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CNN Special Reports
The Trump Insurrection: 24 Hours That Shook America. Aired 11p- 12a ET
Aired February 06, 2021 - 23:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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[23:00:53]
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CROWD: Fight for Trump. Fight for Trump.
MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: We have been told by Capitol police that the Capitol is in lockdown.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They broke the glass? Everybody stay down. Get down.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Gunshots rang out. The rioters actually started. They trying to ram the door.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are watching an attempt at sedition. We are watching an attempt at a bloodless coup in the United States.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is a bonfire of the insanities that we are watching in the nation's capital right now and it all flows from Trump.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: His initial action was not horror which was almost everybody else's reaction. His initial reaction was to watch the show.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I heard multiple conversations loudly and publicly, "find the vice president, hang the vice president".
CROWD: We want Pence. We want Pence.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Now, a first draft of history in the making, a revealing look inside the Trump Insurrection.
Thousands of angry true believers triggered by lies and calls to battle, attempted a coup that left five people dead. A mob that came armed with conspiracy, hate and weapons, overwhelming undermanned police and shocking a nation even though former President Trump and his followers long made it clear they would not believe they were losers in the election.
And now a CNN's special report, THE TRUMP INSURRECTION: 24 HOURS THAT SHOOK AMERICA. DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: They say I have
the most loyal people. Did you ever see that. Where I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and I would not lose any voters, ok. It is like incredible.
CROWD: We want Trump. We want Trump. We want Trump.
TRUMP: And I'm afraid the election is going to be rigged. I have to be honest.
JIM ACOSTA, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well this started back in 2016 campaign. We would be at the rallies and he would refer to the press as the disgusting news media, the dishonest news media, liars, scum and so on. He rolled that into the Oval Office.
TRUMP: Stick with us. Don't believe the crap you see from these people, they're fake news.
What you are seeing and what you are reading is not what's happening.
ACOSTA: And the coronavirus pandemic, I think, is a perfect example of how Trump's corrosive effect on the truth, on what we consume in the news media, what that can do to the country.
TRUMP: Looks like by April, you know in theory when it gets a little warmer it miraculously goes away. I hope that's true.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: COVID is just a made-up government thing, you know.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have read the facts. I don't listen to the news.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm not worried about the pandemic at all.
TRUMP: I want to always play it down. I still like playing it down.
Voting by mail is wrought with fraud and abuse.
They're going to try and steal the election. Look at this crowd.
MAGGIE HABERMAN, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": He talked about the lack of security around by-mail voting. It created a real sense of unease for voters with their own system in the country.
TRUMP: The only way we are going to lose the election is if the election is rigged. Remember that. It is the only way we are going to lose this election.
PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Take a look at the top line vote. There has been record turn out throughout the country.
BLITZER: After four long tense days, CNN projects Joseph R. Biden Jr. is elected the 46th president of the United States.
ACOSTA: Talking to my sources, you know, the president understood in the days after the election that he had lost. But he was willfully misleading, lying to the American people, telling them -- telling his supporters that he had in fact won the election and that it was a rigged election.
BLITZER: No evidence or fraud has emerged. The election was not rigged.
HABERMAN: His allies, his supporters, and some formerly with the campaign, some outside of it filed a number of legal challenges to try to overturn the results.
ELLEN L. WEINTRAUB, FEDERAL ELECTION COMMISSION: There had been 60 lawsuits brought by the president and his allies to try and challenge the election results throughout the country.
[23:05:02]
And in 59 out of 60 of them, they lost.
HABERMAN: so one thing that they started talking about the lawsuits, started seeing trouble was can we get pro-Trump electors in various states and have those certified instead and sent to the electoral college. Those efforts also failed.
BLITZER: On December 19th, President Trump tweeted quote, "Peter Navarro releases 36-page report alleging election fraud, more than sufficient to swing victory to Trump. A great report by Peter, statistically impossible to have lost the 2020 election. Big protest in D.C. on January 6th. Be there, will be wild."
ARIEH KOVLER, POLITICAL ANALYST: His supporters understood that as the code that actually they have been waiting for since election day who genuinely believe not only that he won the election but that he will remain president by proving that the election is fake or maybe there's other ways to stay in power.
BLITZER: Political consultant Arieh Kovler, who's based in Israel, says he was following Trump supporters' message boards and tweeted this warning on December 21st. Quote, "On January 6th armed Trumpist militias will be rallying in D.C. at Trump's orders. It's highly likely that they'll try to storm the Capitol after it certifies Joe Biden's win. I don't think this has sunk in yet".
KOVLER: There were groups of people who were absolutely making plans. Some of them quite (INAUDIBLE). Things I saw included a map of the district around the Capitol including all of the congressional buildings and how they connected by the underground tunnels. And a discussion about whether or not, given how many people that there are, they set up a -- set of blockades around the congressional district to stop Congress movement.
JOSH CAMPBELL, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: If average citizens looking at the Internet could see this, that raises the question, why didn't law enforcement catch this?
BLITZER: A number of Republican politicians spread their own lies and disinformation to support and abet President Trump's efforts to overturn the election results and incite supporters. REP. LOUIE GOHMERT (R-TX): The bottom line is the court is saying we
are not going to touch this, you have no remedy. Basically, it affects the ruling would be that you got to go to the street and be as violent as Antifa and BLM.
SENATOR TED CRUZ (R-TX): We will not go quietly into the night. We will defend liberty into the future. And we are going to win.
CAMPBELL: It is very clear and looking at the record that not only President Trump but other elected officials, his allies were out there trying to whip up anger, trying to get people to believe that an election had been stolen.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: President Trump is speaking in front of thousands of his supporters who've gathered in Washington for the so- called March to Save America rally, protesting the legal results of the November election.
ACOSTA: Anderson, it is very difficult to secure a crowd of this side. It is enormous and more people are continuing to show. And they are angry. The animosity in the air in this crowd --
REP. MO BROOKS (R-AL): Today is the day American patriots start taking down names and kicking ass.
DONIE O'SULLIVAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Do you believe -- do you accept that Joe Biden won the election?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No.
O'SULLIVAN: Well, what do you think happened?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Fraud.
O'SULLIVAN: All these Trump events I've been going to I just hear the same thing over and over again.
Why did you come here?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I mean all this fraud and I could see all over online. And it's not made-up.
O'SULLIVAN: People were amped up. They were raring to go. I was standing at the mall with them and I said here in two week's time, Biden is going to be inaugurated. They said, no way. It's not happening.
BLITZER: As the crowd got amped up for the president's appearance, he and his adult children were all backstage, giddy with excitement. Ivanka at her focused father's side, Eric celebrating his birthday.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Happy birthday, Eric.
BLITZER: And this seemingly lighthearted namesake -- DONALD TRUMP, JR., SON OF DONALD TRUMP: Mark Meadows -- an actual
fighter. One of the few/
BLITZER: -- turning to anger on stage.
D. TRUMP: If you're going to be the zero and not the hero, we are coming for you. We are going to have a good time doing it.
TRUMP: All of us here today do not want to see our election victory stolen by emboldened radical left Democrats. We will never concede. It doesn't happen. You don't concede with this (INAUDIBLE).
Our country has had enough. We will not take it anymore. And that's what this is all about.
You will never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength. You have to be strong.
I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.
CAMPBELL: The day started with President Donald Trump, his lawyer Rudy Giuliani, his son, Donald Trump Jr. At a rally whipping up people into anger, whipping up people into fear.
[23:10:05]
RUDY GIULIANI, TRUMP LAWYER: If we're wrong, we will be made fools of. But if we're right, a lot of them will go to jail.
CROWD: Yes.
GIULIANI: So, let's have trial by combat.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He just said trial by combat. I'm ready.
CAMPBELL: The day ended with this violent mob attacking the United States Capitol.
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CROWD: U.S.A. U.S.A. U.S.A.
TRUMP: Let's walk down Pennsylvania Avenue. I want to --
DAVID AXELROD, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: He basically had a match and a can of kerosene and he lit it.
CROWD: Fight for Trump. Fight for Trump.
AXELROD: And the manifestation of that were these folks streaming down Pennsylvania Avenue headed towards the Capitol. [23:15:06]
KOVLER: The people that came to this rally were not the ones (ph) of the real Trump supporters. They were the hardest of the hardcore, extremely radicalized, extremely agitated.
O'SULLIVAN: Do you accept that Biden won the election?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Absolutely not.
KOVLER: So they got between that and people having a rally (INAUDIBLE) the president speak.
It was turning into a multiple march which was already very (INAUDIBLE).
O'SULLIVAN: We walked from the White House with the Trump supporters who are marching to the Capitol just as we got to the west side of the Capitol.
There was a very small line of police and just sort of one set of barriers. And all of a sudden we heard a bit of commotion. And next thing we just saw is Trump supporters streaming through the barriers and onto the lawn of the U.S. Capitol. And I just got the sense that this was about to get out of control.
RAJU: I was inside the Capitol as these protesters were gathering. We were getting reports about how much more unrest there was outside. The extent to which members of Congress aides, people on Capitol Hill could be in danger was certainly did not even come close to the radar of virtually anybody in Congress.
HABERMAN: Before all the chaos erupted during the joint section of Congress to certify the Electoral College vote, Mike Pence was preparing to preside over the proceedings.
RAJU: The Republican movement to essentially throw out these electoral votes was essentially all fed by President Trump's disinformation, his conspiracy, rankly the lies that he told the American public about the election.
CRUZ: What does it say to the nearly half the country that believes this election was rigged?
RAJU: Despite the objections, President Trump was not going to be President Trump anymore come January 20th.
ACOSTA: Mitch McConnell despite being a pretty loyal Republican through all of this was saying no, he was not going to have it.
SENATOR MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY), SENATE MINORITY LEADER: If this elections were overturned by mere allegations from the losing side, our democracy would enter a death spiral.
HABERMAN: Mike Pence had made clear to President Trump he was not going to do what President Trump wanted which was overturn the results somehow. The president refused to accept that.
ACOSTA: It just goes to show you how detached from reality the president had become. Hew thought that his Vice President could march up to Capitol Hill and carry out some kind of coup.
Mike Pence was essentially telling the rest of the world, I'm not in on this. It is over for Donald Trump.
That, of course, set the president off, set him into this tirade and that is part of the reason why you saw the president down on the Ellipse charging up the crowd.
TRUMP: We are not going to let it happen.
CAMPBELL: Although President Trump told that rally and that crowd that he was prepared to join them in marching to the Capitol, that never happened.
RAJU: We have been told by Capitol police that the Capitol is in lockdown and that people cannot leave the building.
ALEXANDER MARQUARDT, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: When I got to the Capitol, you can tell there were different factions and energy within the crowd.
BLITZER: Alexander Marquardt is there right in the middle of all of this.
MARQUARDT: There are some people who just wanted to be there and wave flags. There were other people who were much more aggressive and those were the people who were really at the front.
ELLE REVE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: With a mob, like logic goes out the window. Mob mentality doesn't even begin to cover what it feels like.
There is just this energy and no sense of personal responsibility. So you see people who look like your parents, like a suburban soccer mom, like scrambling over the wall.
MARQUARDT: The protesters were able to rush through, rush up the stairs, rush up into the upper area and suddenly I was looking up and they were just everywhere. They had swarmed the Capitol building.
ELIZABETH NEUMANN, FORMER DHS ASSISTANT SECRETARY: I was on the phone with a reporter on a different issue and somebody said like they breached the perimeter. And I was like what? Yes, how does that even happen?
DARYL JOHNSON, FORMER DHS SENIOR DOMESTIC TERRORISM ANALYST: I was shocked because the police were overrun so easily and quickly.
[23:20:01]
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You better run, cops.
MARQUARDT: And just the sheer number of people in this mob of insurrection was easily able to breach the Capitol. It was just mayhem. It was total chaos.
And I kept looking around for law enforcement, thinking how on earth is this possible?
CAMPBELL: There should have been a larger police presence there. There should have been more fencing. There should have been all the things that law enforcement typically does whenever you have a large crowd gathered inside the United States Capitol.
BLITZER: The now former United States Capitol police chief said the police responded quote, "valiantly".
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let's go.
MARQUARDT: There was a moment that the crowd clocked on to us. And it became hostile very, very quickly.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This guy is with the media. This guy is with the media.
CROWD: Boo. Boo.
MARQUARDT: Just to watch the crowd turn on us --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: CNN sucks. CNN sucks. CNN sucks.
MARQUARDT: -- was really, really unsettling and luckily we got out of there unscathed, all of us, and we are all quite experienced were pretty rattled by it.
I have been in a lot of riots and protests and this was the most hostile crowd that I think I have ever been in.
CAMPBELL: There've been many descriptions of what took place at the United States Capitol. Some calling it violence, some calling it lawlessness.
This was terrorism. The definition of terrorism is violence in pursuit of a political goal.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Supreme Court is not helping us. No one is helping us. Only us can help us. Only we can do it.
CAMPBELL: What we saw take place in an unprecedented way was domestic terrorism.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What are you going to do?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Whatever we have to do. What do you think 1776 was?
KOVLER: I never thought of a protest that you get some (INAUDIBLE). And it was scary. It wasn't clear how it was going to end.
RAJU: Would the United States Capitol police be prepared to hold back an angry crowd from entering the United States Capitol. Of course, we know in hindsight the answer was no. [23:21:58]
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[23:26:16]
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CROWD: U.S.A. U.S.A. U.S.A. U.S.A. U.S.A.
CAMPBELL: Once the crowd makes their way inside, past law enforcement into the building, it's total chaos.
What you see is this mob storming the building. Going floor by floor. They encounter law enforcement. In certain instances, they pushed forward past them, some officers stepped aside and allowed them by.
But what you see is just this constant building and building, more people coming, more people coming.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let him in. Let him in. Let him in.
RAJU: So the way they got into the Capitol was rioters and looters and the mob walked up the steps -- the west front steps of the Capitol.
Broke the windows on the first floor of the Senate's side. Opened the door and the rest of these rioters walked in through the first floor of the Capitol.
At that point many of them walked towards the Senate side of the Capitol and they were immediately confronted by one police officer.
IGOR BOBIC, POLITICAL REPORTER, HUFFINGTON POST: I heard a commotion, and some yelling and I ran downstairs where I encountered this lone police officer courageously making a stance against a mob of 20 or so Trump supporters.
You could see him trying to but ultimately failed to prevent them from moving in. Shocking moment because at that point nobody really knew that there had been an intrusion into the Capitol itself.
MARQUARDT: It is hard to say what the police presence is out here. I cannot see any sort of law enforcement.
I'm just thinking, where is law enforcement? Where are the re- enforcements for the Capitol police inside? Why hasn't MPD, the D.C. police shown up. Why hasn't the National Guards shown up?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Vice President and the United States Senate.
REP. JASON CROW (D-CO): One thing I did notice was that the security seemed lighter than it did earlier in the session actually last year when the BLM protests were going on.
MIKE PENCE, FORMER VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The house will be in order.
BLITZER: House members were meeting in a joint session to consider the electoral votes.
RAJU: It was followed by an hour of debate before we realized that the mob and the riot fighting with police outside and that they had broken through.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are watching an attempted sedition. We are watching an attempt at a bloodless coup in the United States, Trump supporters stopping the constitutional process, the counting of electors.
[23:30:02]
RAJU: The chamber went into lockdown, Mike Pence was ushered out of the Senate chamber. Most of the Senate were still in the chamber waiting for their instructions.
BLITZER: Look at this. These protesters are inside Statuary Hall. This is a legendary place. It is hard to believe what we are seeing.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I have never been in this house. How about you? No.
You (EXPLETIVE DELETED) own it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's right, we own it. We own you.
RAJU: At one point you have a crowd of rioters approaching the doorway with are block by capitol police. It appears as though the officers are going to keep them back. Then, inexplicably, the officers suddenly step aside.
The mob begins using objects to crash through the door. We didn't see what those officers have done is leaving jeopardy their colleagues behind the doors, which were essentially the last time of defense. They tried to grab everything they can, chairs, desks, furniture to try to block the way.
JIM ACOSTA, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: This is a bonfire of the insanities that we are watching at the nation's capitol right now, and it all flows from Trump. I could not imagine that in my wildest dreams to see Trump supporters carrying the confederate flag through the halls of the U.S. capitol, it's traitorous.
JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: President Trump could stop this with one tweet. But instead he's on twitter attacking Vice President Pence for refusing to go along with his attempt at a coup.
PROTESTERS: Hang Mike Pence. Hang Mike Pence. Hang Mike Pence. Hang Mike Pence. Hang Mike Pence.
JIM BOURG, PHOTOGRAPHER, REUTERS: It was just, you know, such a constant, hundreds of people at the top of the east front steps of the Capitol chanting that for quite some time. I heard multiple conversations loudly and publicly, not anything people were trying to hide, discussing what are we going to do with the vice president? We should go in and find the vice president. We should hang the vice president.
DAVID AXELROD, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Donald Trump put a price on the head of his own vice president. So the message was very clear that somehow Pence could overturn the results of the election and hand it to Trump. They believed it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, we came this far. What do you say?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Drag him out.
AXELROD: And so it's not surprising that some would go hunting for Pence when they went over the Capitol after he announced that he wasn't going to play that role.
ACOSTA: And the president has broken his silence. The president tweeting just a few moments ago, he is not telling these protesters to leave the Capitol.
TAPPER: It's odd that he said stay peaceful given the fact that this crowd is not peaceful.
MAGGIE HABERMAN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: There have been efforts imploring him to send out something to calm down his supporters over the course of the -- at that point, hour-and-a-half that it had been going on, what that tweet was, was something that he said stay peaceful but did not acknowledge the things that absolutely spire out of control and was not the condemnation that folks were hoping for.
MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: As these rioters approached the house floor, there was a deadly incident. They were warned to step away.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: A warning that this video contained some disturbing content.
CAMPBELL: Pro-Trump supporter later one identified as Ashli Babbitt tries to make her way through a window, there was a shot.
RAJU: That person that immediately after she was shot was given medical assistance, was taken to the nearby hospital and died. This was a terrifying, tragic scene that was unfolding steps away from the halls of freedom on Capitol Hill.
THOMAS BARANYI, PROTESTER: I was right there with her. They shot her.
CAMPBELL: CNN spoke to her mother who said that she was a type of person who would be willing to die for her beliefs.
BLITZER: Ashli Babbitt's social media feed was flooded with posts supporting President Trump and QAnon conspiracy theories.
CAMPBELL: One thing is clear, this was not a protest, this was not a demonstration, this was a violent mob attempt and causing destruction. This was a violent insurgence. This was not a protest.
BLITZER: Ahead, more violence.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They broke the glass. Everybody stay down, get down.
BLITZER: Lawmakers under siege.
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[23:38:42]
BLITZER: Around 3:00 P.M. on Wednesday afternoon, January 6th, this shaky video tells the story of shaken nerves.
RAJU: The House members who were on the first floor of the House had been evacuated already but there were members in the upstairs gallery part of the chamber. And those members were particularly scared about what would happen.
REP. JASON CROW (D-CO): I saw the Capitol police locking the doors and started to stack furniture and barricade us in the chamber. It was at that point that I realized that we are trapped and that we are going to try to protect ourselves within the chamber.
REP. ANNIE KUSTER (D-NH): We had to shelter-in-place order. They told us to use the gas masks that are under the seats.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They asked to put on masks, check the door to make sure it is locked.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They broke the glass?
CROW: I heard the sound of breaking glass and gunshots rang out. And then rioters actually start to trying to ram the doors down.
REP. SUSAN WILD (D-PA): I thought I really should call the kids, and I was on with them telling them what was going on and that we were waiting to get out, that I was OK.
[23:40:03]
At one point, my son said what do you mean you are, okay? I can hear gunshots.
KUSTER: I was frightened that it would be a mass casualty incident, that if they had automatic weapons, they could have killed hundreds of members of Congress.
CROW: I was preparing myself to make a stand and to finish. They have to fight our way out.
WILD: My heart was pounding out of my chest. I was really getting very, very upset. And at that point, Jason Crow reached out and took my hands, saying, you're going to be okay.
Everything is going to be okay. He was like the perfect person to be in the fox hole with. He was a former Army Ranger.
BLITZER: Outside the House floor nearby, lawmakers were hunkered down hiding.
REP. GRACE MENG (D-NY): Within about 10 or 15 minutes, the room that I was in, I started hearing a lot of stomping and chanting right outside. Then I realized that they were literally right outside of my door. And so I was really frightened. I moved a lot of furniture that I was physically able to and tried to barricade the door.
BLITZER: Across the Capitol, protesters were entering offices.
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: People climbing the walls, breaking windows, breaking into doors and the parliamentarian's office.
RAJU: This is a breach of national security office because the Senate parliamentarian's office is a critical office. That is what ensures the Senate can function, where all the papers are kept.
Nancy Pelosi's office is one of the most heavily guarded offices on Capitol Hill. You cannot just walk into Nancy Pelosi's office. But that's exactly what some of these demonstrators did. There is a photo of one rioter sitting there with his feet up.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I sat down here at my desk. I'm a taxpayer. I'm a patriot. That ain't her desk. We loaned her that desk, and she ain't appreciating the desk so I thought I'll sit down and appreciate the desk.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There you go, here you go, brother.
RAJU: The rioters even took away her name plate that was on top of her suite.
HABERMAN: A lot of other pictures of these rioters sitting at desks, they should never be sitting at on the house floor, on the Senate floor.
RAJU: This is something that is not done. You don't walk into the Senate floor and that is a place where the senators gather where their aides gather. But these rioters had gotten into the Senate chamber and stunning image, were sitting where the presiding officer sits, where Mike Pence, as the president of the Senate sits while presiding over the chamber.
BLITZER: While chaos reigned, authorities made sure those members of the House in the gallery got out safely.
WILD: While we were crouched down in that those final minutes, Jason Crow told us all to take our pins off so that when we got out to the hallway, if there were perpetrators there, they wouldn't know we are members of the Congress. This identifies me as member of 117th member of Congress.
CROW: When we went out through that door, there is a line of SWAT officers with their guns drawn. They were holding back protesters. They took us to the underground tunnels to Longworth and then had kind of fortified Longworth with police and additional security.
The speaker came in at one point and gave some remarks just to reinforce our resolve and most importantly make a commitment that we were going to return that night.
BLITZER: As both House members and senators stayed locked down in the Capitol, fearing for their lives and vowing to return to finish verifying the votes, the president and his personal lawyer were trying to stop that from happening.
HABERMAN: President Trump and his lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, both tried reaching out to newly elected Senator Tommy Tuberville to try to convince him to delay the certification in some way. This was all as this violence was taking place. The concern was not all about whether Tuberville was safe.
RUDY GIULIANI, TRUMP PERSONAL LAWYER: I'm calling you because I want to discuss with you how they're trying to rush this hearing and how we need you, our Republican friends, to try to just slow it down so we can get these legislators to get more information to you.
HABERMAN: In Giuliani's case, he left a voice mail on the wrong person's phone, and that the president's case, he called Senator Mike Lee thinking that he was calling Tommy Tuberville.
ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Inside sources tell CNN that during that deadly insurrection, the president was, quote, borderline enthusiastic about the attempted coup.
[23:45:00]
HABERMAN: His initial reaction was not horror which was almost everybody else's reaction. His initial reaction was to watch the show.
JOE BIDEN, U.S. PRESIDENT: I call on President Trump to go on national television now to fulfill his oath and defend the Constitution and demand an end to this siege.
DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: I know your pain. I know you were hurt. We had an election that was stolen from us.
But you have to go home now. We love you. You're very special. I know how you feel. But go home and go home in peace.
ACOSTA: When you're telling your violent supporters that you love them, what kind of message does that send? I mean, it sends a message of approval.
ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: We learned later in the afternoon that the mayor of D.C. had imposed a curfew starting at 6:00 P.M. So I thought, okay, at least we know that it's 6:00 P.M., the cavalry is probably going to show up and get all these rioters out of here. And sure enough as dusts started falling, we did see a huge number of Washington, D.C. police show up, National Guards showed up and then we saw a contingent of FBI.
REPORTER: You're up there?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, I was up on the left side at the very top before they threw out a flash bang and started spraying tear gas.
REPORTER: Why did you decide to come here today?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: To represent my country, to fight for what I believe in and what I know to be true.
REPORTER: Which is?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Which is that Trump won and that there are people in high places trying to take advantage of everybody in lower places.
BLITZER: There believes, they're uprising came with a heavy price.
CAMPBELL: At one point, you see an officer trapped in the door as he's pinned in screaming for help. That's one of the many officers that were injured on that day. You know, of course, another Capitol police officer would later die from injuries.
BLITZER: Dozens of officers were injured in mob violence like this, sticks and poles, even American flags raining down on police who were trying to keep the rioters from entering the Capitol.
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[23:51:18]
MIKE PENCE, FORMER U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: The Senate will come to order.
RAJU: 8:00 P.M. eastern on Wednesday night, they came in and they kicked off a pretty somber moment.
PENCE: For even in the wake of unprecedented violence and vandalism at this Capitol, the elected representatives of the people of the United States have assembled again on the very same day to support and defend the Constitution of the United States.
SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): We will not be kept out of this chamber by thugs, mobs or threats.
AXELROD: There's no question that when the Congress returned after this siege to their vandalized chambers to finish the work that they started, there was a different atmosphere.
SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY): I have never lived through or even imagined an experience like the one we have just witnessed in this Capitol.
SEN. MITT ROMNEY (R-UT): Today was heartbreaking.
AXELROD: It was a cold shower for a lot of people. It had changed the tenor of the debate. It didn't change everyone's mind.
SEN. JOSH HAWLEY (R-MO): We do need an investigation into irregularities, fraud. We do need a way forward together.
RAJU: Some politicians decided to back off the objections in the aftermath of the violence that we saw. Josh Hawley of Missouri still went forward with his objection. His critics said he was helping incite the passions that led to the violence.
ROMNEY: Those who choose to continue to support this dangerous gambit by objecting to the results of a legitimate democratic election will forever be seen as being complicit in an unprecedented attack against our democracy.
AXELROD: I don't think that the 147 who voted to overturn the results of the election ever believed that they were going to be successful.
PENCE: Joseph R. Biden Jr. of the state of Delaware has received 306 votes.
AXELROD: They were doing it to posture for the president but more importantly for their base. There is abject fear of the Trump base among some Republicans.
TRUMP: We will never give up. We will never concede. It doesn't happen. You don't concede when there's theft involved.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Donald Trump has posted a new video on Twitter.
TRUMP: I would like to begin by addressing the heinous attack on the United States Capitol. Like all Americans, I am outraged by the violence.
HABERMAN: It took a while for the president's advisers to get him to agree to shoot this video message.
TRUMP: A new administration will be inaugurated on January 20th. My focus now turns to ensuring a smooth, orderly, and seamless transition of power.
HABERMAN: Among the things that his advisers did to get him to do that was Pat Cipollone, the White House counsel, told the president he had legal exposure, potential legal exposure anyway, over what had happened in terms of him speaking to this rally of people before they became a mob and urging them to fight and whipping up the crowd. Others told him that he faced mass resignations of his cabinet members.
So he agreed to do this video. And then as we have seen over and over with the president, he regretted it within 16 hours, 12 hours, 14 hours. He told some of his aides that he wished he hadn't done it.
AXELROD: Well, I thought the message was as persuasive and sincere as a hostage tape.
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TRUMP: And we fight. We fight like hell. And if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore. AXELROD: This was a manmade disaster. And while he had a lot of people abetting him in this project, the man was the president of the United States.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These people who were at the Capitol were really radicalized by Donald Trump.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The government did this to us. We were normal good law-abiding citizens and you guys did this to us.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's really called for here is yes, the 25th Amendment ought to be invoked.
DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: If you incite a mob to violence and they then commit violence and people are killed, you're guilty. You're guilty of a crime.
TAPPER: Do you think President Trump has blood on his hands?
JOHN BOLTON, FORMER TRUMP NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR: I think he does.
REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): If the vice president and cabinet do not act, the Congress may be prepared to move forward with impeachment.
ACOSTA: With less than two weeks left in his presidency, how on earth could you invoke the 25th Amendment and get that done before the end of this term? How on earth could you have an impeachment process that results in a Senate conviction with less than two weeks to go?
HABERMAN: The president is not happy about another impeachment call. The president didn't like being impeached the first time. He could be the first president to be impeached twice and he is well aware of that. But he has been more consumed with the fact that his Twitter feed was taken away.
ACOSTA: They were worried about plans for future armed protests that have already begun proliferating on and off Twitter regarding some sort of planning for potentially a secondary attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 17th of this year right before the inauguration.
ELIZABETH NEUMANN, FORMER DHS ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR COUNTERTERRORISM AND THREAT PREVENTION: We have a man who has proven that he's willing to do just about anything. And if he gets back to that place where he just wants to burn it all down, he will look for opportunities to cause damage to the United States.
BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Today, he's announcing that he will not attend Joe Biden's inauguration, one of the country's most symbolic acts for a peaceful transfer of power.
PROTESTERS: Stop the steal. Stop the steal.
REPORTER: What did all of this achieve today?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We'll see. I think the people has spoken. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The day isn't over yet. And the week isn't over yet. The time isn't over yet. There's still much more evidence that will come out.
TRUMP: To all of my wonderful supporters, I know you are disappointed but I also want you to know that our incredible journey is only just beginning.
AXELROD: It was striking how easily these insurrectionists, these terrorists were able to penetrate the Capitol. And you have to ask yourself the question how did that happen? How could that possibly be? And then you contrast it with what we saw last summer when there was a Black Lives Matter march in Washington.
CAMPBELL: You saw mass arrests as these crowd members engaged and encountered police officers. You saw a president using law enforcement to clear a street in order to hold a photo op in front of a church. Compare all of that with what we saw on January 6th at the United States Capitol. We didn't see mass arrests after the fact. What we saw were law enforcement officers opening the door, letting these criminals leave the building.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These cops are very cool. They're like hey guys, have a good night, some of them, which is just crazy. It's really weird. You can see that some of them are on our side.
BIDEN: No one can tell me that if that had been a group of Black Lives Matter protesting yesterday they wouldn't have been treated very, very differently than the mob of thugs that stormed the Capitol.
AXELROD: I sat on the set on Wednesday night and I watched these scenes from our Capitol and I cried. I love this country. I believe in this country. I believe in our democracy with all its imperfections.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Everybody stay down.
AXELROD: What happened in the United States of America was devastating. And I hope that feeling is pervasive and I hope that it causes all of us to do some thinking about where we go from here and how we prevent such a thing from ever happening again.
BLITZER: More than 150 people have been charged in federal court in the weeks following the domestic terror attack on the United States Capitol that resulted in multiple deaths, including a Capitol Hill police officer who died from injuries he sustained fending off the insurrectionists.
Former President Trump has been banned permanently from his preferred mode of communication, Twitter, which cited the risk of further incitement of violence.
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And he's been impeached for a second time by the House of Representatives charged with incitement of insurrection against the government of the United States.
