Rep. Liz Cheney, the vice chair of the committee, issued a scathing rebuke of former President Donald Trump during her opening remarks on Monday, saying he is unfit for office based on his actions regarding Jan. 6 insurrection.
“No man who would behave that way at that moment in time can ever serve in any position of authority in our nation again. He is unfit for any office,” the Republican from Wyoming said.
“At the beginning of our investigation, we understood that tens of millions of Americans had been persuaded by President Trump that the 2020 election was stolen by overwhelming fraud. And we also knew this was flatly false. We knew that dozens of state and federal judges had addressed and resolved all manner of allegations about the election,” Cheney said. “Our legal system functioned as it should. But our president would not accept the outcome. Among the most shameful of this committee's findings was that President Trump sat in the dining room off the Oval Office watching the violent riot at the Capitol on television.”
She went on to describe how Trump was unmoved by “urgent pleas” from people around him to “issue a public statement instructing his supporters to disperse and leave the Capitol," even as rioters attacked law enforcement officials and halted the electoral count.
“In addition to being unlawful as described in our report, this was an utter moral failure, and a clear dereliction of duty,” Cheney added.