speeches, and on Twitter. And during President Trump's speech that morning of the attack, he ramped it up again. After privately pressuring Mike Pence in front of thousands in the crowd, he called Mike Pence out 11 times, including saying:

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Mike Pence, I hope you're going to stand up for the good of

our Constitution and for the good of your country. And if

you're not, I'm [going] to be . . . disappointed in you. I

will tell you right now.

And this was the crowd's response to Donald Trump's days of relentless attacks on his own Vice President:

(Text of video presentation.)

(People chanting: ``Hang Mike Pence.'')

By 2:15 p.m., the crowd was chanting in unison ``Hang Mike Pence'' outside the very building he had been evacuated from with his family.

Now, even if President Trump didn't know that his inflammatory remarks about his Vice President would result in chants of ``Hang Mike Pence,'' by 2:15 p.m., he surely knew. The attack was all over television. They were doing this out in the open. This was a Vice President whose life, whose family's life, was being threatened by people whom the President had summoned to the Capitol. And what did President Trump do in response? Did he stop? Did he tell his base: No, don't attack my Vice President. Even when President Trump knew what his words were causing, he didn't do any of those things to stop the crowd. In fact, he did the opposite. He fueled the fire.

At 2:24 p.m., he tweeted:

Mike Pence didn't have the courage to do what should have

been done to protect our country and our Constitution. . . .

USA demands the truth.

Over an hour and a half into the attack, and this is what he tweeted. And he still, even at this point, did not acknowledge the attack on the Capitol, let alone condemn it. Instead, he further incites the mob against his own Vice President, whose life was being threatened.

Well, some of you may say: Well, who was paying attention anyway? Well, that mob was paying attention.

(Text of video presentation.)

Unidentified Speaker. Mike Pence didn't have the courage to

do what should have been done to protect our country and our

Constitution, giving States a chance to certify or correct a

set of facts, not (inaudible) defraud ones or inaccurate

ones, which they were asked to previously certify. U.S.

demands the truth.

Unidentified Speaker. Mike Pence, anarchist. Mike Pence,

anarchist.

Unidentified Speaker. (Inaudible.) Can I speak to Pelosi?

Yeah, we're coming, bitch. Oh, Mike Pence, we're coming for

you, too, fucking traitor.

Unidentified Speaker. Donald J. Trump better (inaudible).

Unidentified Speaker. Full house.

Unidentified Speaker. (Inaudible) Mike Pence let us down.

Mike Pence let us down, people. If you want to get something

done, you are going to have to do it yourself.

The insurgents amplified President Trump's tweet attacking the Vice President with a bullhorn. They were paying attention, and they also followed instructions. In fact, the insurgents were at one point, as you saw, 60 feet away from the Vice President and the Vice President's family. Some of these insurgents were heard saying ``that they hoped to find Vice President Mike Pence and execute him by hanging him from a Capitol Hill tree as a traitor,'' and then they erected a gallows with a noose.

This is what Donald Trump incited. Please take a close look at that picture. It hearkens back to our Nation's worst history of lynching.

A President's words have the power to move people to action, and these were the results.

And why did the President incite such rage against the Vice President? He was fulfilling his constitutional duty, as we all were that day. Vice Presidents in this country have been carrying out this constitutional duty--overseeing the certification of election results-- without incident, without contest, without a word, for the entirety of our Nation. It is part of our peaceful transition of power in the United States.

The Vice President said he reviewed the Constitution and he could not block certification, as President Trump wanted him and was pressuring him to do. He told the President in a letter that morning, a few hours before President Trump's tweet:

[I will] approach this moment with [a] sense of duty and an

open mind, setting politics and personal interests aside, and

do [my] part to faithfully discharge our duties under the

Constitution. I also pray that we will do so with humility

and faith.

And the President's response to that statement was to attack Mike Pence while he was with his family under the threat of a violent mob. The Vice President was following his faith, his duty, and his oath to our Nation.

The Vice President and I don't agree on too much in politics, but he is a man who upholds his oath, his faith, his duty, and most of all upholds the Constitution. And Mike Pence is not a traitor to this country. He is a patriot. And he and his family, who was with him that day, didn't deserve this, didn't deserve a President unleashing a mob on them, especially because he was just doing his job.

As this was unfolding and the crowd grew more violent, the President, of course, was not alone at the White House, and the people closest to him--his family and advisers--who saw this unfolding in realtime, begged him, implored him to stop the attack.

An aide to Mark Meadows, the President's Chief of Staff, urged his boss to go see the President, saying: ``They are going to kill people.''

``They are going to kill people.'' That is what those around President Trump feared, and still nothing. It wasn't until 2:38 p.m., nearly 2 hours after the start of the siege, that Donald Trump even acknowledged the attack. And when he finally did acknowledge the attack, here is what he said.

On the right you will see what had been happening prior to that tweet and as he sent the tweet, and on the left you will see exactly what he tweeted.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Unidentified Speaker. I'm going to stop you there for just

one moment because we do have some breaking news. We want to

bring in congressional correspondent Chad Pergram as this is

all developing right now. Chad, I understand the Capitol is

now on lockdown?

Mr. Pergram. They're definitely fired up. The chant, by the

way, I heard the most today was ``fight for Trump,'' and

that's clearly what many of them feel they're doing.

Unidentified Speaker. Hold the line.

(People singing: ``O, the land of the free.'')

That is what our President saw unfolding in realtime, broadcast all over television, and this is what he tweeted at 2:38 p.m.:

Please support our Capitol Police and Law Enforcement. They

are truly on the side of our Country. Stay peaceful!

Much has been made of the fact that in this tweet he says, ``Stay peaceful.'' Senators, ``Stay peaceful''? Think about that for a second. These folks were not peaceful. They were breaking windows, pushing through law enforcement officers, waving the flag as they invaded this Capitol Building. This was a violent, armed attack.

``Stay peaceful''? How about: Stop the attack. Stop the violence.

``Stay peaceful''? How about you say: Immediately leave. Stop.

And he said: ``Please support our Law Enforcement.'' How about he actually support our law enforcement by telling these insurgents to leave the Capitol immediately, which he never did. He didn't because, the truth is, he didn't want it to stop. He wanted them to stay and to stop the certification. And his failure had grave and deadly consequences.

By 2:45 p.m., the warnings were tragically proven correct. Ashli Babbitt was shot by an officer as she tried to break through a glass door to reach the Speaker's Lobby.

At this point, the pleas to Donald Trump, publicly and privately, grew even more desperate. At 2:54 p.m., Alyssa Farah, a former strategic communications director, begged the President:

Condemn this now. You are the only one they will listen to.

For our country!

Mick Mulvaney, the President's former Chief of Staff, his right-hand man at one point, tweeted at 3:01:

The President's tweet is not enough. He can stop this now

and needs to do exactly that. Tell these folks to go home.

He can stop this now. Tell these folks to go home.

At 3:06 p.m., Representative McCarthy appeared on FOX News. Here is what he said.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Mr. McCARTHY. I could not be sadder or more disappointed

with the way our country looks at this very moment. People

are getting hurt. Anyone involved in this, if you're hearing

me, hear me very loud and clear: This is not the American

way.

He is saying on FOX News, which the President watches: This is not the American way. Stop the attack.

Representative Gallagher, at 3:11 p.m., while secured in his own office, posted a video to Twitter.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Mr. GALLAGHER. Mr. President, you have got to stop this.

You are the only person who can call this off. Call it off.

And then, when the President didn't answer his pleas on Twitter, Representative Gallagher went on live television.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Mr. GALLAGHER. I mean, this is insane. I mean--I--I have

not seen anything like this since I deployed to Iraq in 2007

and 2008. I mean, this is America, and this is what is

happening right now. We need--the President needs to call it

off. Like, call it off. Call it off.

Representative Gallagher, you see there, said he had not seen anything like this since he was deployed in Iraq.

The message around the President was clear, from everyone: You need to call this off. Stop it.

But does he? No. His next tweet was not until about 3:13 p.m. Once again, it is important to consider what was happening between Donald Trump's 2:38 p.m. tweet and his next tweet at 3:13 p.m.

You will see footage from the attack during that time on the right and Donald Trump's tweet on the left.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Unidentified Speaker. We've been informed that protesters

have penetrated the Capitol.

Unidentified Speaker. This is my fucking building.

Unidentified Speaker. I tell ya, the sentiment in the

streets is really getting to a different level. This is

spinning out of control. This is turning violent. This is

getting dangerous.

Unidentified Speaker. Stand up for America.

Unidentified Speaker. Don't touch me

Unidentified Speaker. Don't get in his way.

Unidentified Speaker. Get the fuck out of here.

This isn't 10 minutes into the insurrection. This isn't just after his speech earlier that day. That is what our Commander in Chief saw happening, and that was his response.

You will notice one of the things he says to his mob, to these insurrectionists, rather than to stop or to leave, was to say thank you. Thank you. Thank you for what? Thank you for shattering the windows and destroying property? Thank you for injuring more than 140 police officers? Thank you for putting in danger all of our lives and the lives of our families?

How about, instead of ``thank you,'' Donald Trump, on that day, acted like our Commander in Chief and stopped this, as only he could, and told those people to leave.

Here is what former Governor Chris Christie, his very good friend, said after that tweet.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Mr. Christie. It's pretty simple. The President caused this

protest to occur. He is the only one who can make it stop.

What the President said is not good enough. The President has

to come out and tell his supporters to leave the Capitol

grounds and to allow the Congress to do their business

peacefully, and anything short of that is an abrogation of

his responsibility.

He is right. Chris Christie is right. We know how Donald Trump acts on Twitter and otherwise when he has a message to convey. In fact, I asked you to remember those tweets earlier this morning when he yelled on Twitter: ``STOP THE COUNT.''

When he wanted to incite his supporters to show up on January 6, President Trump tweeted 16 times between midnight on January 5 and his noon rally/speech the next day--16 times to get them to do something he wanted. And his message in those 16 times was clear: ``Fight.'' ``Stay strong.'' ``Be strong.''

But when the violence started, he never once said the one thing everyone around him was begging him to say: Stop the attack. He refused to stop it. And as Governor Christie and Representative Kinzinger and others made clear, only Donald Trump could have stopped that attack.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Mr. KINZINGER. You know, a guy who knows how to tweet very

aggressively on Twitter, you know, puts out one of the

weakest statements on one of the saddest days in American

history because his ego won't let him admit defeat.

He was not just our Commander in Chief. He had incited the attack. The insurgents were following his commands, as we saw when they read aloud the tweet attacking the Vice President. They confirmed this during the attack too.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Senators, ask yourselves this: How easy would it have been for the President to give a simple command, a simple instruction, just telling them: Stop. Leave.

This was a dereliction of duty, plain and simple, and it would have been for any President who had done that. And that brings me to my next point. You heard from my colleagues that when planning this attack, the insurgents predicted that Donald Trump would command the National Guard to help them.

There is a lot that we don't know yet about what happened that day, but here is what we do know: Donald Trump did not send help to these officers who were badly outnumbered, overwhelmed, and being beaten down. Two hours into the insurrection, by 3 p.m., President Trump had not deployed the National Guard or any other law enforcement to help, despite multiple pleas to do so.

President Donald Trump was at the time our Commander in Chief of the United States of America. He took a solemn oath to preserve, protect, and defend this country, and he failed to uphold that oath. In fact, there is no indication that President Trump ever made a call to have the Guard deployed or had anything to do with the Guard being deployed when it ultimately was.

Shortly after 3:04 p.m., the Acting Defense Secretary announced that the Guard had been activated and listed the people he spoke with prior to this activation, including Vice President Mike Pence, Speaker Pelosi, Leader McConnell, Senator Schumer, and Representative Hoyer. But that list did not include the President. This omission of his name was reportedly not accidental. According to reports, ``Trump initially rebuffed requests to mobilize the National Guard and required interference by other officials,'' including his own White House Counsel. And later, ``as a mob of Trump supporters breached police barricades and seized the Capitol,'' Trump reportedly was ``disengaged in discussions with Pentagon leaders about deploying the National Guard to aid the overwhelmed U.S. Capitol Police.'' President Trump was reportedly ``completely, totally out of it. He made no attempt to reach [the National Guard.]'' And it was Vice President Pence, still under threat for his life, who reportedly spoke to the Guard.

President Trump's conduct confirms this too. At no point on January 6 did Donald Trump even reference the National Guard. The only thing that we heard connecting the President to the Guard was from his Press Secretary, who tweeted about the Guard being deployed at the President's direction over half an hour later, at 3:36 p.m.

We have seen what Donald Trump does when he tries to take credit for something, and yet, even when the National Guard was finally deployed, he didn't even acknowledge it. In fact, he didn't say a word about the National Guard the entire day. Think about that: the bloodiest attack we have seen on our Capitol since 1812 and our President couldn't be bothered to even mention that help was on its way.

These insurgents had been attacking our government for over 4 hours by that point. And we may have been the

target, but it was the brave men and women who protect our Capitol who were out there combating thousands of armed insurgents in a fight for their lives, and that is who Donald Trump left entirely unprotected.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

This is hard to watch, but I think it is important to understand what the Capitol Police were facing, how severely they were outnumbered while our Commander in Chief, whose job it was to protect and defend them, was just watching, doing nothing for hours, refusing to send help. If he wanted to protect these officers, if he cared about their safety, as he tweeted about, he would have told his supporters to leave. He would have sent help right away.

One brave officer was killed. Others took their lives after the attack. More than 140 police officers were injured, including cracked ribs, smashed spinal discs. One officer will lose an eye. Another was stabbed with a metal fence stake. They were completely and violently overwhelmed by a mob and needed help, and our Commander in Chief, President Trump, refused to send it.

Senators, you have seen all the evidence so far, and this is clear: On January 6, President Trump left everyone in this Capitol for dead. For the next hour after President Trump's 3 p.m. tweet, he still did nothing. Not until 4:17 p.m., over 3\1/2\ hours after the violence started, did our President send a message finally asking the insurgents to go home.

On the right, you will see what happened that day in the hours leading up to his prerecorded video. On the left, you will see his message. Let's watch.

(Text of video presentation.)

President TRUMP. I know your pain, I know you're hurt, we

had an election that was stolen from us. It was a landslide

election and everyone knows it, especially the other side.

But you have to go home now. We have to have peace. We have

to have law and order. We have to respect our great people in

law and order. We don't want anybody hurt. It's a very tough

period of time. There's never been a time like this, where

such a thing happened, where they could take it away from all

of us. From me, from you, from our country. This was a

fraudulent election, but we can't play into the hands of

these people. We have to have peace. So go home. We love you,

you're very special. We've seen what happens, you see the way

others are treated that are so bad and so evil. I know how

you feel. But go home and go home in peace.

This is the first time our Commander in Chief spoke publicly at all since the attack began, over 3\1/2\ hours after it started, and these are the entirety of the words the President spoke out loud to the American people or to the attackers that entire day.

Nowhere in that video, not once did he say: I condemn this insurrection. I condemn what you did today.

Nowhere did he say: I am sending help immediately. Stop this.

Here is what he said instead:

I know your pain, I know you're hurt. We had an election

that was stolen.

Even after all the things we witnessed, even after all of that carnage, he goes out and tells the same big lie, the same big lie that enraged and incited the attack. He repeated this while the attack was ongoing and while we were still under threat.

And here is what else he said:

Go home in peace.

We love you, you're very special.

Senators, you were here. You saw this with your own eyes. You faced that danger. And when President Trump had an opportunity to confront them as the leader of us all, as our Commander in Chief, what did he tell them?

We love you, you're very special.

This was not a condemnation; this was a message of consolation, of support, of praise. And if there is any doubt that his supporters, these insurgents, took this as a message of support and praise, watch for yourselves.

(Text of video presentation.)

Mr. Angeli. Donald Trump asked everybody to go home. He

just said--he just put out a tweet. It is a minute long. He

asked everybody to go home.

Unidentified Speaker. Why do you think so?

Mr. Angeli. Because we won the fucking day. We fucking won.

Unidentified Speaker. How did we win?

Mr. Angeli. Well, we won by sending a message to the

Senators and th Congressmen, we won by sending a message to

Pence, OK, that if they don't do as--as it is their oath

do, if they don't uphold the Constitution, then we will

remove them from office, one way or another.

I suspect you recognize that man. You will hear him say that ``we won the day.'' Who won the day? We know that at least five people lost their lives that day. The House and the Senate were in life-threatening danger, and so was the Vice President, and think of everyone else here as well. Who won on January 6? That is not a win for America, but it is a win for Donald Trump unless we hold him accountable.

Now, a little over an hour after that video, the brave members of law enforcement secured the Capitol, and we as a Congress got ready to continue certifying the results of our free and fair election.

A half hour after that, President Trump issued another tweet. In case there was any doubt as to whether he was happy with the people who did this, as to whether he had incited this, he commemorated what happened on January 6.

At 6:01 p.m. on January 6, he tweeted:

These are the things and events that happen when a sacred

landslide election victory is so unceremoniously & viciously

stripped away from great patriots who have been badly &

unfairly treated for so long.

Ending with:

Remember this day forever!

My colleague Manager Cicilline started with this tweet because this tweet shows exactly how Donald Trump felt about what happened on January 6. ``These are the things . . . that happen.'' He is saying this was foreseeable. He is saying: I told you this was going to happen if you certified the election for anyone else, and you got what you deserved for trying to take my power away.

[G]reat patriots. . . . Go home with love & in peace.

Remember this day forever!

He is saying to them: You did good. He is not regretful. He is not grieving. He is not sad. He is not angry about the attack. He is celebrating it. He is commemorating it.

This is the entirety of what President Trump said to the public once the attack began--five tweets and a prerecorded video. On the day of the most bloody insurrection we faced in generations, our Commander in Chief, who is known for sending 108 tweets in a normal day, sent 5 tweets and a prerecorded video. That is the entirety of President Trump's public statements from when the attack began until he went to bed on January 6. That is all he did despite all the people we know who begged him to preserve, protect, and defend. That was our Commander in Chief's response.

He began the day with ``Our country has had enough, we will not take it anymore, and that's what this is all about,'' and he ended the attack with letting us know that we got what he forewarned that morning.

We will, of course, each of us, remember that day forever, but not in the way that President Trump intended, not because of the actions of these violent, unpatriotic insurrectionists. I will remember that day forever because despite President Trump's vicious attempts throughout the day to encourage the siege and block the certification, he failed. At 8:06 p.m., the Senate gaveled into session, and the counting of the electoral votes continued. About an hour later, the House followed suit. And close to 4 a.m., after spending a significant part of the day evacuated or on the floor or hiding, this great body fulfilled the will of the people and certified the electoral college vote.

And I am proud to be part of Congress. I am proud that we ensured that the will of the American people finally prevailed on that day. And I am proud that I and everyone in this room abided by our oath of office even if the President didn't abide by his.

President Trump, too, took an oath as President. He swore on a Bible to preserve, protect, and defend. And who among us can honestly say they believe that he upheld that oath? Who among us will let his utter dereliction of duty stand?

I ask for the yeas and nays, Mr. President.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, as I understand it, there are discussions underway, and so I ask unanimous consent that the Senate recess until 12:30 p.m.

Mr. President, so now as we move to another matter, I am advised that the House managers have no objection to the admission of evidence proposed to be admitted by the former President's counsel under the provisions of section 8 of S. Res. 47 and that the President's counsel have no objections to the evidence proposed to be admitted into evidence by the House managers.

Pursuant to section 8 of the resolution, as agreed to by Leader McConnell and myself a few days ago, both parties have made timely filings of this evidence with the Secretary of the Senate and have provided copies to each other. I, therefore, ask unanimous consent that the Senate dispense with the provisions of section 8(a) of S. Res. 47; and that the materials submitted by both parties be admitted into evidence subject to the provisions of section 8(c) of that resolution, which provides that the admission of this evidence does not constitute a concession by either party as to the truth of the matters asserted by the other party; and that each Senator shall decide for him or herself the weight to be given such evidence. This request has the approval of both parties and the Republican leader.

Proceed.

Counsels' Closing Arguments

Mr. Counsel VAN DER VEEN. I will promise that I will be the only one talking, and it will not be so long.

Before I start my prepared closing, I really want to clean up a few things from the mess that was the closing of the House managers. I do not want to ruin my closing because I think the ending is pretty good.

What they didn't--they started off by misstating the law, and they started off by misstating the intent of our stipulation. What we did today was stipulate to an article that was published in a magazine, apparently, they have had for weeks, according to the documents they produced today, but for some reason this morning popped up with it.

The stipulation was that they can put that in. We did not stipulate to its contents for truthfulness, and they tried to portray that in their closing as the stipulation. The stipulation was read into the Record. The proponents of that conversation--the real ones--have denied its content, its veracity.

With respect to--and I am not going to talk much about the tortured analysis of our arson wars that started off or the truly sideways analogies that were used with fires. What I do want to talk about, though, is the doctoring of evidence.

First of all, they sent us their evidence on Tuesday the 9th at 2:32 p.m. by email. I was in the room trying the case already when they sent their evidence--due process.

They used evidence that was flat wrong two or three nights ago with Senator Lee and had to withdraw it. They tried to use it again today.

They tried to use evidence that they had never presented in the case in their closing argument. That is a very desperate attempt by a prosecuting team--nine of them--by a prosecuting team that knew that their case has collapsed.

Their closing did not mention one piece of law. They didn't talk about the Constitution once. They didn't talk about the First Amendment and its application. They didn't talk about due process and how it applies to this proceeding for my client.

The basic rule of any court is that when you close a case out, you close on the facts that were admitted in the trial. It is a basic, fundamental principle of due process and fairness. And that was violently breached today on multiple occasions. And you have to ask yourself why? Why did they resort to those tactics at this moment in time?

Senators, good afternoon. Mr. President.

What took place here at the U.S. Capitol on January 6 was a grave tragedy. Over the course of this trial, you have heard no one on either side of this debate argue that the infiltration of the Capitol was anything less than a heinous act on the home of American democracy.

All of us, starting with my client, are deeply disturbed by the graphic videos of the Capitol attack that have been shown in recent days. The entire team condemned and have repeatedly condemned the violence and law breaking that occurred on January 6 in the strongest possible terms. We have advocated that everybody be found and punished to the maximum extent of the law. Yet the question before us is not whether there was a violent insurrection of the Capitol. On that point, everyone agrees.

Based on the explicit text of the House Impeachment Article, this trial is about whether Mr. Trump willfully engaged in an incitement of violence and even insurrection against the United States, and that question they have posed in their Article of Impeachment has to be set up against the law of this country.

No matter how much truly horrifying footage we see of the conduct of the rioters and how much emotion has been injected into this trial, that does not change the fact that Mr. Trump is innocent of the charges against him.

Despite all of the video played, at no point in their presentation did you hear the House managers play a single example of Mr. Trump urging anyone to engage in violence of any kind. At no point did you hear anything that could ever possibly be construed as Mr. Trump encouraging or sanctioning an insurrection.

Senators, you did not hear those tapes because they do not exist, because the act of incitement never happened. He engaged in no language of incitement whatsoever on January 6 or any other day following the election.

No unbiased person honestly reviewing the transcript of Mr. Trump's speech on the Ellipse could possibly believe that he was suggesting violence. He explicitly told the crowd that he expected the protest outside the Capitol to be peaceful and patriotic.

They claim that is not enough.

His entire premise was that the proceedings of the joint session should continue. He spent nearly the entire speech talking about how he believes the Senators and Members of Congress should vote on the matter.

It is the words. The Supreme Court ruled in Brandenburg that there is a very clear standard for incitement. In short, you have to look at the words themselves. The words have to either explicitly or implicitly call for--the words--call for lawlessness or violence. Whether the speech--you have to determine whether the speech was intended to provoke the lawlessness and whether the violence was the likely result of the word itself. They fail on all three prongs.

The false and defamatory claim that Mr. Trump gave a speech encouraging his supporters to go attack the Capitol has been repeated so often, uncritically, without any examination of the underlying facts, that the American--the Americans--listening at home were probably surprised to learn it is not true.

Furthermore, some of the people in this room followed Mr. Trump's statements and tweets in the weeks leading up to January 6 very closely. We know that he was not trying to foment an insurrection during the time because no one--from the Speaker of the House to the Mayor of Washington, DC--behaved in a fashion consistent with the belief that violence was being advocated for.

Mr. Trump did not spend the weeks prior to January 6 inciting violence. He spent those weeks pursuing his election challenge through the court system and other legal procedures, exactly as the Constitution and the Congress prescribe.

To believe based on the evidence you have seen that Mr. Trump actually wanted and, indeed, willfully incited an armed insurrection to overthrow the U.S. Government would be absurd.

The gathering on January 6 was supposed to be an entirely peaceful event. Thousands and thousands of people, including Mr. Trump, showed up that day with that intention. A small percentage--a small fraction of those people--then engaged in truly horrible behavior. But as we now know, that those actors were preplanned and premeditated and acted even before this speech was completed, to which is the basis of the Article of Impeachment. It was preplanned and premeditated by fringe--left and right--groups. They hijacked the event for their own purposes.

The House managers' false narrative is a brazenly dishonest attempt to smear, to cancel--constitutional canceled culture--their No. 1 political opponent, taking neutral statements, commonplace political rhetoric, removing words and facts from context

and ascribing to them the most sinister and malevolent intentions possible.

Their story was based not on evidence but on the shear personal and political animus.

The flimsy theory of incitement you heard from the House managers could be used to impeach, indict, or expel countless other political leaders. Many leading figures in other parties have engaged in far more incendiary and dangerous rhetoric, and we played some of them. I am not going to replay it. I am not going to replay you the words. You all saw the evidence. I am not going to replay mob scenes. I don't want to give those people another platform, any more view from the American people as to what they did. They should be canceled.

Democrat politicians spent months prior to January 6 attacking the very legitimacy of our Nation's most cherished institutions and traditions. They didn't just question the integrity of one election; they challenged the integrity of our entire Nation--everything from our Founding Fathers, our Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, law enforcement officers, and the United States Military. They said that our society was rooted in hatred. They even said that America deserved--and I will quote--``a reckoning.''

As you heard yesterday, throughout the summer, Democrat leaders, including the current President and Vice President, repeatedly made comments that provided moral comfort to mobs attacking police officers. During that time, many officers across the country were injured. As we all know, two sheriff's deputies in Los Angeles were ambushed and shot at point-blank range.

Members of this very body have been in danger. Senators from Maine to Kentucky, and most points in between, have been harassed by mobs.

Last August, a menacing leftwing mob swarmed Senator Rand Paul and his wife as they left the White House, and they had to be rescued by police.

For months, our Federal courthouse in Portland was placed under siege by violent anarchists who attacked law enforcement officers daily and repeatedly and tried to set fire to the building.

Speaker Pelosi did not call the violent siege of the Federal building an insurrection. She called the Federal agents protecting the courthouse ``stormtroopers.''

The White House complex was besieged by mobs that threw bricks, rocks, and bottles at Secret Service agents, set fire to a historic structure, and breached a security fence to infiltrate the Treasury grounds.

When my client's administration sent in the National Guard to secure the Nation's Capital City amidst the violence, Democrat leaders demanded that the forces be withdrawn.

The Washington, DC, Mayor said the presence of the National Guard was an affront to the safety of the District. It must be fully investigated whether political leadership here in Washington, DC, took an inadequate and irresponsible force posture on January 6 because of their commitment to the false narrative of what happened last June.

Hopefully we can all now agree that the administration acted properly by taking action to stop a riotous mob, establishing an appropriate security perimeter, and preventing the White House from potentially being overrun.

The House managers argued this week that an alleged brief delay in issuing a public statement from Mr. Trump on January 6 was somehow evidence that he committed incitement or supported the violence. Yet for months last year Joe Biden and Vice President Harris and countless other Democrats repeatedly refused to condemn the extremists as riots were occurring daily, as businesses were being ramshackled, as neighborhoods were being burned, as bombs were exploding. They repeatedly refused to tell their violent supporters to stand down.

Some even suggested that the mobs' actions were justified. Vice President Harris literally urged her followers to donate money to a fund to bail out the violent, extreme rioters so that they could get out and continue to do it over and over again. She later said that those folks were not going to let up and that they should not.

All of this was far closer to the actual definition of ``incitement'' than anything President Trump has ever said or done, never mind what he said on the 6th. It is a hypocrisy. It is a hypocrisy that the House managers have laid at the feet of this Chamber.

The House managers suggested that this recent history is irrelevant to the current proceedings, but not only is Democrats' behavior surrounding last year's riots highly relevant as precedent and not only does it reveal the dishonesty and insincerity of this entire endeavor, it also provides crucial context that should inform our understanding of the events that took place on January 6.

Many of the people who infiltrated the Capitol took pictures of themselves and posted them on social media. To some, it seems, they thought that it was all a game. They apparently believed that violent mobs, destruction of property, rioting, assaulting police, and vandalizing historic treasures was somehow now acceptable in the United States. Where might they have gotten that idea? I would suggest to you that it was not from Mr. Trump. It was not Mr. Trump. It was not anyone in the Republican Party that spent the 6 months immediately prior to the Capitol assault giving rhetorical aid and comfort to mobs, making excuses for rioters, celebrating radicalism, and explaining that angry, frustrated, and marginalized people were entitled to blow off steam like that.

Let me be very clear. There can be no excuse for the depraved actions of the rioters here at the Capitol or anywhere else across this country. One hundred percent of those guilty of committing crimes deserve lengthy prison sentences for their shameful and depraved conduct. But this trial has raised the question about words, actions, and consequences.

As a nation, we must ask ourselves, how did we arrive at this place where rioting and pillaging would become commonplace? I submit to you that it was month after month of political leaders and media personalities, bloodthirsty for ratings, glorifying civil unrest and condemning the reasonable law enforcement measures that are required to quell violent mobs.

Hopefully we can all leave this Chamber in uniform agreement that all rioting--all rioting--is bad and that law enforcement deserves our respect and support. That has been Mr. Trump's position from the very beginning.

The real question in this case is, Who is ultimately responsible for such acts of mayhem and violence when they are committed? The House Democrats want two different standards--one for themselves and one for their political opposition.

They have carried out a grossly unconstitutional effort to punish Mr. Trump for protected First Amendment speech. It is an egregious violation of his constitutional rights. Since he uttered not a single word encouraging violence, this action can only be seen as an effort to censor disfavored political speech and discriminate against a disapproved viewpoint. It is an unprecedented action with the potential to do grave and lasting damage to both the Presidency and the separation of powers and the future of democratic self-government.

Yesterday we played you a video of countless Democrat Members of the Senate urging their supporters to fight. We showed you those videos not because we think you should be forcibly removed from office for saying those things but because we know you should not be forcibly removed from office for saying those things. But recognize the hypocrisy

Yesterday in questioning, House Manager Raskin admitted that the House Democrats had invented an entirely new legal standard. In fact, they have created a new legal theory: the Raskin doctrine. The Raskin doctrine is based on nothing more than determining protected speech based on the party label next to your name. Regardless of what you have heard or what you have seen from the House managers, if you pay close attention, you will see that any speech made by Democrat elected officials is protected speech, while any speech made by Republican elected officials is not protected.

The creation of the Raskin doctrine actually reveals the weakness of the House managers' case. Elected officials--and we reviewed this in- depth yesterday--under Supreme Court precedent Wood and Bond--by the way,

Bond didn't burn his draft card; he actually still had it. It was part of his defense. But in Bond and in Wood, the Court clearly directed all to know that elected officials hold the highest protections of speech, the highest protections, and I remind you why: because you all need to be free to have robust political discussion because your discussion is about how our lives are going to go, and that shouldn't be squelched by any political party on either side of the aisle, no matter who is the majority party at the time.

Why would the House managers make up their own legal standard? I will tell you why. Because they know they cannot satisfy the existing constitutional standard set forth by the United States Supreme Court that has existed for more than half a century. They argue Mr. Trump, as an elected official, has no First Amendment rights. It is the complete opposite of the law. We have shown you, without contradiction, that is wrong.

They also know that they cannot satisfy the three-part test of Brandenburg, as elucidated in the Bible Believers case.

There was absolutely no evidence that Mr. Trump's words were directed to inciting imminent lawless action. There was no evidence that Mr. Trump intended his words to incite violence. And the violence was preplanned and premeditated by a group of lawless actors who must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, but it proves that his words weren't what set this into motion, what was the incitement.

With no ability and no evidence to satisfy the existing constitutional standard, what are the House managers to do? They had to make up their own law. This is not only intellectually dishonest, folks; it is downright scary.

What type of precedent would be set if the Senate did vote to convict? Can Congress now ignore Supreme Court precedent on the contours of protected free speech? Will Congress be permitted to continually make up their own legal standards and apply those new standards to elected officials' speech? This would allow Congress to use the awesome impeachment power as a weapon to impeach their fellow colleagues in the opposing party. This is not a precedent that this Senate can set here today.

If the Senate endorses the House Democrats' absurd new theory, you will set a precedent that will trouble leaders from both parties literally for centuries to come, but that will not be the only disgraceful precedent to come from this case.

This has been perhaps the most unfair and flagrantly unconstitutional proceeding in the history of the United States Senate. For the first time in history, Congress has asserted the right to try and punish a former President who is a private citizen. Nowhere in the Constitution is the power enumerated or implied. Congress has no authority, no right, and no business holding a trial of Citizen Trump, let alone a trial to deprive him of some fundamental civil rights.

There was mention of a January exception argument. The January exception argument is a creation of the House managers' own conduct by delaying. They sat on the Article. They could have tried the President while he was still in office if they really believed he was an imminent threat. They didn't. The January exception is a red herring. It is nonsense because Federal, State, and local authorities can investigate. Their January exception always expires on January 20.

House Democrats and this deeply unfair trial have shamefully trampled every tradition, norm, and standard of due process in a way I have never ever seen before. Mr. Trump was given no right to review the so- called evidence against him at trial. He was given no opportunity to question its propriety. He was given no chance to engage in factfinding.

Much of what was introduced by the House was unverified second- or thirdhand reporting cribbed from a biased news media, including stories based on anonymous sources whose identities are not even known to them, never mind my client. They manufactured and doctored evidence, so much so that they had to withdraw it.

We only had--we had the evidence after we started the trial. They went on for 2 days, so in the evening, I was able to go back and take a really close look at the stuff. Myself and Mr. Castor and Ms. Bateman and Mr. Brennan, we all worked hard and looked at the evidence, four volumes of books in little, tiny print. We started--we literally had 12, 14 hours to really look at the evidence before we had to go on, and just in that short time of looking at the evidence, we saw them fabricating Twitter accounts. We saw the masked man sitting at his desk with the New York Times there.

And when we looked closely, we found that the date was wrong; the check had been added. They fabricated evidence. They made it up. They never addressed that in their closing--as though it were acceptable, as though it were all right, as though that is the way it should be done here in the Senate of the United States of America. Fraud--flatout fraud. Where I come from, in the courts I practice in, there are very harsh repercussions for what they pulled in this trial.

As we have shown, the House managers were caught creating false representations of tweets, manipulating videos, and introducing into the Record completely discredited lies, such as the ``fine people'' hoax, as factual evidence.

Most of what the House managers have said and shown you would be inadmissible in any respectable court of law. They were not trying a case; they were telling a political tale--a fable--and a patently false one at that.

House Democrats have denied due process and rushed the impeachment because they know that a fair trial would reveal Mr. Trump's innocence of the charges against him. The more actual evidence that comes out, the clearer it is that this was a preplanned and premeditated attack, which his language in no way incited.

Because their case is so weak, the House managers have taken a kitchen-sink approach to the supposedly single Article of Impeachment. They allege that Mr. Trump incited the January 6 violence. They allege that he abused power by attempting to pressure Georgia Secretary of State Raffensperger to undermine the results of the 2020 election, and they allege that he gravely endangered the democratic system by interfering with the peaceful transition of power. There are at least three things there.

Under the Senate rules, each of these allegations must have been alleged in a separate Article of Impeachment. I need not remind this Chamber that rule XXIII of the Rules of Procedure and Practice in the Senate when Sitting on Impeachment Trials provides, in pertinent part, that an Article of Impeachment ``shall not be divisible . . . thereon.''

Why is that? Because the Article at issue here alleges multiple wrongs in the single Article, it would be impossible to know if two- thirds of the Members agreed on the entire Article or just on parts of it as the basis for a vote to convict. Based on this alone, the Senate must vote to acquit Mr. Trump. You have got to at least obey your own rules if it is not the Constitution you are going to obey.

In short, this impeachment has been a complete charade from beginning to end. The entire spectacle has been nothing but an unhinged pursuit of a longstanding political vendetta against Mr. Trump by the opposition party.

As we have shown, Democrats were obsessed with impeaching Mr. Trump from the very beginning of his term. The House Democrats tried to impeach him in his first year. They tried to impeach him in his second year. They did impeach him in his third year. And they impeached him again in his fourth year. And now they have conducted a phony impeachment show trial when he is a private citizen out of office.

This hastily orchestrated and unconstitutional circus is the House Democrats' final, desperate attempt to accomplish their obsessive desire of the last 5 years.

Since the moment he stepped into the political arena, my client-- since my client stepped in, they have been possessed by an overwhelming zeal to vanquish an independent-minded outsider from their midst and to shame, demean, silence, and demonize his supporters in the desperate hope that they will never, ever pose an electoral challenge.

We heard one of the Congressmen on the screen: If you don't impeach him, he might be elected again.

That is the fear. That is what is driving this impeachment.

When you deliberate over your decision, there are four distinct grounds under which you must acquit my client.

First is jurisdiction. There is no jurisdiction. And if you believe that, you still get to say it.

Two, rule XXIII--it had to be divisible. Each allegation had to be singularly set out in front of you so it could be voted on and to see if two-thirds of you think that they proved that case or not. They didn't do that. You have got to ask yourself why. They know the Senate rules. They got them, and so did I. Why did they do it? Because they hadn't investigated, first of all. But, also, what they found out is when they were preparing all this, they couldn't do it. So if they threw in as much as they could and made as many bold, bald allegations as they could, then maybe two-thirds of you would fall for it. That is why the rules don't allow it to go that way.

Due process--I have exhausted that subject. It is a really good reason for all of you--all of you--in this Chamber to stop the politics, to read the Constitution and apply it to this proceeding and acknowledge that the lack of due process--way over the top, shocking. And you must not stand for it.

And, of course, the First Amendment--the actual facts of this case. There were no words of incitement.

Four grounds. Nobody gets to tell you which ground to pick, and nobody gets to tell you how many grounds to consider.

Senators, do not let House Democrats take this maniacal crusade any further. The Senate does not have to go down this dark path of enmity and division. You do not have to indulge the impeachment lust, the dishonesty, and the hypocrisy.

It is time to bring this unconstitutional political theater to an end. It is time to allow our Nation to move forward. It is time to address the real business pressing this Nation--the pandemic, our economy, racial inequality, economic and social inequality. These are the things that you need to be thinking and working on for all of us in America--all of us.

With your vote, you can defend the Constitution. You can protect due process. And you can allow America's healing to begin. I urge the Senate to acquit and vindicate the Constitution of this great Republic.

Thank you.

Mr. President, the Senate is now ready to vote on the Article of Impeachment. And after that is done, we will adjourn the Court of Impeachment.

Mr. President, I send an order to the desk.

Mr. President, distinguished Senators, my name is Eric Swalwell, and I represent California's 15th Congressional District.

Manager Castro just told you about Donald Trump's lies and acts before the election, but to paraphrase Winston Churchill, that wasn't the end of his efforts. That wasn't the beginning of the end, but perhaps it was the end of the beginning. Here is what I mean.

You saw President Trump prime for months his supporters to believe that, if the election were lost, it only could

have been so because it was rigged, but that took time just like, to build a fire, it doesn't just start with the flames. Donald Trump, for months and months, assembled the tinder, the kindling--threw on logs for fuel--to have his supporters believe that the only way their victory would be lost was if it were stolen. So, that way, President Trump was ready, if he lost the election, to light the match.

And on November 7, after all the votes were counted, President Trump did lose by 7 million votes.

But for Donald Trump, all was not lost. He had a backup plan. Instead of accepting the results or pursuing legitimate claims, he told his base more lies. He doused the flames with kerosene.

And this wasn't just some random guy at the neighborhood bar blowing off steam. This was our Commander in Chief.

Day after day, he told his supporters false, outlandish lies that the victory--that the election outcome was taken and it was rigged. And he had absolutely no support for his claims, but that wasn't the point. He wanted to make his base angrier and angrier.

And to make them angry, he was willing to say anything. On November 15, he stated:

I concede NOTHING! We have a long way to go. This was a

Shortly after 2 p.m., the Capitol Police and Metropolitan Police were overwhelmed by President Trump's mob. Perimeters were broken. The Capitol had been breached. Those officers kept fighting back for hours and hours to hold th line. They fought to defend the Capitol Building and all of us within it.

But they weren't there just to protect us--and they did--and our staff and the custodial staff and all the people who work so hard in this building. They were there to protect the votes of the American people that were being counted that day. I will show you more later about what that day was like for those brave officers.

But first, let's go back to what was happening where Manager Plaskett left off in the House Chamber. Rioters who had entered the building through the Senate quickly spread out through the Capitol. Many headed toward the House and Senate Chambers. After Speaker Pelosi was ushered out, Chairman McGovern was presiding in the House, attempting to keep the counting process going.

On our phones, Members were receiving security updates and watching social media to see the horror that was going on outside. We never thought it would make its way in.

By 2:25 p.m., rioters who were already in the building opened the east side doors of the Capitol Rotunda to let more of the mob in. They quickly flooded through the doors, overwhelming the officers.

This is new security footage of those doors, and, as before, the mob is identified with the red dot on the model of the Capitol. If you look closely, you will see the first person through the door is holding the Trump flag.

(Video presentation.)

At the same time, just one floor below, the mob finally pushed through a line of Capitol Police officers and overtook the area. We all know that area in the Capitol as the Crypt. This is directly beneath the Rotunda at the very center of the Capitol.

(Text of video presentation.)

(People chanting: ``Open up.'')

The Officer. No harm. No harm.

Inside the House Chamber, a security officer suspended the floor debate to update Members.

(Text of video presentation.)

The Officer. We have a person with tear gas in the Rotunda.

Please stand by. There are masks under your seats. Please

grab a mask. Place it in your lap, and be prepared to don

your mask in the event the room is breached.

We were told there were tear gas masks underneath our seats and to be prepared to grab them.

Determined to keep the count going, Chairman McGovern called the House back into session, but only 4 minutes later, at 2:30 p.m., the House abruptly recessed. A new security announcement was made.

(Text of video presentation.)

The Officer. Be prepared to get down under your chairs, if

necessary. So we have folks entering the Rotunda and coming

down this way. So we will update you as soon as we can, but

just be prepared. Stay calm.

As I heard that announcement on the floor, I saw the new House Chaplain, on just her fourth day on the job, walk to the front podium unannounced, and, amidst the chaos, she started to recite a prayer for peace.

Uncertain what would happen next, I sent a text message to my wife:

I love you and the babies, please hug them for me.

I imagine many of you sent a similar message.

What we could not see from inside the Chamber was that outside, the mob was growing larger and larger and approaching our doors. But we could hear them.

This security footage, which does not have sound, shows a closeup of Trump's mob as they move toward the second floor of the House Chamber to stop the counting of votes.

(Video presentation.)

In the back of the group, you see one individual carrying a ``Stop the Steal'' sign. They get within footsteps of the House door.

The next video is the viewpoint of the insurrectionists. It begins with the mob amassing and cuts ahead to show you their search to the House door.

(Text of video presentation.)

(People chanting: ``We want Trump.'')

Unidentified Man. It's a mob. They're going. Just stop.

Whoa, whoa. Dude, dude, dude, dude--you're not helping.

You're not helping. You are going to get me hurt and other

people.

(People chanting: ``Stop the steal.'')

Unidentified Man. All right, no violence.

Unidentified Man. It's too late for that. They don't listen

without that stuff.

(People chanting: ``Stop the steal.'')

Those doors, to orient you at home, are the doors that the President of the United States walks through when he or she gives the State of the Union Address.

You may have heard one man yell ``no violence'' and another respond:

It's too late for that. They don't listen without that.

They were there to stop the certification of the election.

At this point, inside the House Chamber, we can now hear the pounding on the doors. At 2:35 p.m., Members on the House floor were told that an evacuation route was secure, and it was time to leave. This video shows Members of Congress exiting to the side of the podium where we would go through the House Lobby and downstairs.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Because of coronavirus restrictions, congressional Members had been waiting in the Gallery for their time to speak, just one level above the House floor. Representatives, staff, journalists all took cover under their chairs, helped each other put on their gas masks, and held hands as rioters gathered outside.

Here, on this slide, you see Representative Jason Crow comforting our colleague Representative Susan Wild.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

The rioters continued to surround the House Chamber, flooding the halls and kicking on the doors as they passed them.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

This security video shows Ashli Babbitt, followed by others in the mob, turning the corner to the House Lobby doors where the Members were leaving.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Chairman McGovern was one of the last Members to leave the floor. As he left through the House Lobby, just after 2:40 p.m., he was spotted by the mob.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Minutes later, at 2:44 p.m., Ashli Babbitt attempted to climb through a shattered window into the House Lobby. To protect the Members in the Lobby, an officer discharged his weapon, and she was killed. I want to warn everyone that the next video, which shows her death, is graphic.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

He has a gun! He has a gun! He's got a gun!

Inside the Chamber, Representatives, staff, and journalists remained trapped in the Gallery, one floor above the House floor, and heard the gunshot. My colleague Representative Dan Kildee produced this recording.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

What the fuck? Take your pins off. Pins off!

Out of fear that they would be seen or taken by the mob, my colleagues were telling each other to take off their congressional pins. That buzzing sound that you hear in the background of these videos was the sound of the gas masks.

It was not until approximately 2:50 p.m., about 6 minutes after the shooting downstairs, that the remaining Members, staff, and journalists in the Gallery were finally able to flee.

In this security footage video, you can see them exiting. Many Members are still wearing their gas masks. They walk just feet away from where the Capitol Police are holding an insurrectionist at gunpoint. Just minutes earlier, that insurrectionist had tried to open the Gallery door and, thankfully, was stopped by a tactical team.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Although Members were now being moved to another location, the mob continued to fight--to stop the count, to find the Members, to engage with the police. The building was not yet secure.

This security video from 2:56 p.m. shows the mob in the House of Representatives' wing on the second floor of the Capitol. Insurrectionists who are still inside the building are fighting with the police, who are overwhelmed in trying to get them out.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Throughout this presentation, we have been very careful to not share where Members of Congress were taken or the paths they followed to get out and off the floor, but that very issue was under discussion by the insurrectionists themselves. One example comes from an FBI affidavit, which stated that a leader of a militia group known as the Oath Keepers received messages while he was at the Capitol. The leader was given directions to where Representatives were thought to be sheltering and instructions to ``turn on gas; seal them in.''

As you know, the threat to the Senate was no less than that of the Members of the House. The mob approached the Senate with the same purpose: fulfilling President Trump's goal of stopping the count; delaying the certification of the electoral college votes of the American people.

As you heard from Manager Plaskett, Vice President Pence was moved away from the area near the Senate Chamber at around 2:25 p.m. By that time, rioters had breached several areas close to this Chamber, and they were flooding the hallways just outside an nearby. The Senate Chamber was not evacuated until 2:30 p.m. The mob had been in the building for more than 15 minutes.

This new security footage of the Senators and staff leaving the Chamber will be displayed on the screens. It is silent.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

You cannot see it in this footage, but quick-thinking Senate floor staff grabbed and protected the electoral ballots that the mob was after.

Those of you who were here that day will recall that, once you left the Senate floor, you moved through a hallway to get to safety. That hallway was near where Officer Goodman had encountered a mob and led them upstairs and away from the Senate Chamber. You know how close you came to the mob. Some of you, I understand, could hear them, but most of the public does not know how close these rioters came to you. As you were moving through that hallway--I paced it off--you were just 58 steps away from where the mob was amassing and where police were rushing to stop them. They were yelling.

In this security video, you can see how the Capitol Police created a line and blocked the hallway with their bodies to prevent rioters at the end of the hall from reaching you and your staff.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Because this is security footage that you have not seen before, I want to play it again. The top of the screen is the other end of that hallway where the mob has amassed and the officers are rushing to protect you.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Additional security footage shows how Leader Schumer and the members of his protective detail had a near miss with the mob. They came within just yards of rioters and had to turn around. Here, in this new video, you see Leader Schumer walking up a ramp. In going up the ramp with his detail, he will soon go out of view.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Seconds later, they return and run back down the hallway, and officers immediately shut the door and use their bodies to keep them safe.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

At 2:45 p.m., shortly after Senators were ushered to safety from the Senate floor, insurrectionists reached the Senate Galleries. The following video was filmed by a New Yorker reporter.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Where the fuck are they? We're here.

Minutes later, the insurrectionists invaded and desecrated the Senate floor. These vandals shouted and rifled through the desks of this room. They took pictures of documents and of

themselves, celebrating that they had taken over the floor and stopped the counting of the electoral college votes.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Unidentified Speaker. Look at this. Take a picture.

Unidentified Speaker. Here. Look. Ted Cruz's objections. He

was going to sell us out all along.

Unidentified Speaker. Really?

Unidentified Speaker. Objection to counting the electoral

votes of the State of Arizona.

Unidentified Speaker. All right. All right. There's got to

be something in here we can use against these scum bags.

Unidentified Speaker. What happened to the phone, man?

Larry Brock, who was arrested for his role in the insurrection, was photographed on the Senate floor, wearing a helmet, tactical gear, and carrying flex cuffs.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

This man, also in the Senate Galleries, is Eric Munchel. Like Brock, he was dressed in what appears to be tactical gear, also holding up flex cuffs.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

If the doors to this Chamber had been breached just minutes earlier, imagine what they could have done with those cuffs.

After insurrectionists occupied the Capitol and stopped the joint session from counting the votes, the Capitol was in lockdown for 5 hours.

As long as it took to get back to the Capitol, to get back to the certification of the election, it could have been so much longer, or we might not have been able to resume at all. As horrific as it was--140 officers injured, 3 officers who ultimately lost their lives--we all know that awful day could have been so much worse. The only reason it was not was because of the extraordinary bravery of the men and women of the Capitol Police and the Metropolitan Police Departments. For hours and hours, these insurrectionists were in hand-to-hand combat with these brave men and women.

Like some of you, I come from a law enforcement family. My dad was a cop. My two brothers--my little brothers are cops who walk the beat today. I am proud of them. And like in every law enforcement family, when we hang up the phone, we don't only say ``I love you,'' we say ``Be safe.''

So let's focus now on the attack and what it was like for the officers defending the Capitol that day. And, again, I want to warn you that the following audio and videos are graphic and are unsettling, but it is important that we understand the extent of what occurred.

Here is an audio recording from the radio traffic of the DC Metropolitan Police Department describing the violence.

(Text of audio presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Cruiser 50, I copy. We're still talking rocks, bottles, and

pieces of flag and metal pole.

Cruiser 50, the crowd is using munitions against us. They

have bear spray in the crowd. Bear spray in the crowd.

1328.

Multiple deployments U.S. Capitol with pepper spray.

DSO, DSO, I need a re-up. I need a re-up up here.

You hear the officer describe they are ``using munitions''--they, the rioters, are ``using munitions against us.''

This video shows how the sprays that were described were used against the officers.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

In a separate Metropolitan Police Department radio traffic recording, you can hear an officer when he realizes that the insurrectionists had overtaken the police line.

(Text of audio presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Cruiser 50. We lost the line. We've lost the line. All MPD,

pull back. All MPD, pull back up to the upper deck. All MPD,

pull back to the upper deck ASAP. All MPD, come back to the

upper deck. Upper deck. Cruiser 50, we're flanked. 10-33. I

repeat 10-33 west front of the Capitol. We have been flanked

and we've lost the line.

The MPD officer calls out ``10-33.'' That is the code for emergency, officer in need of assistance; his words, ``We've lost the line.''

Hours after Members of the House and Senate had left this area on the west front of the building, the mob continued to grow, continued to beat the officers, as they tried to get in.

In this new security video, you can see the mob attacking officers with a crutch, a hockey stick, a bull horn, and a Trump flag.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

I want to show you that same attack from the officer's perspective, from his body camera footage.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

This body camera footage is from 4:27 p.m., over 2 hours from when the Capitol was first breached. The attack on police that afternoon was constant.

Metropolitan Police Officer Michael Fanone, a 20-year police veteran with four daughters, was part of a line of officers protecting the Capitol. He was one of three officers whom the mob dragged down the stairs. When they dragged him, they stole his badge, his radio, his ammunition magazine, and they tased him, triggered a heart attack.

Here he describes his experience.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Officer Fanone. It looked like a medieval battle scene. It

was some of the most brutal combat, you know, I have ever--

ever encountered. At one point I got tased. People were

yelling at me, `We got one. We got one.'

Officer Christina Laury, who regularly serves in MPD's Narcotics and Specialized Investigation Division, also protected the front Capitol entrance. Here is her experience.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Officer Laury. I mean, I can't say enough about the

officers that were there, the officers that were on the

frontline. And when I say `the frontline,' I mean, literally,

officers that were in a line, stopping these people that were

beating them with metal poles. They were spraying them with

bear mace. I mean, they did everything in their power to not

let those people in. And this was going on for hours.

Around 4:30 p.m., hours into the Capitol riots, Officer Daniel Hodges was protecting a west side Capitol entrance, when rioters who were trying to stop the certification trapped him between two doors.

When Officer Hodges was interviewed later, this is how he described what was happening.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Officer Hodges. They threw down a huge metal object that

hit me on the head. I was also knocked down. The medical mask

I was wearing at the time got pulled up over my eyes, so I

was on the ground and blinded, and they started attacking me

from all sides.

Rioters crushed Officer Hodges. He was wedged in the doorway, blood dripping from his mouth. He was struggling to breathe, all while the insurrectionists hit him.

Officer Hodges' experience reminds you of what he and many other officers experienced that day, what they went through.

We are also reminded of three officers who lost their lives: Capitol Hill Police Officers Sicknick, Liebengood, and Metropolitan Police Officer Smith.

In many law enforcement families, we pray for our loved ones, and we know the scripture of Matthew 5:9, ``Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.''

I am sorry I have to show you the next video, but in it you will see how blessed we were that on that hellish day, we had a peacemaker like Officer Hodges protecting our lives, our staffs' lives, this Capitol, and the certification process.

May we do all we can in this Chamber to make sure that never happens again.

(Video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

Recess

Mr. President, esteemed Members of the Senate, it is my solemn honor to be before you today.

I am Madeleine Dean, Congresswoman from the Fourth Congressional District of Pennsylvania. I am a lawyer. I am a former professor of writing. I am a sister. I am a wife. I am a mother. I am a grandmother to three, with fourth on her way. I am a person of faith. And I am an American.

Along with Manager Lieu, I will present the actions of a desperate President, and we will present evidence today of a class of public servants who, standing up to enormous pressure from the President of the United States, did the right thing and upheld their oaths.

My colleagues just presented evidence of President Trump's months- long effort to incite his base, leading them to believe the election was stolen, that they needed to fight like hell to stop the steal on January 6.

These weren't President Trump's only efforts to overturn the results. Manager Lieu and I will present evidence of President Trump's relentless, escalating campaign to fabricate an election victory by ignoring adverse court rulings, pressuring and threatening election officials, attacking Senators and Members of Congress, pressuring the Justice Department, and finally bullying his own Vice President.

President Trump and his allies filed 62 separate lawsuits in Federal courts across more than half a dozen States and the District of Columbia, including Pennsylvania, my home State, as well as Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, and Wisconsin. Of the 62 postelection legal challenges, he lost 61. Only one was successful, and that case involved ballot curing in Pennsylvania and had no impact on President Biden's 80,555-vote victory in our Commonwealth.

To be clear, not a single court, not a single judge agreed that the election results were invalid or should be invalidated. Instead, court after court reviewing these challenges said these cases were ``not credible,'' ``without merit,'' ``based on nothing but speculation,'' and ``flat out wrong.''

The judiciary resoundingly rejected Trump's fraud allegations and upheld the election results, but it was more than that. The court said these cases were different; they were dangerous to our democracy. For an example, in an opinion by United States District Court Judge Matthew Brann from Pennsylvania, he said:

[T]his Court has been presented with strained legal

arguments without merit and speculative accusations. . . . In

the United States of America, this cannot justify the

disenfranchisement of a single voter, let alone all the

voters of its sixth most populated state. Our people, [and]

laws, and institutions demand more.

Because this Court has no authority to take away the right

to vote of even a single person, let alone millions of

citizens, it cannot grant Plaintiff's requested relief.

That decision by Judge Brann was affirmed on appeal by Judge Stephanos Bibas, a Trump appointee who agreed and wrote:

The Campaign's claims have no merit. The number of ballots

it specifically challenges is far smaller than the roughly

81,000-vote margin of victory. And it never claims fraud or

that any of the votes were cast by illegal voters. Plus,

tossing out millions of mail-in ballots would be drastic and

unprecedented, disfranchising a huge swath of the electorate

and upsetting all down-ballot races.

Similarly, as Judge Linda Parker of the Eastern District of Michigan framed it--she said:

[S]tunning in its scope and breathtaking in its reach. If

granted, th relief would disenfranchise the votes of . . .

more than 5.5 million Michigan citizens who, with dignity,

[and] hope, and a promise of a [vote], participated in the

2020 General Election.

Donald Trump told his supporters: They are stealing the election. They took away your vote. It is rigged.

That was not true. According to judge after judge, the truth was exactly the opposite.

Trump was not suing to ensure election integrity; he was pursuing lawsuits that would, in effect, strip away American votes so that he could win. In other words, Donald Trump was asking the judiciary to take away votes from Americans so that he could steal the election for himself.

Then, after losing in all the courts, Trump turned to another tactic: pressuring and threatening election officials. You saw what happened in Michigan after Trump attacked the State and its election officials. His supporters surrounded the secretary of state's home, as you saw in the earlier slide, chanting, calling her a felon.

On November 17, the Board of Canvassers for Wayne County, MI, home to Detroit, unanimously certified the election results for Biden. That same night, after their vote to certify the results, Trump called the two Republican members of that board, pressuring them to change their minds. The call worked. The next day, both Monica Palmer and William Heartmann, the Republican board members, attempted to rescind their vote to certify Michigan's election results, but they simply couldn't.

President Trump didn't stop there. He then contacted majority leader of the Michigan Senate, Mike Shirkey, and the speaker of the Michigan House, Lee Chatfield, to lobby them to overturn Michigan's results. Trump invited Mr. Chatfield and Mr. Shirkey to Washington to meet with him at the White House, where the President lobbied them further.

Let's be clear. Donald Trump was calling officials, hosting them at the White House, urging them to defy the voters in their State and instead award votes to Trump. The officials held strong, and so Trump moved on to a different State, my home State of Pennsylvania. I am certain my Senators, Casey and Toomey, remember what happened there.

In early December, as he did in Michigan, he began calling election officials, including my former colleagues in the Pennsylvania Legislature, Republicans, Majority Leader Kim Ward

and Speaker of the House Bryan Cutler. Majority Leader Ward said the President called her to ``declare there was a fraud in the voting.''

Then, on November 25, President Trump phoned in to a Republican State senate policy hearing, trying to convince the Republican legislators, senators, and house members that there had been a fraud in the vote. He even had his lawyer hold a phone up to the microphone in that hearing room so the committee could hear him. Here is what he said:

(Text of audio presentation.)

President TRUMP. We can't let that happen. We can't let it

happen for our country. And this election has to be turned

around because we won Pennsylvania by a lot, and we won all

of these swing States by a lot.

This was a gathering--I have attended many, I have to tell you, as a former State legislator, a lot of policy hearings. I have to say with some confidence, that was likely the first time a President of the United States of America called in to a State legislative policy hearing.

And, remember, here is the President saying he won Pennsylvania, and Pennsylvania had been certified, that Biden had won by more than 80,000 votes.

Less than a week after calling in to that meeting, he invited multiple Republican members of the Pennsylvania Legislature to the White House--the same scheme he had used on the Michigan legislators. It didn't work with those public servants either.

Think about it. The President of the United States was calling public officials, calling from the White House, inviting them into the Oval Office, telling them to disenfranchise voters of their State, telling them to overturn the will of the American people. All so he could take the election for himself.

And then in Georgia, a State Trump had counted on for victory, his conduct was perhaps the most egregious. On November 11, Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger confirmed that he believed ballots were accurately counted for Biden.

Trump went on a relentless attack. Here are just a few examples. In all, Trump tweeted at Raffensperger 17 times in the coming weeks--there are just a few--calling him a ``disaster,'' ``obstinate,'' not having a clue, being played for a fool, and being a ``so-called Republican,'' all because Raffensperger was doing his job, ensuring the integrity of our elections.

And these attacks had consequences. Mr. Raffensperger and his family received death threats:

Your husband deserves to face a firing squad.

You better not botch this recount. Your life depends [upon]

it.

The Raffenspergers should be put on trial for treason and

face execution.

Just some of the threats they received. After these death threats, on November 25, Mr. Raffensperger wrote an op-ed, where he said:

My family voted for [Trump], donated to him and are now

being thrown under the bus by him.

But he also noted:

Elections are the bedrock of our democracy. They need to be

run fairly and, perhaps more [importantly], impartially.

That's not partisan. That's just American.

It is important to remember that this wasn't just a random attack. Trump wasn't just criticizing a politician over policy or saying he didn't agree. Donald Trump was savagely attacking a secretary of state because the official did his job and certified the State according to how the people in that State voted.

Donald Trump was trying to undermine our elections by taking votes away from the American people so that he could remain President, and he was willing to blame and betray anyone--anyone--even his own supporters, if they got in the way. Remember, Senators, those threats were to Mr. Raffensperger's family.

So some may say Trump didn't know his attacks against Mr. Raffensperger would result in death threats--except that all of this was very public. The secretary published his op-ed in USA TODAY, and major networks, including FOX, covered the threats against the Raffenspergers.

What did Trump do? Did he stop? Did he say: No, no, supporters; that isn't what I meant? No. He doubled down.

Let's see the evidence.

(Text of audio presentation of 11-26-2020.)

President TRUMP. This was a massive fraud. This should

never take place in this country. We're like a third world

country. Look at--look at Georgia. But I understand the

secretary of state who is really, uh, uh, he's an enemy of

the people. The secretary of state--and whether he's

Republican or not, this man, what he's done.

. . . this character in Georgia, who is a disaster.

Let that sink in. A Republican public servant doing his job, whose family had just received death threats, and the President of the United States labeled him ``an enemy of the people.''

And that is why this is different, because this was not just one attack or one comment. This was attack after attack in the face of clear threats of violence.

And on December 1, another official, Gabriel Sterling, a Republican who voted for Trump, made this point and appealed directly to our President to stop his dangerous conduct:

(Text of audio presentation 12-1-20.)

Mr. STERLING. Mr. President, it looks like you likely lost

the State of Georgia. We're investigating. There's always a

possibility--I get it--and you have the right to go through

the courts. What you don't have the ability to do--and you

need to step up and say this--is stop inspiring people to

commit potential acts of violence. Someone's going to get

hurt, someone's going to get shot, someone's going to get

killed.

Mr. Sterling put this perfectly. In this country, we can appropriately challenge a close count or go to the courts or disagree with others or make bold statements, but what Trump was doing was different.

Someone's going to get hurt, someone's going to get shot,

someone's going to get killed.

Mr. Sterling saw what Trump's conduct was fomenting. He warned him on live TV that violence was already happening and that more violence was foreseeable and inevitable. Sterling's pleas were played over and over on every network.

Rather than heed that warning, Trump escalated again. In early December, Trump called Brian Kemp, the Governor of Georgia, and pressured him to hold a special session of the State legislature to overturn the election results and to appoint electors who would vote for Trump.

A few weeks later, on December 23, Trump called the chief investigator for the Georgia Bureau of Investigations, who was conducting an audit, an audit of the signature-matching procedures for absentee ballots. Trump urged him, ``[F]ind the fraud,'' and claimed the official would be a ``national hero'' if he did.

Let's call this what it is. He was asking the official to say there was evidence of fraud when there wasn't any. The official refused, and the investigation was completed. And on December 29, Raffensperger announced that the audit found ``no fraudulent absentee ballots'' with a ``99 percent confidence'' level.

On January 3, Trump tweeted about a call he had with Georgia election officials the day before. He said:

I spoke to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger yesterday

about Fulton County and voter fraud in Georgia. He was

unwilling, or unable, to answer questions such as the

``ballots under the table'' scam, ballot destruction, out of

state ``voters'', dead voters, and more. He has no clue!

On January 5, the Washington Post released a recording of that call which had occurred on January 2--remember, just 4 days before the attack on the Capitol. Here is what President Trump said:

(Text of audio presentation of 1-2-2021.)

President TRUMP. It's more illegal for you than it is for

them because you know what they did and you're not reporting

it. That's the--you know, that's a criminal--that's a

criminal offense. And you know, you can't let that happen.

That's--that's a big risk to you and to Ryan, your lawyer.

That's a big risk.

Let's be clear. This is the President of the United States telling a secretary of state that if he does not find votes, he will face criminal penalties--and not just any number of votes. Donald Trump was asking the secretary of state to somehow find the exact number of votes Donald Trump lost the State by.

Remember, President Biden won Georgia by 11,779 votes. In his own words, Trump said:

All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes.

He wanted the secretary of state to somehow find the precise number, plus one, so that he could win.

Here is what he said.

(Text of audio presentation of 1-2-21.)

President TRUMP. So, look, all I want to do is this. I just

want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have.

He says it right there, the President of the United States, telling a public official to manufacture the exact votes needed so he can win.

Senators, we must not become numb to this. Trump did this across State after State, so often, so loudly, so publicly. Public officials like you and me received death threats and calls threatening criminal penalties, all because Trump wanted to remain in power. These public officials exercised great political and personal courage in the face of unprecedented pressure from a President of the United States.

Senators, ours is a dialogue with history, a conversation with the past, with a hope for the future.

Senators, I thank you today for your kind attention

For me and for many Americans, January 6 is forever etched in our memories.

I went to work with a sense of excitement--the start of my second term in Congress and the first time I would participate in the certification of a Presidential election.

And then we all know what happened. I know many of us have similar experiences from that day, but I will briefly share mine. I stood with colleagues in the Gallery above the House floor to observe the Arizona challenge. Moments later, police radios reported a breach of the Capitol grounds. Someone shouted up to us, ``Duck''; then, ``Lie down''; then, ``Ready your gas masks.''

Shortly after, there was a terrifying banging on the Chamber doors. I will never forget that sound. Shouts and panicked calls to my husband and to my sons, instructions to flee, and then the constant worrying of the gas masks filtering the air--the Chamber of the United States House of Representatives turned to chaos.

For Donald Trump, it was a very different day. Earlier, I showed you Donald Trump's desperate attempts to maintain power: ignoring adverse court rulings, attacking elected officials, pressuring his Justice Department, even attacking his own Vice President. You saw a man who refused to lose, who was desperate to retain power by any means necessary. You saw a man willing to attack anyone and everyone who got in his way, and you saw a man who thought he could play by different rules.

He told his supporters, as my colleague Ms. Plaskett just showed you, exactly what he thought those different rules were--combat, fight, violence.

This was not just one speech. This was weeks and weeks of deliberate effort by Donald Trump to overturn the election results so that he didn't have to give up the Presidency.

The speech on January 6 builds on, refers to, and amplifies that same pattern--the pattern Trump had used and broadcasted for months: He refused to lose, his attacks on others, and his different rules.

The only thing different about hi speech on January 6 from all these other times that we went through was that he was no longer telling his base just that they had to fight to stop the steal. He was finally telling them: Now is the time to do it. Here is the place, and here is how.

For weeks, he had urged his supporters to show up at a specific time and place, and when they got there, he told them exactly what he wanted.

Let's start with his desperation. You saw how much planning went into January 6, and when the day arrived, Donald Trump's desperation was in full force.

Between the time he woke up on January 5 and the start of the Save America March that next day, he had tweeted 34 times. When Donald Trump wants to get his message across, he is not shy, as you all know. These tweets were relentless. And these tweets all centered on his singular focus--his drumbeat to motivate, anger, and incite his supporters--his big lie: The Presidential election had been rigged. It had been stolen from him, and they had to fight to stop it.

And the timing was no coincidence. He sent 34 tweets because this was his last chance to rile up his supporters before the big, historic, wild event he had planned.

Now, I won't go through all of these tweets, but let me just highlight a few. At 1 in the morning, he tweeted:

If Vice President [Mike Pence] comes through for us, we

will win the Presidency. . . . Mike can send it back.

This will look familiar to you because Mr. Lieu just showed you how Trump had privately been pressuring and publicly attacking his Vice President to stop the certification.

And when Vice President Pence refused, when he explained that the Constitution simply does not allow him to stop certification, Donald Trump provoked his base to attack him. The late-in-the-evening tweet was no different. It just got more forceful.

Let's be clear. What Donald Trump was saying--that Vice President Pence could send back the certification--was not true.

For one thing, all 50 States had ratified this election. And for another, Vice President Pence explained to him that he does not have the power to unilaterally overturn States' votes and just send certification back.

And Donald Trump knew this, but this was his last chance to get his Vice President to stop the certification, and so he was willing to say or do just about anything.

These tweets--attacking the election as fraudulent, attacking his Vice President, and urging his supporters to fight--continued throughout the morning.

Here is another example. At 8:17 a.m. he tweeted:

All Mike Pence has to do is send it back to the States, AND

Mr. President, distinguished Senators, counsel, like several of you, I am a child of immigrants. And as a son of immigrants, I believe firmly in my heart that the United States is the greatest Republic that this world has ever known.

A hallmark of our Republic since the days of George Washington has been the peaceful transfer of power. For centuries, we have accepted it as fact.

Unfortunately, sadly, we know now that we can no longer take that for granted because, as Lead Manager Raskin explained, on January 6, the peaceful transition of power was violently interrupted when a mob stormed this Capitol and desecrated this Chamber.

As you will see during the course of this trial, that mob was summoned, assembled, and incited by the former President of the United States, Donald Trump, and he did that because he wanted to stop the transfer of power so that he could retain power, even though he had lost the election. And when the violence erupted, when they were here in our building, with weapons, he did nothing to stop it.

If we are to protect our Republic and prevent something like this from ever happening again, he must be convicted.

Now, I want to be very clear about what we will show you during the course of this trial. As my fellow managers present our case to you today, tonight, and tomorrow, it will be helpful to think about President Trump's incitement of insurrection in three distinct parts: provocation, the attack, and the harm.

Let's start with the provocation. We will show, during the course of this trial, that this attack was provoked by the President, incited by the President, and, as a result, it was predictable, and it was foreseeable. And, of course, that makes sense.

This mob was well orchestrated. Their conduct was intentional. They did it all in plain sight--proudly, openly, and loudly--because they believed, they truly believed that they were doing this for him; that this was their patriotic duty.

They even predicted that he would protect them. And for the most part, they were right. In his unique role as Commander in Chief of our country and as the one person whom the mob was listening to and following orders from, he had the power to stop it, and he didn't.

Now, some have said that President Trump's remarks, his speech on January 6, was just a speech. Well, let me ask you this: When in our history has a speech led thousands of people to storm our Nation's Capitol with weapons, to scale the walls, break windows, kill a Capitol Police officer?

This was not just a speech. It didn't just happen. And as you evaluate the facts that we present to you, it will become clear exactly where that mob came from, because here is the thing: President Trump's words, as you will see, on January 6 in that speech, just like the mob's actions, were carefully chosen. Those words had a very specific meaning to that crowd. And how do we know this? Because in the weeks prior to, during, and after the election, he used the same words over and over and over again. You will hear over and over three things--you can see them on the screens--first, what Lead Manager Raskin referred to as the ``big lie,'' that the ``election was stolen, full of fraud, rigged.'' You will hear over and over him using that lie to urge his supporters to ``never concede'' and ``stop the steal.'' Finally, you will hear the call to arms, that it was his supporters' patriotic duty to fight like hell. To do what? To stop the steal. To stop the election from being stolen by showing up in this very Chamber. To stop you. To stop us.

I respectfully ask that you remember those three phrases as you consider the evidence today--``The election was stolen,'' ``Stop the Steal,'' and ``Fight like hell''--because they did not just appear on January 6. Let me show you what I mean. Let's start with the ``big lie.''

You will see during this trial that the President realized, really by last spring, that he could lose, he might lose the election. So what did he do? He started planting the seeds to get some of his supporters ready by saying that he could only lose the election if it was stolen.

In other words, really what he did was create a no-lose scenario: either he won the election or he would have some angry supporters--not all but some--who believed that if he lost, the election had to be rigged, and they would be angry because he was telling Americans that their vote had been stolen. And in America, our vote is our voice. So his false claims about election fraud, that was the drumbeat being used to inspire, instigate, and ignite them, to anger them.

Watch this clip.

(Text of video presentation.)

President TRUMP. Because we are not going to let this

election be taken away from us. That's the only way they are

going to win this. We are not going to let it happen.

(Applause.)

It is the only way we can be--it is the only way we can

lose, in my opinion, is massive fraud.

We all know what happened after that. He lost. He lost the election. But remember, he had that no-lose scenario that I referenced earlier. He told his base that the election was stolen, as he had forecasted, and then he told them: Your election has been stolen, but you cannot concede. You must stop the steal.

(Text of video presentation.)

President TRUMP: You can't let another person steal that

election from you. All over the country, people are together

in holding up signs: `Stop the Steal.'

The Democrats are trying to steal the White House. You

cannot let them. You just can't let them.

Now, while he is inciting his supporters, he is also simultaneously doing everything he possibly can to overturn the election.

First, he begins with the courts--a legitimate avenue, legitimate avenue--to challenge the election, but he ignores all of their adverse rulings when all of his claims are thrown out.

Then he moves on to try to pressure State election officials to block the election results for his opponent even though he had lost in their States. You will hear my fellow managers discuss that in detail.

Then he tries to threaten State election officials to actually change the votes to make him the winner, even threatening criminal penalties if they refused.

He had the Justice Department investigate his claims, and even they found no support for those claims. So he tried to persuade some Members of his party in Congress to block the certification of his vote with attacks in public forums.

When that failed, he tried to intimidate the Vice President of the United States of America to refuse to certify the vote and send it back to the States.

None of it worked. So what does he do, with his back against the wall, when all else has failed? He turned back to his supporters. He had already spent months telling them that the election was stolen, and he amplified it further. He turned it up a notch. He told them that they had to be ready not just to stop the steal but to fight like hell.

(Text of video presentation.)

President TRUMP. We are going to fight for the survival of

our nation. And we are going to keep on fighting.

We will never surrender, we will only win.

Now is not the time to retreat. Now is the time to fight

harder than ever before.

We have to go all the way. We are going to fight like hell,

I will tell you right now.

We will not bend, we will not break, we will not yield. We

will never give in. We will never give up. We will never back

down. We will never, ever surrender.

You will see that in the months the President made thes statements, people listened. Armed supporters surrounded election officials' homes. The secretary of state for Georgia got death threats. Officials warned the President that his rhetoric was dangerous, and it was going to result in deadly violence. And that is what makes this so different, because when he saw firsthand the violence that his conduct was creating, he didn't stop it. He didn't condemn the violence. He incited it further, and he got more specific. He didn't just tell them to fight like hell; he told them how, where, and when. He made sure they had advance notice, 18 days' advance notice. He sent this ``save the date'' for January 6. He told them to march to the Capitol and fight like hell on January 6, as Lead Manager Raskin said, the exact same day we were certifying the election results. What time was that rally scheduled for? The exact same time that this Chamber was certifying the election results in joint session. When did he conclude his speech? Literally moments before Speaker Pelosi had gaveled us into session.

Many of us were in the House during that joint session of Congress. I was sitting two rows behind Leader Schumer and Leader McConnell. I remember it vividly. And as we were standing there fulfilling our solemn oath to the Constitution, the President was finishing his speech just a couple of miles away. How did he conclude that infamous speech? With a final call to action. He told them to march down Pennsylvania Avenue, to come here; that it was their patriotic duty because the election had been stolen. And when they heard his speech, they understood his words and what they meant because they had heard it before.

Let's take just a minute and really look at his words on January 6 as he spoke at the Save America rally. Remember, I told you you would hear three phrases: ``The election was stolen,'' ``Stop the Steal,'' and ``Fight like hell.'' Let's start with that first phrase.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

President TRUMP. All of us here today do not want to see

our election victory stolen.

There has never been anything like this. It is a pure theft

in American history. Everybody knows it. Make no mistake,

this election was stolen from you, from me, and from the

country.

Now, of course, each of you heard those words before. So had the crowd. The President had spent months telling his supporters that the election had been stolen, and he used this speech to incite them further, to inflame them, to stop the steal, to stop the certification of the election results.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

President TRUMP. We will never give up, we will never

concede. It doesn't happen. You don't concede when there's

theft involved. And to use a favorite term that all of you

people really came up with: We will stop the steal.

We must stop the steal.

Finally, the President used the speech as a call to arms. It was not rhetorical. Some of his supporters had been primed for this over many months. As you will learn, days before this speech, as Lead Manager Raskin noted, there were vast reports across all major media outlets that thousands of people would be armed, that they would be violent. You will learn that Capitol Police and the FBI reported in the days leading up to the attack that thousands in the crowd would be targeting the Capitol specifically, that they had arrested people with guns the night before the attack on weapons charges.

And this is what our Commander in Chief said to the crowd in the face of those warnings, right before they came here.

(Text of video presentation of 1-6-2021.)

President TRUMP. We will not let them silence your voices.

We're not going to let it happen. Not going let it happen.

(People chanting: ``Fight for Trump.'')

President TRUMP. Thank you. And you have to get your people

to fight because you'll never take back our country with

weakness. You have to show strength, and you have to be

strong. And we fight. We fight like hell. And if you don't

fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore.

``You have to get your people to fight,'' he told them.

Senators, this clearly was not just one speech. It didn't just happen. It was part of a carefully planned, months-long effort with a very specific instruction: Show up on January 6, and get your people to fight the certification.

He incited it. It was foreseeable. And again, you don't have to take my word for it. The President's former Chief of Staff--he is a retired marine, four-star general, was confirmed by this body to be the Secretary of Homeland Security, overwhelming vote--that man was John Kelly. On the day after the insurrection, he said this:

(Text of video presentation.)

Mr. KELLY. You know, the president knows who he's talking

to when he tweets or when he makes statements. He knows who

he is talking to. He knows what he wants them to do. And the

fact that he said the things, he has been saying the things

he has been saying since the election, and encouraging

people, there is no surprise, again, at what happened

yesterday.

No surprise. Think about that. No surprise. The President had every reason to know that this would happen because he assembled the mob, he summoned the mob, and he incited the mob. He knew when he took that podium on that fateful morning that those in attendance had heeded the words and they were waiting for his orders to begin fighting.

And that, of course, brings me, my fellow managers, to what happened here in this building. As Lead Manager Raskin stated, my colleagues are going to walk through the events of January 6 and the evidence in very great detail. They are painful to watch and to recount, and I am not going to repeat the evidence now.

But I do want to be clear about what also happened during that terrible attack, and that is this: that President Trump, once again, failed us because when the violence erupted, when we and the law enforcement officials protecting you were under attack, as each of you were being evacuated from this Chamber from a violent mob, as we were being evacuated from the House, he could have immediately and forcefully intervened to stop the violence. It was his duty as Commander in Chief to stop the violence, and he alone had that power, not just because of his unique role as Commander in Chief but because they believed that they were following his orders. They said so.

(Text of videotape presentation.)

President Trump!

President Trump!

Fight for Trump!

Fight for Trump!

Fight for Trump!

We were invited by the President of the United States!

I thought I was following my President. I thought I was

following what we were called to do. President Trump

requested that we be in DC on the 6th.

You heard it from them. They were doing what he wanted them to do. They wouldn't have listened to you, to me, to the Vice President of the United States who they were attacking. They didn't stop in the face of law enforcement, police officers fighting for their lives to stop them. They were following the President. He alone, our Commander in Chief, had the power to stop them and he didn't.

You will hear evidence tonight, tomorrow, throughout the trial, about his refusal as Commander in Chief to respond to numerous desperate pleas on the phone, across social media, begging him to stop the attack. And you will see his relentless attack on Vice President Pence, who was at that very moment hiding with his family as armed extremists were chanting, ``Hang Mike Pence,'' calling him a traitor.

You will see that even when he did finally, 3\1/2\ hours into the attack, tell these people to go home in peace, he added, as Lead Manager Raskin said, I will quote:

You're very special. We love you.

Think for a moment--just a moment--of the lives lost that day, of the more than 140 wounded police officers, and ask yourself if, as soon as this had started, President Trump had simply gone onto TV, just logged onto Twitter and said ``Stop the attack.'' If he had done so with even half as much force as he said ``Stop the steal,'' how many lives would we have saved? Sadly, he didn't do that.

At the end of the day, the President was not successful in stopping the certification. That we know, thanks to the bravery of our law enforcement and to the bravery of the Senators in this

room, each of you who still fulfilled your constitutional duty even under the threat of mortal peril. But there can be no doubt of the grave harm that he caused to our elected leaders; to us, our families; to all who work at the Capitol, our staff, your staff; to our brave Capitol police, who defend us tirelessly with little thanks, who believed that they had a Commander in Chief who would defend and protect them, instead put them in harm's way; to those killed for heeding his command; to our democracy and the system, which ensures that we have a President elected by the people; to our national security and our standing in the world. The harm was real. The damage was real.

Five people lost their lives on that terrible, tragic day. A woman was shot dead 50 feet from where we later certified the election results. And for those who question just how bad it was, criminal complaints recently unsealed by the Department of Justice are more than revealing. You all see one of these documents on the screen. In the charging affidavit of one of the leaders of the Proud Boys, we learned that members of this group ``said that they would have killed . . . Mike Pence if given the chance.''

In another, we learned of the tweet in realtime while they were in the building stating:

We broke into the Capitol . . . we got inside, we did our

part. . . . We were looking for Nancy [Pelosi] to shoot her

in the friggin' brain but we didn't find her.

And for anyone who suggests otherwise, these defendants themselves have told you exactly why they were here. You will se this in the trial, that in the halls of the Capitol, on social media, in news interviews, and in charging documents, they confirmed they were following the President's orders. You can see some of the statements on that screen, one who said:

Trump wants all able-bodied patriots.

Another:

President Trump is calling us to FIGHT! . . . This isn't a

joke.

Another:

I thought I was following my President. I thought I was

following what we were called to do.

Our President wants us here.

We wait and take orders from [the] president.

He made them believe, over many weeks, that the election was stolen and they were following his command to take back their country.

As I prepared for today--yesterday, this trial--one memory that I couldn't shake: It was on the night of January 6 and the feeling of walking back onto the House floor and seeing many of you there. I remember us finishing our task at 4 in the morning, and as I walked off the floor, I was so grateful--so grateful--for the opportunity to thank the Vice President of the United States, Mike Pence, for his actions, for standing before us and asking us to follow our oath and our faith and our duty.

We only got a couple of hours of sleep that morning. Early the next day, I called my dad, who came to this country, as I mentioned, as an immigrant 40 years ago, and I told him that the proudest moment, by far, of serving in Congress, for me, was going back on to the floor with each of you to finish the work that we had started.

I am humbled to be back with you today. And just as on January 6, when we overcame that attack on our Capitol, on our country, I am hopeful that at this trial, we can use our resolve and our resilience to, again, uphold our democracy by faithfully applying the law, vindicating the Constitution, and holding President Trump accountable for his actions.