Donald Trump investigation: Rally organizer says Trump team encouraged Jan. 6 attendees to march to Capitol

Former President Donald Trump was impeached twice for his role in the January 6 Capitol insurrection after inciting a mob of his supporters to derail Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s victory. New revelations have emerged since then, the latest coming from the rally organizer who said the Trump team agreed to encourage the attendees that day to go to the Capitol.

Rally organizer Scott Johnston, who worked with Kylie Jane Kremer of Women for America First, revealed to Rolling Stone that Trump’s former chief of staff Mark Meadows was involved in the planning phone calls for January 6. Johnston revealed that the Trump team agreed to encourage the attendees on January 6 to march to the Capitol but not ask them directly.

However, the now-former president at the time directly told the crowd to march to the Capitol, even saying that he will lead them.

Johnston went on to say that all the former president’s claims in efforts to shirk off any responsibility are all false. Johnston added that he revealed all of this when he testified before the House Committee investigating the insurrection. Johnston apparently overheard Meadows and Trump campaign national spokesperson Katrina Pierson speaking with Kylie Kremer about the plans to march to the Capitol on January 6.

According to Johnston, everyone appeared to be aware that there was going to be a march. At one point, Meadows, Pierson, and Kremer talked about a permit to make the march to the Capitol official only to decide against it as it would increase security costs. Optics was also an apparent concern for Meadows, Pierson, and Kremer, especially of an outgoing president organizing a march to Congress as lawmakers certified his election defeat.

The congressional committee probing the insurrection is already weighing in “enhanced criminal penalties” for Trump’s involvement in the riots. Wyoming Republican Rep. Liz Cheney, who is the committee’s vice chair, said on MSNBC’s “Meet the Press” that based on the evidence that the committee has looked through, the former president “was intimately involved” with the planning and execution of the insurrection at the Capitol.

Cheney explained that the panel’s first priority is to make recommendations, considering the possibility of the need for enhanced criminal penalties for the “supreme dereliction of duty” of the former president.