January 6, 2021 will live in infamy as the day that right-wing protestors stormed the U.S. Capitol building under the false pretense that the 2020 election was stolen from lame duck president Donald Trump. While investigations by a House committee into the attack on the Capitol started nearly a year ago, they will continue sharing their findings tonight in the second public hearing, and it will be available to view online and on national television.
What are the January 6 hearings?
Investigations into the 2021 attack on the Capitol began last July by the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. The committee’s investigation has included 1,000 interviews and 140,000 documents, according to the Washington Post, in order to accurately piece together what happened on January 6, as well as in the months leading up to the attack. The New York Times says the hearing tonight will include testimony from Capitol police officer Caroline Edwards, who was injured during the attack, and British filmmaker Nick Quested, who was documenting the actions of the far-right extremist group the Proud Boys. Tonight’s hearing will also reveal video footage of top Trump aides and Trump family members testifying as part of the investigation.
There are currently two hearings scheduled over the next week:
- Monday, June 13 at 10AM EST
- Wednesday, June 15 at 10AM EST
Deadline says that there could be a total of eight days of hearings by the end of the June, and more in September.
Where can I watch the January 6 hearings?
The easiest way to watch today’s hearing is via live stream on YouTube, embedded below, which will begin today at 10am ET on the January 6th Committee’s official YouTube channel. Other networks and outlets like PBS NewsHour, The New York Times, and the Washington Post will also be live streaming the hearing with some offering commentary from reporters.
The hearing will also be aired on national television. Channels like CNN, ABC, CBS, and NBC will not be airing their original programming and will instead broadcast the hearing. Fox News did not broadcast the first hearing, opting to air Tucker Carlson sans commercials instead, while pushing the hearing to Fox Business. However Fox News will broadcast this morning’s hearing as they argue that primetime slots are for host opinions while daytime programming is for news, according to CNN Business.
The focus of these upcoming hearing is to present a comprehensive narrative and timeline of how the insurrection began, dating back to the presidential election a few months prior. While bits and pieces of the committee’s investigation have been reported on, these upcoming hearings are an opportunity to hear the group’s findings cohesively, illuminating what actually happened in the months leading up to, during, and following the January 6 attack on the Capitol.
What was presented at the first hearing?
The first of the hearings, on Thursday, June 9, saw the committee present a 10-minute video compiled from various sources including Capitol Police radio recordings, Capitol Building security cameras, and video taken at Trump’s speech. The 10-minute video, which was also posted on Twitter, laid out the events of January 6, from the Proud Boys marching to the Capitol at 11:22 AM to altercations between Capitol Police and Insurrectionists at 4:15 PM. While scattered clips have been available across the Internet for months, this is the first time an official government source put out a video of this kind.
Capitol Police officer Caroline Edwards also testified at the hearing, presenting her experience of being injured and verbally harassed during the insurrection. The committee also revealed testimonies from Trump officials like Ivanka Trump and former attorney general Bill Barr. Notably, Barr testified that he told Trump that the claims of election fraud were unfounded—which Ivanka claims to have agreed with—but Barr’s attempts to speak sense to the former president fell on deaf ears.
The committee also presented evidence of former Trump campaign adviser Jason Miller and Trump lawyer Alex Cannon telling Trump that he lost the election. Despite all of these close sources confirming the outcome, Trump still whipped up support from his ravenous fanbase on unfounded claims of election fraud.
Update 6/13/22 8:30 AM: Updated with new streaming link, added details from previous hearings,