WASHINGTON — The Republican plan to parry the House Jan.6 committee was meant to be simple. GOP officials would focus solely on rising prices, and would treat the hearings like a sideshow that voters would not find relevant.
Ex-President Donald Trump has thrown out the script yet again.
Trump shared a series of notes on Friday’s hearing on social media, while the party tried to capitalize on a disturbing piece of economic news that was bad for President Joe Biden. In May, inflation reached a 40 year high.
On Thursday, the hearing attracted millions of people — some from Trump-world. Trump’s allies began a frenzy with texting and tweeting to try to blunt specific claims after the hearing ended.
Trump spoke of the inflation rate on Truth Social but gave far more time to hearings than GOP operatives wanted to ignore. After being banned from Twitter, Trump launched Truth Social. This gave him an unfiltered platform to reach his supporters.
“I think it is fine to correct the record so that it’s not just uninhibited talk points,” stated a former Trump White House aide. “But I believe the vast majority should be spent on economic issues.”
His former attorney general Bill Barr was the target of the 45th president. The committee viewed video testimony from Barr, which showed him telling Trump that there had been no widespread election fraud in 2020.
Trump wrote that Barr was “a weak, frightened attorney General” and worried about his chances of running into trouble with Democrats. He repeated the unfounded claim of election theft and seemed to mock his oldest daughter, who was a senior advisor in the West Wing. A small portion of Ivanka Trump’s testimony was shown by the committee. She said that she respected Barr’s decision and was influenced to believe that Trump had legitimately lost.
Her father wrote that “Ivanka Trump” hadn’t looked at the election results, and that he had “long since checked them out.” He was only trying to be respectful of Bill Barr and his position in the role as attorney general (he sucked!) ).”
Trump’s claim his daughter “checked out”, doesn’t fit with his previous portrayal of his daughter as a dynamo. He credited Ivanka for finding 14 million jobs at a White House event in 2019. In December 2020, she ran for the Senate in Georgia. She told voters that she had spoken with her father earlier in the day and that he wanted her to send the message that he would never stop fighting to protect you.
The strategy that Republicans had in mind before the hearings is to discredit individual witnesses is not compatible with their strategy.
The party settled for mocking Democrats for focusing on Jan. 6, when parents are struggling to find baby formula, and motorists face $5 per gallon gas.
The Republican National Committee released an ad Thursday that captured the GOP’s approach. Biden was criticized for inflation, crime and chaotic troop withdrawals from Afghanistan. The ad ends with a message that reads “But what should Democrats focus on?” and a reference to Jan. 6 committee.
Trump may not be able to ignore the hearings. He has never been a good listener. According to people close to him, he is still fixated on the notion that he was robbed from a victory and that it is impossible to get him off the topic. According to the committee, Trump’s confidant, Fox News host Sean Hannity sent a text message asking for help: “No more stolen elections talk.” Hannity’s advice did not work.
According to one strategist for the Republican National Campaign, the committee will struggle to sustain public interest in additional hearings this month, when there are many competing stories that are more interesting to Americans. According to this viewpoint, Republicans don’t need Trump to draw more attention to their hearings. They’ll fade on their merits.
The strategist stated that there is a lot of polling that shows that Jan. 6 was not a priority for voters. “With all the other things happening around the world, it’s hard to see how they can continue to break that. There are many other important issues that are top of mind.
When asked about the fallout of the hearings, another GOP strategist said that he did not see them.
Missouri Rep. Jason Smith is a Trump ally. He was a former member of the GOP leadership and said he fell asleep while watching Thursday’s hearing. Smith suggested that Democrats are using a tired strategy amid terrible economic news.
Smith stated to NBC News that Donald Trump’s speech is what unites Democrats. Therefore, Smith said that Smith was not surprised that they made it into a movie for TV. “Unfortunately, for them, I haven’t found anyone outside Washington, D.C. who is watching.”
Many did. New Jersey Republican National Committee member Bill Palatucci said that he watched the hearing with a heavy heart. He also questioned whether the hearings were worth the time.
