Over the past six years, Americans have seen Donald Trump utter so many seemingly self-incriminating things in the open, you’d be forgiven for thinking he’s immune to punishment.
But the House Jan. 6 committee’s hearings appear to pose the gravest danger to Trump in terms of his civil and criminal liability yet. And the revelation that he and his family kept a camera crew around before and after the Jan. 6 attack could ultimately show that Trump’s vanity has consequences.
Alex Holder, a British filmmaker who followed the Trump family for months in 2020 and 2021, said on “The ReidOut” Thursday that his plan was always to capture the election, but “what happened during the election campaign wasn’t necessarily anticipated.” Holder is releasing a Trump family documentary this summer, and the footage was subpoenaed by the Jan. 6 committee earlier this week. He reportedly testified before the committee for several hours on Thursday.
Later that day, he gave “The ReidOut” a sneak peek of what’s to come.
In the clip (above), Trump sits like he’s filming a reality TV confessional and spews conspiratorial nonsense about being cheated out of the 2020 election. Trump sat for three interviews: in December 2020, March 2021 and May 2021.
In the 2020 interview, Trump railed against Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, whom Trump allegedly told to pressure Georgia’s Legislature into overturning the state’s presidential election results.
“We have a governor — the poor guy doesn’t know what the hell is happening,” Trump said, adding that Kemp, a Republican, has “lost control of the state” to Democrat Stacey Abrams.
Last I checked, Kemp, albeit through controversial means, is the current governor of Georgia and has never ceded control to Stacey Abrams. Another Trump lie.
Trump went on to attack another Georgia official he tried to pressure into meddling in the 2020 election: Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. In the interview, Trump calls him a “hard-headed rock” for refusing to pursue his election fraud claims.
The interview was filmed the same month Trump retweeted an apparent threat to jail Raffensperger and Kemp for refusing to go along with his election scheme, and one month before Trump was recorded urging Raffensperger to “find” 11,780 extra votes that would help him falsely claim victory in Georgia. At the end of the clip, Trump offers some parting words for the two men, calling them “stupid people.” It’s obvious Kemp and Raffensperger made smart choices not to go along with Trump’s cockamamie coup plot. The Jan. 6 committee’s evidence has shown Trump received ample proof from campaign and Justice Department officials that the very suggestions he makes in Holder’s interview are false. We know officials told him he was expected to lose the 2020 election, explained his claims of voter fraud were bogus and warned his attempts to overturn the election results were illegal. Everything that Trump has said and done in furtherance of that lie could be used against him. In this case, it’s possible Trump’s thirst for attention and praise will be his undoing. If so, it’d be a fitting end to his nightmarish political career. The House Jan. 6 committee is holding its sixth public hearing on Tuesday, June 28 at 1 p.m. ET. Get expert analysis in real-time on our liveblog at msnbc.com/jan6hearings.
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog. Recommended
