(CNN) The House House Committee of Inquiry, which examined Jan. 6, 2021, uprising, closed its closed-door interview Friday with Trump White House attorney Pat Cipollone, while it was expected to ask about what he did in Donald’s disappearing days Trump administration has seen. as the former president and his allies tried to bypass the election.
The interview was videotaped and could be shown at future hearings, including one on Tuesday about how the violent mob was summed up and the role of extremist groups, as well as another hearing – which is not yet planned – on the 187th minute of Trump’s inaction as rioters stormed the US Capitol.
Cipollone met with the committee for nearly eight hours on Friday. He did not answer CNN questions when entering or leaving the room. Cipollone took 70-minute breaks from the interview with his lawyer in a separate conference room throughout the day. His appearance Friday is the result of months of negotiations between his lawyers and the Jan. 6 panel on what topics can be discussed. He had previously met informally with the committee in April.
Cipollone was among the handful of people who spent time with Trump as he watched the Capitol riot on television from a dining room in front of the Oval Office, according to two sources familiar with the panel’s investigation. The committee heard from other witnesses who said that Cipollone, along with other senior Trump advisers, including Ivanka Trump and Dan Scavino, were with the president at various points during this time.
Like others who were present and spoke before the committee, Cipollone was able to help shed light on Trump’s mental state as the violence took place. Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson, for example, said she overheard a conversation in the dining room at one point about rioters singing “Hang Mike Pence.”
Cipollone’s presence in the dining room – which some witnesses described to the committee – underscores why the committee seeks his on-the-record testimony as key fact witnesses.
The California Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a Democrat on the committee, told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on “The Situation Room” on Friday that in his testimony, Cipollone “does not contradict the testimony of other witnesses, and I think we learned a few things that we will roll out in the next hearings. “
When specifically asked if Cipollone confirmed Hutchinson’s testimony, Lofgren said, “not contradictory is not the same as confirming.”
Pressed on the distinction, Lofgren said: “Well, he could say that and so was wrong – what he did not say. There are things for which he was not present or in some cases could not remember with precision.
“I think he was honest with the committee. He was careful in his answers, and I believe he was honest in his answers,” she added.
Cipollone’s concerns about executive privileges around the role of White House attorney could lead to him limiting his cooperation with the committee, according to sources familiar with his thinking.
The committee sought to compile a comprehensive account of what Trump did on January 6, with whom he spoke, and how he responded to the violence in real time. The panel relied heavily on eyewitness accounts to do so due to an hour-long gap in White House records during that time, CNN previously reported.
Lofgren, backing down on the claims of the Cipollone privilege, could claim on CNN earlier this week.
“Well, executive privilege is held by the current president, who did not claim it when it came to finding out information about the January 6 plot,” Lofgren said. “The attorney-client privilege could be asserted. But, remember, the presidency is his client, not Mr. Trump as a person.”
But Lofgren confirmed: “I am sure we will get information that is useful to him and we will also respect his commitment to those principals he loves.”
Cipollone’s name has come up again and again during the committee hearings as far as he is considered as a key witness of the committee.
Cipollone was in a key Oval office meeting on January 3, 2021, when Trump considered acting Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen to replace DOJ Environment Attorney Jeffrey Clark because Clark, unlike Rosen, was willing to have the power of to use the federal legislation for its baseless claims of electoral fraud.
At that meeting, Rosen and Cipollone discredited Clark’s job credentials and categorically dismissed a draft letter written by Clark, who falsely claimed that the Department of Justice had found evidence of electoral fraud.
Rosen’s deputy Richard Donoghue heard in a committee that Cipollone said of the draft letter in that assembly, “the letter that this guy wants to send, that letter is a murder-suicide pact. It will hurt anyone who touches it.” I have nothing to do with that letter. I never want to see that letter again. “
The committee revealed that in his earlier, informal conversation with Cipollone, Cipollone told the elected committee that “he intervened when he heard that Mr Clark met with the President on legal issues without his knowledge, which is strictly against the policy of White House was. “
Hutchinson noted that Cipollone was against Trump, who called on his supporters to march to the Capitol in his speech on the morning of January 6, and was particularly against Trump for banning his supporters from the Capitol.
Hutchinson said Cipollone told her on January 3: “We have to make sure this does not happen, this would be a terrible idea for us legally. We have serious legal concerns if we go to the Capitol that day.”
When violence erupted in the Capitol, Cipollone marched into the office of Trump’s former chief of staff Mark Meadows, according to Hutchinson, and demanded that she talk to Trump about doing something to intervene.
Hutchinson said the Meadows told Cipollone that the former president did not want to do anything and Cipollone said something to the effect of the mark, ‘something has to be done, or people die, the blood will be on your F ** * en Hänn. ‘
Cipollone wanted to tell Trump in his speech of January 7, 2021 that the riots should be persecuted and described as violent, but Hutchinson said that these original lines did not bring it to the final version of the speech that the Trump delivered.
Hutchinson added that from what she understood at the time, the reason individuals like Cipollone wanted this language there was because it was a “big concern of the 25th.
The committee played the video of the testimony of Jared Kushner and says that Cipollone and his team “always said,“ Oh, we are going to resign. We will not be here if that happens, if that happens. Kushner said, “I took it a bit to just cry to be honest with you.”
Before Cipollone’s interview was determined, the committee made a public push to confirm him under oath.
“Our committee is confident that Donald Trump does not want Mr. Cipollone to confirm here,” the GOP rep. Wyoming Liz Cheney, who will serve as the committee’s vice president, will attend the panel’s fourth hearing on June 21.
“We think the American people deserve to hear from Mr. Cipollone personally,” she added. “He should appear before this committee, and we will work to secure his testimony.”
This story and headline were updated with additional developments Friday.
CNN Andrew Millman and Kaitlan Collins contributed to this report.
