A former aide of ex-US president has said that Donald Trump insisted on going to Capitol Hill on January 6, 2021 when his supporters were rioting, and had attempted to grab the steering wheel of the presidential limousine when his security declined his request to be taken there.
According to a report in Reuters, citing foreign media outlets such as CNN and The New York Times, Cassidy Hutchinson, a top aide to the then president’s White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, made the revelations on the sixth day of House of Representatives hearings into the assault by Trump’s supporters on the Capitol Hill in January of last year.
Hutchinson said that a senior Secret Service official, Tony Ornato, told her that former president Trump had also dismissed concerns that some supporters were carrying weaponry and insisted that they not be screened so that the crowd would look larger.
“Take the effing mags [magnetometers] away; they’re not here to hurt me,” Trump had stated, according to what Hutchinson was told by the Secret Service official.
Hutchinson also stated during the hearings, citing Ornato, that Trump was angry and told Secret Service to take him to Capitol Hill to join supporters who had gathered while the Congress was meeting to endorse Joe Biden’s victory in the elections.
“I’m the effing president. Take me up to the Capitol now,” Hutchinson quoted the former president as saying.
She also said that Trump tried to take the wheel, lunging from the back of his presidential car.
Meanwhile, The New York Times and NBC, while citing sources within the US Secret Service, reported that the head of Trump’s security detail and the limousine driver were willing to testify under oath that the incident never happened.
Moreover, Trump, on his social media app Truth Social, said that the “fake” story on him attempting to grab the steering wheel was “sick and fraudulent”.
On Jan 6, 2021 Trump’s supporters had gathered outside Capitol Hill, as the Congress was meeting inside to officially endorse Joe Biden’s victory in the presidential elections. The gathering had turned into a riot, followed by supporters storming the parliamentary building.
In the rioting that day, four people died, with one being fatally shot by police and others of natural causes.
Additionally, more than a 100 police officers were wounded, with one dying the next day. Four officers later ended their life by suicide.
