Jan. 6 committee holds first prime-time hearing

Documentarian Nick Quested, who is testifying before the Jan. 6 committee, explained how and why he witnessed the attack on the Capitol.

During his opening statements, Quested said that he was surprised at "the anger" he observed and described "incredibly aggressive chanting."

"In the winter of 2020, I was working on a documentary. As part of that documentary, I filmed several rallies in Washington, DC," he said, adding, "I learned there would be a rally on the mall on January 6."

He said that he and several colleagues came to document the event.

"We arrived at the mall and observed a large contingent of Proud Boys marching toward the Capitol," he said. "I documented the crowd turn from protestors to rioters to insurrectionists. I was surprised at the size of the group, the anger and the profanity."

Documentarian Nick Quested is testifying now in the Jan. 6 committee hearing.

Quested was embedded with the Proud Boys for a significant period of time leading up to January 6 and is considered a firsthand fact witness because of the amount of time he spent with the group.

He has already been deposed by the committee and Justice Department officials about his experience on January 6 and has provided the committee and the department with video footage from the filming of his documentary.

Why the focus on the Proud Boys? Leaders of the Proud Boys were involved in some of the early clashes that overpowered police lines and breached the Capitol.

The group has been a focus of the Justice Department for months, and on Monday, the agency charged the head of the Proud Boys, Enrique Tarrio, and four other leaders with seditious conspiracy in connection with the January 6 attack.

These are the most aggressive charges brought by the Justice Department against the Proud Boys, and the first allegations by prosecutors that the group tried to oppose by force the presidential transfer of power.

Tarrio and his co-defendants previously pleaded not guilty to an earlier slate of charges.

Read more about the documentarian here.

Capitol Police Officer Caroline Edwards, who was injured after she was part of an altercation involving members of the Proud Boys while defending the US Capitol during the Jan. 6 riot, is now providing testimony to the House select committee.

Leaders of the Proud Boys were involved in some of the early clashes that overpowered police lines and breached the Capitol. The group has been a focus of the Justice Department for months, and earlier this week the agency charged the head of the Proud Boys, Enrique Tarrio, and four other leaders with seditious conspiracy in connection with the Jan. 6 attack.

These are the most aggressive charges brought by the Justice Department against the Proud Boys, and the first allegations by prosecutors that the group tried to oppose by force the presidential transfer of power.

Tarrio and his co-defendants previously pleaded not guilty to an earlier slate of charges.

Broadly, committee members have teased that the hearings could be focused on former President Donald Trump's role in undermining the 2020 presidential election results.

The panel has been working toward a thesis that former President Donald Trump's obsession with his election loss and his peddling of false claims about the results laid the groundwork for the deadly riot at the Capitol.

Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson, chair of the committee, and Republican Rep. Liz Cheney, vice chair of the committee, opened the hearing with statements and then showed a video of the Capitol attack that had not yet been released.

In case you missed the first portion of the hearing, here's what happened:

CNN's Annie Grayer contributed reporting to this post.

Jason Miller, Donald Trump’s campaign spokesperson, is claiming he was taken out of context during tonight’s Jan. 6 hearing.

During the hearing, Rep. Liz Cheney played a clip of Miller:

Miller is now reacting on twitter, saying that Cheney did not play the rest of the clip in which Trump disagreed with Oczkowski and believed that Oczkowski was not looking at the prospect of “legal challenges” going Trump’s way:

"Here’s what came next in my testimony, which Liz Cheney failed to play:

Q: Okay. And what was the President's reaction then when Matt said to him, 'Hey, we've looked at the numbers, you're going to lose'? A: I think it's safe to say he disagreed with Matt's analysis," Miller wrote in a Twitter thread.

Remember: Despite this belief, the Trump campaign has lost almost every legal challenge regarding election fraud.

The Jan. 6 committee hearing is back after taking a short break.

The panel will now hear testimony from two witnesses: documentarian Nick Quested, who has filmed members of the Proud Boys, and Capitol Police Officer Caroline Edwards, who was injured after an altercation involving members of the Proud Boys.

The Jan. 6 committee showed never-before-seen footage of people rushing out of House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s office during the early stages of the riot.

The clip was included in a montage of some of the most violent moments from the riot, including Trump supporters attacking police officers and smashing windows.

In the days after the insurrection, McCarthy said former President Donald Trump “bears responsibility” for the attack.

But over time, he cozied back up to Trump. Asked by CNN at a news conference earlier today about Trump’s culpability, McCarthy said, “everybody in the country bears some responsibility.” 

Former President Trump's final White House counsel Pat Cipollone repeatedly threatened to quit, the committee revealed, citing testimony from Trump’s son-in-law and former White House adviser Jared Kushner. 

"The White House Counsel was so concerned about potentially lawless activity, he threatened to resign, multiple times," Rep. Liz Cheney, the vice chair of the committee, said at the hearing.

“That is exceedingly rare and exceedingly serious. It requires immediate attention, especially when the entire team threatens to resign. However, in the Trump White House, it was not exceedingly rare and it was not treated seriously.”

It is not known whether Cipollone will testify to the House select committee. 

Kushner, in his testimony, also said he believed those threatening to quit could have been "whining." 

The committee didn’t provide further detail about the near-resignations on Thursday.

The incident echoed a significant moment central to the Russia investigation in the first half of Trump's presidency. Special counsel Robert Mueller documented how then-White House Counsel Don McGahn prepared to quit rather than shut down the investigation at Trump's order, and Mueller found the incident met the legal threshold for obstruction of justice, though Trump was not charged. 

Right now, the committee is playing video footage that has not yet been released. The video shows the day of Jan. 6, 2021 in chronological order, starting in the morning before the Capitol is breached.

The video includes timestamps and audio of officers responding to crowds storming the building.

"We need backup," a voice said as violent scenes play out.

The clips show rioters breaking windows and pushing through barricades. Some people are specifically identified as Proud Boys by captions written on the screen.

"Hold the line! Hold the line!" officers yell as they physically clash with rioters at about 2 p.m. ET, according to the video.

"I need support," an officer says over body camera footage of another officer getting pushed by crowds. "We lost the line," the officer continues.

Watch the full video here.