Star Witness Cassidy Hutchinson’s Credibility Questioned After January 6 Materials Released

Cassidy Hutchinson
AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite
Joel B. Pollak

Cassidy Hutchinson, a star witness at the January 6th Committee’s scripted public hearings, is being called out for alleged inconsistencies in her testimony following the release of the committee’s final report on Thursday.

As Breitbart News reported in June:

Specifically, Hutchinson testified that she heard deputy chief of staff Tony Ornato say that he heard Robert Engel, the U.S. Secret Service agent on Jan. 6, 2021, claim that Trump tried to seize the wheel of his car to force it to drive to the Capitol.

The testimony was not only hearsay — testifying about what a witness heard someone else say — but hearsay upon hearsay.

…

[R]eports emerged after Hutchinson’s testimony that Ornato and Engel were prepared to testify to contradict her claims.

Hutchinson also made disputed claims about what White House Counsel Pat Cippolone told her. As Breitabrt News reported:

During her testimony, Hutchinson claimed that Cipollone told her to tell her boss, Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, that former President Donald Trump should not go to the Capitol on January 6.

Hutchinson testified that Cipollone said, “We’re going to get charged with every crime imaginable,” if Trump went to the Capitol.

…

However, Cipollone was reportedly not at the White House on the morning of January 6, according to Human Events Senior Editor Jack Posobiec.

The final report includes a footnote in which Hutchinson is said to admit that she was unsure:

While Cipollone did not specifically recall talking with Cassidy Hutchinson about this topic, he informed the Select Committee that he was sure that he did express his view to some people. … Hutchinson believes it was Pat Cipollone, but also testified that it may have been a different lawyer.

The testimony to which the footnote refers is the transcript of Hutchinson’s closed-door deposition to the committee, and not her public testimony. In fact, the committee may have implicated itself in her misleading testimony. On June 28, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) publicly accepted Hutchinson’s claim that she had spoken with Cipollone, without asking whether she was certain; Hutchinson privately said she was unsure in February.

Further controversy arose Thursday arose from transcripts of Hutchinson’s closed-door depositions on other dates. Hutchinson told the committee in September that some former White House lawyers tried to pressure her to change her testimony to protect the president. One of the lawyers she named publicly disputed her testimony.

The New York Times reported:

In a statement through a spokesman, Mr. Herschmann disputed parts of Ms. Hutchinson’s testimony.

“She told Mr. Herschmann that she was desperate, had no money and needed to find a lawyer,” the statement said. “Mr. Herschmann never put her in contact with any lawyer. No one discussed her testimony with Mr. Herschmann, nor did anyone ever try to confirm with him whether her testimony was accurate. The only thing he ever said to her about her testimony was to be truthful.”

Hutchinson’s credibility as a disinterested witness was also contradicted when she and Cheney embraced in the hearing room after the June testimony, undermining the idea that the investigation was objective or impartial.

The full report of the January 6 Committee was released on Thursday evening, numbering nearly 850 pages.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. His recent book, RED NOVEMBER, tells the story of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary from a conservative perspective. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.

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