(Credit: Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
Committee on House Administration’s Subcommittee on Oversight Chairman Barry Loudermilk (GA-11) revealed that days before January 6, 2021, President Trump met with senior Pentagon leaders urging them to do their jobs to protect lives and property. The transcripts released show Trump gave senior Pentagon leadership directives to keep January 6 peaceful – including using the National Guard – which the Pentagon leaders ignored. This revelation directly contradicts the conclusions drawn in the flawed DoD IG report on January 6, 2021.
In response to these revelations, Chairman Loudermilk released the following statement:
“Pentagon leadership prioritized concerns of optics over their duty to protect lives,” said Chairman Loudermilk. “President Trump met with senior Pentagon leaders and directed them to make sure any events on January 6, 2021 were safe. It is very concerning that these Senior Pentagon officials ignored President Trump’s guidance AND misled Congressional Leaders to believe they were doing their job, when they were not. The DoD IG’s report is fundamentally flawed. It does not draw conclusions from the interviews they conducted, but pushes a narrative to keep their hands clean. We have many questions for them, and we will continue to dig until we are satisfied the American people know the truth.”
Click here or the image below to see the key excerpts from these transcripts.
Click here to read the transcripts in full.
See below for a full breakdown of the Pentagon leaders’ choices to ignore President Trump’s directives.
Days before January 6, 2021, President Trump met with senior Pentagon leaders urging them to do their jobs to protect lives and property. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Mark Milley, recalls a conversation between the Acting Secretary of Defense Chris Miller, and President Trump:
Milley: “The President just says, ‘Hey, look at this. There’s going to be a large amount of protestors here on the 6th, make sure that you have sufficient National Guard or Soldiers to make sure it’s a safe event.’… [POTUS said] I don’t care if you use Guard, or Soldiers, active duty Soldiers, do whatever you have to do. Just make sure it’s safe.’ [SecDef] Miller responds by saying, ‘Hey, we’ve got a plan, and we’ve got it covered.’”
McCarthy resigns January 20, 2021 amid questions about his role readying NG troops. (Credit: John McDonnell/WP)
Major General William Walker
On January 5, the Secretary of the Army, Ryan McCarthy, placed unprecedented restrictions on DCNG Commander Major General William Walker to prevent any movement to the Capitol without Secretary McCarthy’s explicit permission on January 6 and 7.
On January 6, 2021, the outer perimeter on the West Front of the U.S. Capitol was breached by rioters at 12:53pm. The DCNG arrived five hours later. Click here to view the timeline.
These transcripts prove President Trump’s senior Pentagon leaders were focused on OPTICS, instead of doing their job, as the Capitol was breached:
Miller: “There was absolutely – there is absolutely no way I was putting U.S. military forces at the Capitol, period.”
Director of the Army Staff, Lieutenant General Walter Piatt: “Was optics a concern for us as we prepared to use soldiers downtown in Washington D.C? Absolutely.”
As “optics” concerns were being discussed and Secretary McCarthy claims he was ‘developing a plan’, the DCNG was ready to move, less than 2 miles from the Capitol – awaiting Secretary McCarthy’s authorization.
Walker’s General Counsel, Colonel Earl Matthews: “We were seeing the Congress of the United States being overrun, and the Guard – and the Capitol Police, the MPD, they need help. We had people at the D.C. Armory who are able to help, and they’re not moving. They’re not allowed to move.”
DCNG Command Sergeant Major Michael Brooks: “They were ready to go, and they just couldn’t understand why they were still sitting there. Literally sitting on a bus, just waiting to drive to the Capitol and do the best they could do to support Capitol Police.”
At 3:04pm, Miller provided verbal approval to Secretary McCarthy for immediate deployment of the DCNG. What was Secretary McCarthy doing between receiving this approval, and 5:08pm, when the order eventually reaches the D.C. National Guard? Why didn’t he communicate this approval for a full two hours?
At 3:18pm, Secretary McCarthy told Congressional Democrat Leadership that the DC National Guard had the “green light” and “is moving”. Two hours would pass before Secretary McCarthy’s deployment order would ACTUALLY be communicated to the DCNG.
In these vital hours, the DCNG had been trying but was unable to reach Secretary McCarthy.
DCNG Adjutant General Aaron Dean: “[Walker] tried to call Secretary McCarthy three times between 2:30 and 5pm. He said, ‘I haven’t heard from him all day.’ When he tried to call his cell phone, it went straight to voicemail.” (Committee on House Administration, 9/20/2024) (Archive)
🚨BOMBSHELL Report EXPOSES January 6th Cover-Up by Pelosi & Gen. Mark Milley | Trump VINDICATED
INSIDE JOB: Gen. Mark Milley IGNORED Trump’s orders to protect the Capitol—bad optics? Deep State COUP to block Trump’s re-election!
— Steven Miller, MD, PhD (@SageListener) September 21, 2024
Breitbart reported July 16, 2022:
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Rep. Jim Banks (R-IN) called on Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley to honor his word and stop dodging questions about allegations in Bob Woodward and Robert Costa’s book Peril that he usurped President Donald Trump’s power as commander in chief after the Capitol riot on January 6, 2021, in violation of the law.
Grassley and Banks both spoke Thursday on the floors of the Senate and House respectively to remind Milley he told members of Congress he would review the allegations in the book and get back to them to say if they are true. Despite repeated requests, he has still not said if they are true.
“Milley allegedly placed military hands — his hands — on controls that belonged exclusively to the president. According to Peril, [he] summoned senior operation officers in the military command center to his office,” Grassley said, adding, “He had them take ‘an oath’ not to ‘act’ on the president’s orders without checking with him first,” Grassley said.
Grassley continued:
These brazen words and actions, if accurate, strike at the heart of our democracy — civilian control of the military. They turn this guiding rule upside down and show utter contempt for the commander-in-chief coming from the nation’s top general. They are dangerous and contrary to military code 10 US Code 888.
Grassley went on to respond to Milley in one of many follow-ups:
“After my third note, Gen. Milley responded with the same old smoke and mirrors routine: ‘I have never read the books.’ Years of oversight have taught…
July 14, 2022