January 6th committee seeks potentially damning Trump video made during 'hours of silence' during riot

The House Select Committee investigating the January 6th riots at the United States Capitol wants to know more about what former President Donald Trump was doing during what the Washington Post describes as "hours of silence" during the insurrection.

Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS) tells the Post that the committee is particularly interested in what Trump did right before he publicly broke his silence, around 187 minutes into the riots, and put out a video asking his followers to go home.

Some sources have indicated that Trump and his associates had to do multiple takes of the video because the former president refused to say what needed to be said to get his supporters to disperse.

“It appears that he tried to do a taping several times, but he wouldn’t say the right thing,” Thompson explained to the Post.

Thompson also said that it needs more information about Trump's actions during the siege before it makes a decision on whether to make a criminal referral against him for potentially corruptly obstructing an official act of Congress.

"That dereliction of duty causes us real concern,” Thompson said. “And one of those concerns is that whether or not it was intentional, and whether or not that lack of attention for that longer period of time, would warrant a referral.”