On Tuesday, after weeks of presenting fragments of evidence and detailed testimony to show how the Trump administration disseminated the Big Lie and contributed to a violent insurrection, the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol presented a persuasive timeline with a clear intent: building up to a ground-shaking finale.
Like the penultimate episode of an intense TV drama, Tuesday's hearing opened with a "previously on ..." montage of flashbacks, advanced the narrative, then closed with a staggering cliffhanger. In the final minutes of the three-hour hearing, Vice Chair Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., dropped the hearings' most tantalizing bombshell yet, saying former President Donald Trump attempted to call a committee witness, and that the committee submitted that information to the Department of Justice. Stay tuned.
This disciplined approach has allowed the hearings to shift with breaking news and new testimony as needed without losing momentum (see last month's questioning of Cassidy Hutchinson), while also organizing the chaos around the 2020 election and its aftermath into a gripping chronology of events. The structure is familiar to fans of serial television — and with each public revelation, the committee has only bolstered the expectation, like an expert writers room, that there are more surprises to come.
