Four witnesses will appear live at the Tuesday hearing of the House Select Committee on the January 6th domestic terrorist attack on Congress, and none of them are really household names. (Be sure to watch the hearing here on National Zero!). It’s important to know who’s on the schedule, so here’s short primer:
Rusty Bowers, the speaker of the Arizona House of Representatives, is a unique Republican: in early December 2020, Bowers issued a press release detailing the pressure he and other Arizona Republicans were getting from Trump, Trump campaign officials and GOP officials to overturn the results of the election. Bowers stood fast to the Constitution, stating “the law does not authorize the Legislature to reverse the results of an election.”
Brad Raffensperger, the Republican Secretary of State for Georgia, who was on the receiving end of a call–which he wisely recorded–in which Trump pleaded, “I just want to find 11,780 votes.”
Gabriel Sterling, the Republican chief operating officer for the Georgia Secretary of State, who also received pressure from Trump campaign officials and outside groups to change the official, accurate count of the vote.
Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, a poll worker in Fulton County, Georgia accused of bringing suitcases of fake ballots to fraudulently turn the election in the state to Democrat Joe Biden. She was individually named by Donald Trump scores of times in his speeches as he screamed about election fraud. On January 4, 2020, she was approached by an associate of faux presidential candidate Kanye West who tried to pressure her to admit to rigging the election.
And a note to potential witness Mike Pence (…’cause you know he totally reads NatZero): Mike… bubby… face facts: Your political career is dead. The GOP base who are still loyal to Trump will never support you running for President. You were immensely unpopular in Indiana when you ran for VP; if you had run for re-election, you would’ve lost. So be the hero you want to be. Volunteer to testify before the committee with no guarantees. Spill the beans. Tell everything you know about who tried to get you to blockade the certification. You’re not going to win political office anymore, so instead of leaving your legacy to be a failed politician, you can have it written as a man who defended the Constitution in the end. Go ask Mother; I’m sure she’ll agree with me.