In a segment of her previously recorded deposition played during Tuesday’s hearing, Ruby Freeman discussed how she didn’t feel safe going anywhere anymore.
“There is nowhere I feel safe. Do you know how it feels to have the President of the United States target you? The President of the United States is supposed to represent every American,” she said.
But Trump targeted her, a small business owner, a mother and a citizen who “wanted to stand up to help Fulton County run an election in the middle of the pandemic.”
The next hearing will be Thursday, June 23 and at the close of today’s proceedings, chair Thompson announced that Rep. Adam Kinzinger would lead questioning of witnesses. That hearing is expected to focus on the former president’s attempt to capture the DOJ and have his allies promote the Big Lie.
Notably, Schiff also seemed to confirm what the committee intends to do with criminal referrals.
“Other countries use violence to seize power but not in the United States,” Schiff said.
When Trump did this to stay in office after losing the election to Joe Biden, Schiff said, he broke that sacred covenant.
“Whether what he did was criminal will be to others to decide,” the California Democrat said Tuesday.
Thompson recently said that the committee would not issue a criminal referral, opting instead to leave the evidence and the testimony on the public record to serve as its referral. Not to mention, the many lawsuits the committee has already filed and judicial rulings it has received affirming that Trump was likely engaged in criminal activity in his attempt to foment a coup.
A criminal referral would be almost purely symbolic, anyway and would technically only restate what the committee has now laid out in four hearings so far.
