The House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 riots on Capitol Hill held its first primetime hearing on Thursday. Cheddar News speaks with legal analyst Tracy Pearson, who breaks down the biggest takeaways.

Cheddar's News Wrap

Biggest Takeaways From First January 6 Hearing

let's switch gears. The House select committee investigating the january 6th attacks on the U. S. Capitol held its first prime time hearing yesterday, making the case that the deadly riot was the direct result of former President donald trump's attempts to cling to power. It showed new footage of the riot and testimony from trump allies including trump's own daughter, Ivanka, who admitted her father's claim that the election was stolen was false. Joining me now to discuss is Tracy Pearson, legal analyst and attorney Tracy. Welcome to the show. Yesterday's hearings was the first in a series that will highlight the panel's finding. I know there's another one on monday. What was your reaction to the first one? What were the big takeaways here? Thank you for having me in my big takeaway here. Was that for the a good period of time our country was not being run by a president but by the vice president who was in hiding trying to put down an insurrection. That was the biggest takeaway for me. I also thought that Caroline Edwards testimony was considerably emotional. Um the fact that this woman who was not trained in hand to hand combat, spent hours fighting against people who were trying to take down our democracy. Is there anything that surprised you from yesterday Tracy? The information about Vice President Pence surprised me. Um you know, I would have hoped that the then president would have taken some steps uh some saving steps to try to put this down. But it was clear that the Vice president was running the country. I also think that um the careful calculated planning of this attack was something that surprised me in the sense that it was planned so far in advance. You know the planned the panel showed footage of the mob reading a direct tweet from president trump former president trump attacking former Vice President mike Pence. We're going to take a listen to it and then I'll talk to you right afterwards. Didn't have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our country and our constitution giving states a chance to certify a corrected set of facts, not the fraudulent or inaccurate ones which they were asked to previously certify. Alright Tracy. Let's talk about former Vice President Pence. What was his role in these attacks? And do you think he's likely to make an appearance here at one of these hearings moving forward? Well, clearly his role was that they saw him as in the way of making sure that former president trump remained president and that he had failed in some way. Obviously nothing could be further from the truth that he was attempting to facilitate the peaceful transfer of power from from being in hiding for a good portion of the day. Um I think that our we may see him I know that that we it sounds likely that we'll see his his Chief of staff but we may see him because that would be absolutely stunning testimony to hear about President trump reacted on his social social app Truth the truth. Social app, I should say claiming that the attacks like we mentioned, we've heard him say this before were caused by stolen election Tracy. I'm so curious how many people are still out there that believe that the election was stolen from former president donald trump. Well, you know, I wish there weren't that many. But it seems that folks who maybe regular fox news viewers probably think that the election was still stolen because Fox News didn't show the hearings live. Whereas other other news providers did. And so unfortunately I think there's a good chunk of America that did believe that the election is stolen. It still is. Do you think there would be any legal repercussions for trump? Okay. You know, we can only hope given what we've heard so far. I think that the Department of Justice is in fact doing due diligence and investigating and I believe, you know someone who's an expert in investigations that we don't investigate in public. And so I believe that they are going to take steps that are appropriate to bring everyone who's responsible to justice. There's several more hearings announced in the next few weeks. Like I mentioned, we're taking one live monday morning at 11 a.m. What can we expect? Well they have a plan. That plan includes learning a little bit about what trump, knew about the election, uh not being stolen and the steps that he took to try to ensure his continued presidency. We're going to hear a little bit about his plan, which was, it was being described as a corrupt plan to replace Department of Justice officials with people who were allies and who could facilitate whatever action he believed was necessary. Um, we're going to hear about the pressure that was placed on mike pence to take steps that were contrary to the constitution. And we're also going to hear about trump's actions. Minute by minute, the day of the attack. A lot to listen out for. We hope to have you back soon. Tracy Pearson, legal analyst and attorney. Fantastic contact. Thank you so much.