For hours on January 6 2021, while Donald Trump’s supporters stormed the US Capitol, messages from frantic senior Republicans and fellow travellers poured into the phone of White House chief of staff Mark Meadows. “We are under siege up here at the Capitol,” wrote one. Another pleaded, “POTUS has to come out firmly and tell protestors to dissipate. Someone is going to get killed.” When Donald Trump Jr texted: “He’s got to condemn this s*** Asap,” Meadows agreed.
This evidence from Congress’s investigation is remarkable not just because it shows Trump knowingly allowing a violent insurrection to continue. It’s also unprecedentedly granular evidence for future historians. Imagine if we’d had real-time minute-by-minute source material for the French Revolution or Hitler’s beer hall putsch.
