Page:Introductory Material to the Final Report of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol.pdf/71

 treating it as a celebratory occasion with that tweet. And so, it just further cemented my decision to resign.

Tim Murtaugh: I don’t think it’s a patriotic act to attack the Capitol. But I have no idea how to characterize the people other than they trespassed, destroyed property, and assaulted the U.S. Capitol. I think calling them patriots is a, let’s say, a stretch, to say the least. . . . I don’t think it’s a patriotic act to attack the U.S. Capitol.

Pat Cipollone: [W]hat happened at the Capitol cannot be justified in any form or fashion. It was wrong, and it was tragic. And a lot – and it was a terrible day. It was a terrible day for this country.

Greg Jacob: I thought it was inappropriate. . . . To my mind, it was a day that should live in infamy.

At 6:27 p.m., President Trump retired to his residence for the night. As he did, he had one final comment to an employee who accompanied him to the residence. The one takeaway that the President expressed in that moment, following a horrific afternoon of violence and the worst attack against the U.S. Capitol building in over two centuries, was this: “Mike Pence let me down.”

President Trump’s inner circle was still trying to delay the counting of electoral votes into the evening, even after the violence had been quelled. Rudolph Giuliani tried calling numerous Members of Congress in the hour before the joint session resumed, including Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Senators Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), Bill Hagerty (R-TN), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Josh Hawley (R-MO), and Ted Cruz (R-TX). His voicemail intended for Senator Tuberville at 7:02 p.m. that evening eventually was made public: "Sen. Tuberville? Or I should say Coach Tuberville. This is Rudy Giuliani, the President’s lawyer. I’m calling you because I want to discuss with you how they’re trying to rush this hearing and how we need you, our Republican friends, to try to just slow it down so we can get these legislatures to get more information to you."

Reflecting on President Trump’s conduct that day, Vice President Pence noted that President Trump “had made no effort to contact me in the midst of the rioting or any point afterward.” He wrote that President Trump’s “reckless words had endangered my family and all those serving at the Capitol.”

President Trump did not contact a single top national security official during the day. Not at the Pentagon, nor at the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Justice, the F.B.I., the Capitol Police Department, or the D.C. Mayor’s office. As Vice President Pence has confirmed, President Trump didn’t even try to reach his own Vice President to make sure that Pence was safe. President Trump did not order any of his staff to facilitate a law enforcement response of any sort. His Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff—who is by statute the primary military advisor to the President—had this reaction: