The BulleTin • Wednesday, June 29, 2022 A13
Cassidy Hutchinson,
Trump White House
aide, now in spotlight
BY NOMAAN MERCHANT
AND ERIC TUCKER
associated Press
WASHINGTON — A year
and a half after the deadly
U.S. Capitol insurrection, the
most memorable recounting
of former President Donald
Trump’s behavior that day
came from a young woman
who had graduated from col-
lege just a few years earlier.
Cassidy Hutchinson gave
two hours of testimony on
national television that cast
Trump as enraged by efforts
to keep his armed support-
ers from attending his speech
before many marched to
the Capitol and her boss at
the time, chief of staff Mark
Meadows, as unwilling to con-
front Trump and staring un-
responsively at his cellphone
during key moments.
Having once shed tears
of joy after getting a White
House internship, Hutchin-
son, now in her mid-20s,
described how she grew dis-
gusted by Trump’s refusal to
stop the rioters. And in a sin-
gle afternoon, she went from
being a former junior White
Jan. 6
Continued from A1
The testimony came as the
Justice Department expands
its investigation into the in-
surrection and deepened,
but did not resolve, ques-
tions about whether Trump
himself could face crimi-
nal charges for his conduct.
Though Attorney General
Merrick Garland has given
no hint about whether his de-
partment will bring a crimi-
nal case against Trump, some
legal experts said Hutchin-
son’s testimony could give
prosecutors additional facts
to pursue.
Potentially problematic
for Trump could be his reac-
tion on the morning of Jan.
6 to news that guns, knives
and other weapons were be-
ing confiscated from security
screenings as crowds of sup-
porters gathered for a rally in
front of the White House. An-
gry that not everyone could
get in to see him, Trump, ac-
cording to Hutchinson, said
words to the effect of, “I don’t
care that they have weapons.
They are not here to hurt me.
Take the f’ing mags away and
they can march to the Capi-
Youth
Continued from A1
Administrators hope these
programs will help improve
student interest in college
and help youths get a head
start on their college credits.
In addition, the college says
the programs are intended to
help students who fell behind
academically during the pan-
demic.
“I hope that it can create
enthusiasm around attending
college and show students that
college doesn’t have to be ex-
pensive,” said Amy Ward, the
director of the college’s Red-
mond campus.
The funds will go toward
Youth Camp programs for
middle schoolers, includ-
ing free programs at COCC’s
campuses in Madras and
Prineville; a weeklong sympo-
sium for Latino, Native Amer-
ican and Black high schoolers
on the COCC Bend campus
will also receive funding; and
a weeklong science program
and courses that give students
career help. The college also
plans to use the funds to pur-
chase equipment and pay for
instructors to grow the pro-
grams.
The 31 Youth Camps on the
college’s four campuses will
include drone technology, ju-
nior police academy, writing
and culinary courses. In Ma-
dras and Prineville, there will
be courses on manga drawing
and theater arts, photography,
House staffer, to high-profile
star witness, with the scrutiny
that comes with it.
“We were watching the
Capitol building get defaced
over a lie,” she said.
The testimony helped fill in
several key gaps about Trump’s
level of direct involvement
that day, and placed Meadows
and other key Trump officials
at the center of events critical
to investigations by the House
committee and the Justice De-
partment.
It amplified calls for Mead-
ows to drop his fight against
the committee’s subpoena and
raised new questions about
whether officials around
Trump could face criminal
charges.
“I knew her testimony
would be damning,” tweeted
Alyssa Farah Griffin, a for-
mer White House communi-
cations official who said she
was friends with Hutchinson.
“I had no idea it’d be THIS
damning. I am so grateful for
her courage & integrity.”
Hutchinson showed her fa-
miliarity with better-known
tol.” “Mags” is a reference to
magnetometers.
“A congressional hearing is
not a court of law, but if this
isn’t powerful evidence that he
wasn’t just aware of the pos-
sibility of violence on the 6th
but that he actively wanted
to encourage it, I’m not sure
what is,” said Stephen Vladeck,
a University of Texas law pro-
fessor.
Whatever any outcome re-
lated to a criminal proceed-
ing, the disclosures come as
Trump is laying the ground-
work for another presidential
run in 2024.
Aides have been debating
the merits of when he should
announce his intentions, with
some arguing he should do
so as soon as this summer to
maximize leverage and stave
off a crowd of likely challeng-
ers and others maintaining he
should follow tradition and
wait until after November’s
midterm elections.
Looking to blunt nega-
tive publicity surrounding
Tuesday’s testimony, Trump
issued a statement on his so-
cial media platform denying
that he had ever complained
about the crowd size or had
sought to “make room for
drone technology and visual
arts.
Stephanie Goetsch, the col-
lege’s community education
coordinator, said 337 students
are enrolled in the courses.
She said the programs can
help students who gener-
ally lack the means to afford
higher educations in rural
communities like Prineville
and Madras. The college
stated in its grant application
that “nearly 22%” of people
in Prineville and Madras live
in poverty. Goetsch said 155
students will be attending the
programs for free in those two
communities.
The programs come at a
time when some students,
particularly in rural areas
of Central Oregon, are sec-
ond-guessing their interests in
college after pandemic school-
ing diminished interest among
some youths and increased
economic hardship among
families.
“Their educational expe-
rience over the last few years
has been all over the board,”
said Goetsch, who added
she hopes the free and low
cost programs will help im-
prove student interest in
college.
Goetsch said students who
attend the programs will re-
ceive guidance from experi-
enced educators. She added:
“It’s not just high-level babysit-
ting.”
█
Reporter: 541-660-9844,
bdole@bendbulletin.com
officials in the White House,
referring at times to Meadows,
security official Tony Ornato,
and national security adviser
Robert O’Brien by their first
names. Meadows, in turn,
called her “Cass,” in her retell-
ing of one story.
Her voice never broke as
she recounted quotes from
Trump and Meadows in her
video depositions and under
questioning from the com-
mittee’s Republican vice chair-
man, Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyo-
ming. Both women embraced
after the hearing.
Allies of Trump and Mead-
ows questioned some details
of her testimony, which in-
cluded stories she said she
heard second-hand. One story
that drew pushback was her
allegation that Trump lunged
for the steering wheel and as-
saulted a Secret Service agent
when his detail wouldn’t take
him to the Capitol on Jan. 6.
Meadows’ attorney, George
Terwilliger, told The Associ-
ated Press that Hutchinson’s
testimony “could not with-
stand even five minutes of
Jacquelyn Martin/aP
Cassidy Hutchinson, former aide to Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, is sworn in to testify
Tuesday as the House Select Committee Investigating the Jan. 6 Attack on the United States Capitol con-
tinues to reveal its findings of a year-long investigation.
fundamental cross-examina-
tion.”
“Most of it is based on hear-
say, lack of first-hand knowl-
edge and even just pure spec-
ulation as to what others were
thinking, said or did,” he said.
Several high-profile Re-
publicans said Tuesday that
Hutchinson was known to be
close to Meadows and often
accompanied him in meet-
ings. The committee early in
her testimony showed photos
of her with Trump and other
top officials.
Mick Mulvaney, who pre-
ceded Meadows as Trump’s
house select Committee via aP
This exhibit from video released by the House select committee
shows a photo of former President Donald Trump talking to his chief
of staff Mark Meadows before Trump spoke at the rally on the Ellipse
on Jan 6, 2021. The exhibit was displayed Tuesday at a hearing by the
House Select Committee Investigating the Jan. 6 Attack on the United
States Capitol.
people with guns to watch my
speech.”
Trump is well-practiced at
marginalizing his critics and
accusers, but Hutchinson’s
well-calibrated testimony will
test that power anew.
Tuesday’s hearing, the sixth
by the House committee in-
vestigating the insurrection,
was accompanied by suspense
even before it began. It was
hastily announced on Mon-
day, but the committee did not
reveal the identity of the wit-
ness until Hutchinson entered
the room.
Where prior hearings have
involved clusters of witnesses
who have recounted pres-
sure campaigns on the Jus-
tice Department, or on local
election officials, to overturn
the election results, Tuesday’s
hearing involved a singular
narrator with an easy-to-fol-
low tale sprinkled with had-
to-be-there color. Some an-
ecdotes she witnessed herself.
Others she heard from fellow
staffers.
She recalled, for instance,
chief of staff, tweeted during
the hearing that “things just
got a lot more interesting.” He
added that “if the President
knew the protesters had weap-
ons, and still encouraged them
to go to the Capitol, that is a
serious problem.”
Hutchinson saw the after-
math of Trump’s rage at Attor-
ney General Bill Barr for tell-
ing The Associated Press that
there was no evidence of wide-
spread election fraud. Enter-
ing a private dining room, she
saw a valet cleaning up a mess
after Trump smashed a plate
and the remains of his lunch
on a wall.
“There was ketchup drip-
ping down the wall, and there
was a shattered porcelain plate
on the floor,” she said Tuesday.
“The valet had articulated
that the president was ex-
tremely angry at the attorney
general’s AP interview and
had thrown his lunch against
the wall.”
She grabbed a towel to help
the valet clean up, she said.
There was no widespread
election fraud.
Trump lost more than 60
court cases attempting to
prove wrongdoing.
being in the White House on
the afternoon of Dec. 1, 2020,
when she heard a sudden
noise. Trump, it turned out,
had just learned of an inter-
view Attorney General Wil-
liam Barr had given to The
Associated Press in which
Barr said the Justice Depart-
ment had not found wide-
spread fraud that could alter
the outcome of the election.
Inside the dining room was
a shattered porcelain plate on
the floor, apparently thrown
in dismay by the president.
Ketchup streamed down the
wall. Hutchinson grabbed a
towel to wipe it off.
She later heard about a sep-
arate episode on the afternoon
of Jan. 6 when Trump tried
to grab control of the steering
wheel of the presidential vehi-
cle so that it would take him
to the Capitol and not to the
White House. He was, he said,
“the f’ing president.” Trump
was directed to take his hand
off the wheel.
In that instance and others,
according to the testimony,
the president’s will did not
always prevail and Hutchin-
son detailed aides’ best efforts
to rein in Trump’s worst im-
pulses. The morning of Jan.
6, for instance, White House
counsel Pat Cipollone cau-
tioned Hutchinson that if
Trump did go to the Capitol to
intervene in the certification
of the election, “We’re going to
get charged with every crime
imaginable.”
Whether the Justice De-
partment thinks it has a case
against the president, espe-
cially one that could further
divide an already polarized
nation, remains an open ques-
tion. But there’s also no doubt
that the investigation is ex-
panding far beyond the riot-
ers themselves, with law en-
forcement officials last week
serving a wave of subpoenas
across the country to state
elections officials.
“When you have wit-
nesses who are in these con-
versations, who are in these
rooms, who are actively par-
ticipating in the high-level
discussions of Jan. 6, it seems
to me that one of two things
has to be true: either they’re
lying or President Trump and
a lot of people close to him
are in serious jeopardy,” Vla-
deck said.
Associated Press writer Jill
Colvin in New York contrib-
uted to this report.
Johnson
Continued from A1
Her statements appeared
in a newsletter Tuesday that
explored Oregon’s political
landscape as a barometer of
potential Democratic losses
nationwide. The newsletter
included an interview with
Johnson.
“You can see the deterio-
ration of the beautiful City
of Roses, now the city of
roaches,” Johnson was quoted
as saying, riffing on Portland’s
moniker.
Johnson, who plans to
run as a candidate not affili-
ated with any party, is one of
many candidates zeroing in
on Portland as an example of
failed policies or action.
“Betsy made a quip about
the city of Portland which
resonates with a lot of peo-
ple,” Jennifer Sitton, Johnson’s
communications director,
told Pamplin Media Group
on Tuesday. “What Betsy has
been saying for months is
that Oregon cannot succeed if
Portland fails and, as detailed
in the NYT piece, only 8% of
residents think that Portland
is on the right track.”
In a campaign speech on
her website, Johnson accuses
Gov. Kate Brown, Portland
Mayor Ted Wheeler and
Johnson’s Democratic oppo-
nent, Tina Kotek, of bridg-
ing the urban-rural divide
by unifying Oregonians in
“mutual frustration with their
Pamplin Media Group file photo
Former state Sen. Betsy Johnson, who is running for governor as
an independent candidate, made controversial statements in a
newsletter Tuesday.
“You can see the deterioration of the
beautiful City of Roses, now the city of
roaches.”
— Betsy Johnson, independent candidate for Oregon governor,
statement in a newsletter
leaders and their govern-
ment.”
“Right now, Portland is
failing,” Johnson said. “I don’t
think any problem demon-
strates the need better to
change Oregon’s politics than
the failure to solve homeless-
ness on our streets.”
She stressed getting un-
housed people into shelters
utilizing police, addiction
treatment services and men-
tal health services. “Demo-
crats are right that we need
compassion, services and
housing,” Johnson said in a
campaign video. “But Repub-
licans are also right that we
need more personal respon-
sibility, accountability, and no
more tent cities.”
But critics say Johnson’s
latest remark about Portland
was callous, equating un-
housed people with vermin
that need to be cleaned up,
rather than humans in crisis.
“Unfortunately her com-
ments are very reminiscent
and in some cases identical
to comments we’ve heard
that dehumanize whole sets
of people,” Marisa Zapata,
director of Portland State
University’s Homelessness
Research and Action Col-
laborative. “It goes beyond
an oversimplification, but it
completely erases their hu-
manity. It’s deeply upsetting
to have somebody using that
language to describe people
who are living their lives the
best they can. It’s especially
upsetting to have someone
who’s been in a position of
leadership in our state talk
about future constituents this
way.”
Zapata noted that the term
“cockroaches” has been used
historically to demonize mar-
ginalized groups in society.
The city of Portland, along
with economic and tourism
groups, has been actively in-
volved in campaigns to bring
shoppers and tourists back to
downtown Portland and help
businesses crippled by the
pandemic and repeated van-
dalism.
They say Johnson’s com-
ments aren’t helping.
“It’s easy to articulate the
challenges Portland is facing,”
Mayor Ted Wheeler said. “We
need a governor who will
partner with us to help find
solutions and fight for Port-
land — not disparage and
write us off.”