
Former Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson testified Tuesday that former President Donald Trump's lawyer Rudy Giuliani told her on Jan. 2, 2021 — four days before the US Capitol was attacked by Trump supporters – that “we’re going to the Capitol” on Jan. 6, 2021 and that Trump himself was also planning to be there.
"As Mr. Giuliani and I were walking to his vehicle that evening, he looked at me and said something to the effect of 'Cass, are you excited for the sixth? It's going to be a great day.' I remember looking at him and saying, 'Rudy, can you explain what's happening on the sixth?' And he responded something to the effect of 'we're going to the Capitol. It's going to be great. The President's going to be there. He's going to look powerful. He's going to be with the members. He's going to be with the senators. Talk to the chief about it. Talk to the chief about it. He knows about it.'"
More context: It was previously known that Trump wanted to go to the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, but Hutchinson’s testimony establishes for the first time that people around Trump had advance knowledge of this plan.
Hutchinson also said during her testimony that she told her boss, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, about Giuliani’s comments, shortly after he made them on Jan. 2, 2021. According to Hutchinson, Meadows “didn’t look up from his phone” during their conversation, but did tell her something to the effect of, “there’s a lot going on… but things might get real, real bad on January 6.”
She testified that these conversations made her feel “scared” about what was going to happen.
Hutchinson’s testimony Tuesday undermines Meadows’ recent book. He wrote that Trump ad-libbed his lines during his speech that “we're going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue… and we're going to the Capitol,” and that this set off a scramble in the moment to figure out if Trump could feasibly make it to the Capitol.