Former president Donald Trump’s eldest adult children flat-out refused to discuss the January 6 attack on the Capitol inspired by their father when interviewed as part of a documentary series released on Sunday.
The film series, Unprecedented, was released on Sunday morning to subscribers of the Discovery+ streaming service. Helmed by British documentarian Alex Holder, the project gained widespread attention last month when Mr Holder received a subpoena ordering him to provide the House January 6 select committee with raw footage acquired during the months he followed Mr Trump and his adult children, and to give evidence in a deposition with committee investigators.
In a widely-shared excerpt from the film released by Mr Holder and his associates shortly after he testified before the panel, Mr Trump is shown to have downplayed the violence of January 6 and praised the riotous mob who stormed the Capitol in hopes of preventing Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory.
“A very small portion, as you know, went down to the Capitol and then a very small portion of them went in. But I will tell you, they were angry from the standpoint of what happened in the election and because they’re smart and they see and they saw what happened. And I believe that was a big part of what happened on January 6,” he said in the clip, which was part of the third episode in the three-part series.
But the three Trump children who Mr Holder interviewed in the wake of the riot were far less forthcoming on the matter of January 6.
His second son, Eric Trump, objects to any discussion of the attack, telling Mr Holder: “Yeah, let’s skip the 6th,” while his two older siblings — Donald Trump Jr and Ivanka Trump — similarly declined to address anything that happened on the day their father’s defeat was made final.
In the wake of Mr Holder’s interview with the select committee, sources told The Independent that the panel had been particularly interested in footage of his interview with Ivanka Trump, who served as an unpaid senior adviser in her father’s administration.
In an interview with the select committee, with answers given under penalty of perjury, Ms Trump told the panel that she agreed with former attorney general William Barr’s assessment that the 2020 election had not been tainted by widespread fraud and the claims of fraud made by her father — who lost the election to Mr Biden — were “bulls***”.
But when she spoke with Mr Holder, Ms Trump sang a different tune.
On the same subject, she told the filmmaker: “As the president has said, every single vote needs to be counted and needs to be heard. And he campaigned for the voiceless.”
Mr Trump, who spoke with Mr Holder three times over the course of filming, spends much of his screen time regurgitating the same claims his own chief law enforcement official had derided in sworn testimony before the panel.
Speaking of his time in the White House, Mr Trump opined: “It's been an amazing four years and I think people really appreciate it, and that's why they don't like to see a terminated with a fake election.”
His daughter defended her father’s impulse to lie in another segment, telling Mr Holder: “For what he does, you know, he has to punch back.”
