A trove of text messages obtained by CNN reveal that a number of Republicans were convinced that Donald Trump could immediately stop the violence at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, but that the then-president failed to take any action for hours.
The messages “began pouring into the cellphone” of White House chief of staff Mark Meadows within minutes of the breach of the Capitol and throughout the afternoon, with pleas to get Trump to call off the violence, CNN reported.
Republican members of Congress, former members of the Trump administration, Fox News hosts and even Donald Trump Jr. reached out to Meadows, clearly convinced Trump could quell the insurrection aimed at overturning the 2020 election and keeping Trump in office.
“POTUS should go on air and defuse this. Extremely important,” Tom Price, Trump’s secretary of health and human services, texted to Meadows, CNN reported.
“POTUS needs to calm this shit down,” Rep. Jeff Duncan (R-S.C.) reportedly messaged Meadows.
“Fix this now,” wrote Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas).
“Mark: he needs to stop this, now. Can I do anything to help?” asked Trump’s former acting White House chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, according to CNN.
“TELL THEM TO GO HOME!!!” former White House chief of staff Reince Priebus reportedly texted.
“He’s to to condem [sic] this shit. Asap,” Donald Trump Jr. texted.
Trump’s dangerous delay before taking action to quell the violence is a key focus of the House select committee’s investigation of the events of Jan. 6, CNN noted. Members will attempt to determine if the holdup is proof that Trump was determined to obstruct Congress’s pro forma certification of the Electoral College count and that he may have been guilty of dereliction of duty.
The messages were among 2,319 texts that Meadows turned over to the House select committee before he stopped cooperating.
CNN reporters have since talked to more than a dozen people who texted Meadows that day, and they stood by their messages and the belief that Trump had the power to shut down the riot.
“I thought the president could stop it, and was the only person who could stop it,” Alyssa Farah Griffin, Trump’s director of strategic communications until she left the White House in December 2020, told CNN. She’s currently a political commentator.
Mulvaney told CNN: “I wish someone had responded to my outreach.”
A Meadows associate, who asked to remain anonymous, said: “Two hours [to act] is just inexcusable ... when the safety of the federal government is in question, you have the duty immediately to speak out. And Trump was derelict in that duty.”
Seven people lost their lives in connection with the riot, and 114 U.S. Capitol Police officers were injured in the violent breach. Nearly 850 people have been charged with crimes so far.
Check out the full CNN report here.