In the midst of the revelations from Mark Meadow’s texts we now have evidence that the GOP and the FoxNews crowd knew immediately that the Capitol Insurrection wasn’t perpetrated by Antifa, they knew that it wasn’t a set of “peaceful tourists” and they all knew that it was under the control of Donald John Trump.
On Monday a pair of Capitol Riot organizers testified before the Jan 6th Commission that they specifically told Mark Meadows that things would get violent.
Dustin Stockton and Jennifer Lynn Lawrence will testify before the committee and turn over all of their documents, text messages and extensive information allegedly implicating members of Congress in the Jan. 6 attack.
"Among the documents the couple is providing are conversations they had with staffers and members of Congress as they planned the main rally that took place on the White House Ellipse that day," Rolling Stone reported. "Stockton described these discussions as largely logistical and focused on planning the members’ participation in objections to the electoral certification on the House floor and various events that were staged to protest against the election. They include Instagram messages Lawrence exchanged with Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC) as she tried to get him to speak at the Ellipse rally."
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Stockton and Lawrence have a history of staging political stunts and previously led the "March for Trump" bus tour that ended at the Ellipse rally with the president. Rolling Stone revealed that they were the sources for an October report saying members of Congress were involved in planning Trump's efforts to overturn the election.
"They claimed one of these lawmakers, Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ), suggested the possibility Trump could get them a 'blanket pardon' in an unrelated ongoing investigation if they helped protest the election," the report said.
Gosar has called the claims "categorically false and defamatory." But Stockton and Lawrence may have proof. They also said that they were coordinating with Mark Meadows and warned him ahead of time that there could be potential violence.
“The people and the history books deserve a real account of what happened,” Stockton said.
"Violent sh*t happened,” Lawrence said. “We want to get to the bottom of that."
If you’re not planning ahead to break the law, exactly why would you need a “blanket pardon?” If Meadows was specifically told that there could be violence the argument that the White House didn’t know what was going to happen is out the window. They knew what they were doing, they knew what they were setting in motion and that they were putting the members of Congress and the Vice President at risk.
Just like with the texts to Mark Meadows — all plausible deniability for the violence that ensued is now gone.
Last night Stockton after his testimony had an amazing interview with Anderson Cooper where he pointed the finger for the riot and violence directly at Trump.
Stockton, who testified before the House Select Committee investigating the attack hours before going on CNN, argued that Trump should have known better than to send an angry crowd down to the Capitol without sufficient security forces in place to prevent things from getting out of hand.
"The people who committed violence, the people who attacked police officers or defaced the capitol are responsible for their own actions, first and foremost," he said. "But the buck's got to stop at President Trump. He knew better and there's no excuse for him sending people down into that situation without having the logistics, the security... to control the crowd."
Stockton also said that the text messages provided by former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows show that Trump declined to act to stop the rioting even though a large number of his political allies begged him to intervene.
"The fact that he delayed for so long responding, I think really speaks ill of what his intentions were and what he was doing," Stockton said.
Of course, all of this has been obvious from the beginning. It’s always been clear that Trump was sitting on his hands while the violence spread from the courtyard and into the Capitol while members of Congress scrambled for cover.
He just sat and watched. For hours.
He knew what was happening and he didn’t care. He let the violence grow and spread, only chiming in with a tweet that yet again attacked Mike Pence for “not doing the right thing” until finally Pence himself called in the National Guard.
And after the attacking mob was finally being expelled, their mission temporarily accomplished, did he finally release a video that said “Go Home, we love you, you’re very special, stay peaceful.”
Stay peaceful.
There was nothing peaceful about it and he damn well knew that.