Updated
Summary
In tomorrow`s hearing, the Jan. 6th committee will reveal what it`s learned about the role extremist groups, like the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, played in the Capitol attack and their potential connection to the Trump White House. This comes as a federal judge refuses to delay Steve Bannon`s contempt of Congress trial. Plus, our one-on-one interview with the filmmaker who had a front row to Trump`s final moments in office.
Transcript
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LAWRENCE O`DONNELL, MSNBC HOST: That`s the Last Word. The 11th Hour with Stephanie Ruhle starts now.
[23:00:30]
STEPHANIE RUHLE, MSNBC HOST: Tonight, the January 6th Committee is now hours away from still more revelations about the insurrection with a special focus on the promise that it will be wild.
Then, a closer look at the role extremist groups like the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys played before and during the capital riot.
Plus, we go one on one with the filmmaker who was right there with Donald Trump and family when the reality of his election laws began sinking in or did not as the 11th Hour gets underway on this Monday night.
Good evening. Once again, I`m Stephanie Ruhle. And by this time tomorrow, we should know substantially more about what led to the January 6 insurrection beginning at 1:00 p.m. Eastern tomorrow, the House Select Committee will reveal what it`s learned about the role extremist groups played in the violent assault on the Capitol. This will be the panel`s seventh hearing thus far.
One committee aide tells NBC that tomorrow`s testimony will focus on how Donald Trump has summoned the mob, as well as the actions of militia groups like the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers. The hearing is also expected to look at how some of these right wing groups had ties directly to Trump associates, including Roger Stone and General Michael Flynn and revealed ties between some Trump associates and the QAnon movement.
A former spokesman for the Oath Keepers is expected to be one of the witnesses. Testimony also expected from an Ohio man you`ve never heard of, this guy on your screen, Steven Ayers. He has already pleaded guilty to storming the Capitol. He admitted to reposting Trump`s December 2020 tweet promising the January 6 would be wild.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. ELAINE LURIA (D-VA): We`ve seen you know what the plot was we`ve seen elements of the plot for the fake electors. We`ve seen the part to influence the Department of Justice, the pressure and Vice President Pence. But now we`re chapter of this story, the violence and how did this plot turn into a violent insurrection attempted coup. So that is really the next phase of what we`ll be laying out tomorrow.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
RUHLE: The panel also expected to look at the possible involvement of members of Congress and what White House top advisors knew about the potential for violence on the sixth. And DC has learned that clips of former Trump White House Counsel Pat Cipollone. Video testimony will be seen at the hearing.
Cipollone, as you recall, sat down with the committee for almost eight hours last Friday. He had another committee hearing will be held next week. It was expected to take place this Thursday. For panel members say they need more time to get ready.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. ADAM KINZINGER (R-IL): We just keep getting more and more information. And we just have figured that it`s probably better to do this next week with more of that information presented before the American people.
Some of it will be wrapping up what we`ve learned so far, but it`ll be looking at the actual attack. Where was the president during that time? A lot of these facts in fact most will be put forward by again, Republican appointees Trump appointees.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
RUHLE: Just think about that January 6, a year and a half ago, yet more information rolling in and all of this happening against the backdrop of Steve Bannon apparent change of heart over cooperating with the January 6 Committee, after defying subpoenas for testimony and documents for weeks and weeks. He not only supported Trump`s election lies, he loudly promoted them promising quote, all hell would break loose on January 6.
His offer to testify came just days before his contempt trial, which starts next Monday. Bannon had tried to delay that but today a federal judge ordered his trial will go ahead as scheduled. No word of when he`ll appear before the House Committee.
Meanwhile, another Trump ally Senator Lindsey Graham lost his fight to resist a subpoena from the Georgia prosecutor investigating Trump`s efforts to overturn the election there. Today a county judge ordered Graham to testify, calling him a quote, necessary and material witness.
With that, we have got a lot to cover tonight. So let`s get smarter with the help of our leadoff panel. Katie Benner, Justice Department reporter for the New York Times, Phil Rucker, Pulitzer Prize winning deputy national editor for The Washington Post, and Neal Katyal, Department of Justice veteran and former acting Solicitor General during the Obama administration, he has argued dozens of cases before the U.S. Supreme Court.
[23:05:08]
Team, I need you to bring your A game tonight. We have a lot here. Katie, we hear the testimony from a writer and a one-time spokesperson for the Oath Keepers. We`re going to hear from them tomorrow. How`s the committee trying to connect the dots?
KATIE BENNER, THE NEW YORK TIMES JUSTICE DPEARTMENT REPORTER: The committee is really trying to show that the Oath Keepers and other far right nationalist groups who attacked the Capitol, keep in mind, these are also the groups that have actually been charged by the Department of Justice for seditious conspiracy, that such groups had a relationship with Donald Trump.
They`re going to want to show that there was a call and response between what Trump was saying and how the crowd responded that when Trump`s had come to the Capitol that people mobilize. They want to show that even if they cannot say definitively that Donald Trump was working hand in glove with these people, that these folks were motivated by the former president. And that`s really important when you see the violence that ensued.
RUHLE: Neal, you may have heard me say it there before ties to Trump associates, Trump associates, what if all these ties get you to Trump`s outer and inner most circle, but not to him?
NEAL KATYAL, FORMER ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL.: Yes, I think that`s possible. But I think unlikely, I think Steph, the evidence is starting to show those connections. So to me, the big picture for tomorrow`s hearing is that the committee over the last weeks has showed us just how narrowly Mike Pence escaped the advancing riders. And tomorrow`s hearing is going to be focused on just what those rioters plan to do if they found them. So that`s one focus, that kind of violence of these people.
And as you said at the outset, it`s amazing. Here we are 18 months after the events, and we find out we`re finding out new stuff virtually every week.
And then the other focus, as we learned of the hearing tomorrow is going to be this important December 18th White House meeting. This meeting, as I guess Stefon Saturday Night Live would put it has everything, it has a Rudy, Michael Flynn and Sidney Powell. And the groups are all sitting — those folks are all discussing like should they how to invoke martial law with Donald Trump. And they wanted to appoint Sidney Powell, a special counsel to investigate voter fraud.
And it was right after that meeting that Trump tweeted, it was the next day that tweeted to his supporters, calling them to protest their own government. And that`s certainly never happened before in the history of the United States for the simple reason that most presidents understand that they`re supposed to act on behalf of the people, not the other way around.
And so Steph, I guess, is the theoretical possibility that Donald Trump wasn`t the guy calling the shots or they won`t be able to prove that. But I got to say this committee, these kinds of counsel who are working on the committee, these are top notch people, they know exactly how to investigate a mob operation. And that`s what unfortunately the White House in the last administration is looking like it was.
RUHLE: And if our audience is not familiar, Stefon, Bill hade, it was one of his greatest SNL characters. He was the New York nightlife critic and guide on a weekend report and he was brilliant.
You talked about new information, Neal, Pat Cipollone, potentially gave almost eight hours of new information last Friday. We believe we`re going to hear some of it tomorrow. What do you want to hear most from him?
KATYAL: Exactly the question you just asked me before all about Donald Trump. We`ve heard all Cipollone is, you know, junior counsel, we`ve had heard people who talk to Cipollone. You know, including, you know, the witness last week, Cassidy Hutchinson, who was amazing in poised and gave direct testimony about what Pat Cipollone said, but hearing it from the horse`s mouth. And what he said to Donald Trump is the most important.
Now Trump has basically it looks like tried to prevent Cipollone from saying certain things, claiming bogus privileges and the like, and I sure hope, and Mr. Cipollone is a very good lawyer. I hope that, you know, he recognized those claims for what they are, which is bogus, and didn`t make them.
But we don`t know the contours. We don`t know exactly what happened. I have to say, saw a witness who`s there for eight hours doesn`t sound to me, like a witness who`s invoking much privilege. You know, it certainly can happen and certainly around some key conversations that Trump probably really wants, not to the American people to learn about. But we`ll have to find out tomorrow.
RUHLE: Phil, the committee is expected to zero in on a meeting that took place in the White House on December 18th, where Trump and his allies pushed ideas like seizing voting machines, but Cipollone and others. They resisted. They said it was crazy. What more do you know about that?
PHIL RUCKER: Yes, Steph, that is a key meeting in the timeline here, and we`ll hear a lot about it in the hearing tomorrow. I assume that that Pat Cipollone was probably asked about that meeting and asked about the legal counsel that he had provided President Trump in that moment, because of course it was not legal or constitutional, to cease voting machines, or to declare martial law or any of the other crazy things that Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell were trying to get the president excited about in that meeting.
[23:10:07]
But there`s an important connection between that meeting and the tweet that President Trump issued to his supporters saying to be in Washington on January 6, because it will be wild. The committee can connect the dots there and try to signal that that tweet where Trump was urging his supporters to come to Washington was part of this broader plot, this broader conspiracy to overturn the election results illegally and unconstitutionally. And that can really start to fill out the picture here.
RUHLE: Neal, in an op-ed, former Muller investigation prosecutor and an MSNBC colleague of ours, Andrew Weissmann said, the Justice Department needs to change how it`s investigating January 6. I want to share what he said this afternoon.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANDREW WEISSMANN, FMR. SENIOR MEMBER OF MUELLER PROBE: Looking at January 6, in terms of what happened that day, and the people who invaded the Capitol, led to a sort of myopic focus on those events and then proceeding up the chain.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
RUHLE: Is he right to criticize the bottoms up aspect of this investigation?
KATYAL: Well, I don`t like to disagree with my friend Andrew Weissmann. But I think, you know, we don`t, first of all, we don`t know exactly where the Justice Department`s investigation has been. It`s been operating in the shadows secretly. That`s the way all the best investigations operate. So it may very well be that they are have that wider aperture that Mr. Weissmann is talking about.
But the second thing is, you know, this is the way most criminal prosecutions are done. And before I referenced mob prosecutions, it is you start with obvious known people who have committed crimes, and the focus may be narrow, and then you gradually work your way out.
Now, I think we`re 18 months here in and so patience is wearing thin. I get that. But I do think the committee is hearing this themselves demonstrate the wide amount of information that is out there. And that, you know, Trump and his allies have tried to hide with bogus claims of privilege here and there.
Now that`s crumbling, that facade is crumbling. And so it`s easier for criminal prosecutors at the Justice Department to pick up what Congress has found in these January 6 hearings, and run with it.
The other thing I just wanted to say back to your last question to me about is it possible that Donald Trump might not be implicated? A federal judge has already looked at the evidence and said, Steph, that it`s more likely than not that Donald Trump personally committed serious felonies.
So I think we`re already — over that threshold, you know, at least as a civil or congressional matter, then the question is, is it enough to be the beyond a reasonable doubt standard of criminal law? And it sure looking like it`s heading that way.
RUHLE: Let`s say with the Department of Justice, Katie, what are you hearing about communications between the committee and the DOJ these days that committees got a lot of information?
BENNER: Yes, the committee has a lot of information. And there is sort of an unusual relationship right now between the Justice Department and the committee, and that we`ve actually seen them argue out loud, you know, Andrew Weissmann and others who worked on the Mueller investigation. I think one of the things they did well was worked with Congress under very difficult circumstances, including with committees that were controlled by Republicans, you really never saw this, these kinds of outbursts back and forth.
And there`s frustration mounting inside of the department. They wish they had more information. They wish the committee had given the transcripts. But you have to also keep in mind and others have said this, that the Justice Department has subpoena power, the Justice Department can ask people to come in for interviews, and the Justice Department can be responsive to some of the material they`ve seen now in public, just as they often are, when public information becomes available about matters that they`re looking into. And it`s not clear that they have taken those sorts of more proactive steps.
RUHLE: All right, how about something else unusual, Phil, a dispute that seems to be brewing between Donald Trump`s lawyers and Steve Bannon, his lawyers, your paper, the Washington Post has some great analysis on it. Can you break this down? You don`t hear about a dispute like this often.
RUCKER: Now, Steph, this dispute is all about Steve Bannon and the broader case about him denying requests from Congress for information as part of this January 6 investigation. Bannon`s lawyers claimed that the President had cited executive privilege that Bannon could cite executive privilege and withholding information.
But the president`s lawyer Justin Clark, his former campaign counsel disputed that and there`s been a lengthy back and forth between the President`s counsel and Bannon`s counsel over executive privilege over whether Bannon`s counsel was overstating matters in refusing to comply with Congress. And a judge has actually ruled that they should that — that Bannon should not have his hearing and not have this case delayed over that matter.
RUHLE: Katie, what do you think about this? Is this just sort of legal mumbo jumbo Steve Bannon trying to run the clock or are Trump and Bannon no longer in lockstep?
[23:15:07]
BENNER: Well, I wouldn`t say that Trump and Bannon are no longer in lockstep, because these are characters that you see sort of move out of Trump`s orbit, move back into Trump`s orbit. And so I really would hesitate to be predictive there. But I think what we`re seeing is pressure being put on a variety of witnesses in multiple different cases so the, you know, the case against Steve Bannon about whether or not he should have provided information to the committee, with the Justice Department`s own investigations, and with the committee investigation, pressure being put on a variety of the former president`s allies.
And it`s interesting to see more and more of them find ways to cooperate. We`re not in the situation during the Mueller investigation where you had a Republican controlled Congress, where you had a very unfriendly White House that was unfriendly to the investigation, and courts that were grinding through multiple lawsuits regarding whether or not information should be shared. So we are in a slightly different environment, and you`re seeing people being more forthcoming in general.
RUHLE: So Steve Bannon will get his day in court and maybe, just maybe Lindsey Graham will. Neal, should we expect to see Senator Graham testify to the Georgia grand jury?
KATYAL: Yes. And, you know, I think Lindsey Graham and 2016 said, Look, if we nominate Donald Trump will be destroyed, and we deserve it. And I wouldn`t quite say we`re at the point of destruction. But the arguments that Lindsey Graham has advanced to try and block the subpoena. He deserves it. And this is ridiculous.
He`s been subpoenaed in this Georgia election fraud dispute. He has material evidence. And what he is saying is, well, the speech or Debate Clause of the Constitution forbids a prosecutor from asking him to tell him — to tell his story and tell the information that he has, that is bogus.
I wrote a Harvard Law Review article about this privilege. And the Supreme Court in 1972, and Gravelle said, absolutely wrong. This clause does not immunize a senator from testifying about information about other people committing crimes, or if as long as it doesn`t impugn a legislative act. And last time I checked, plotting a coup is not a legislative act.
So this is bogus. He`s going to testify. And Bannon for his part, I think, is also, you know, his criminal trial next week on trying to withhold information from the American people. He`ll go to through a criminal trial next week. He`s almost certainly going to lose indeed, his lawyer today set after the judge`s rulings. Hey, I got nothing left to defend here. You know, and so he`s heading to a criminal trial in jail time. And it is so interesting, because this is the first time that Mr. Steve Bannon wants to check his privilege. And it turns out, he doesn`t have any.
RUHLE: There you go. Phil, before we go, I want to ask you about something else that many believe are bogus. President Biden`s approval rating is low. It is it 33 percent. But you`re starting to hear people on the right say, oh, it`s because people don`t care about January 6. People care about Donald Trump. Joe Biden`s approval rating does not mean that America wants Donald Trump.
Can you explain this to us? Because the most important thing for the American voter right now seems to be economic issues and inflation, which is the reason that approval rating is where it is not Trump.
RUCKER: I think that`s right, Steph. I mean, Trump is it was a historically unpopular president. He lost reelection obviously, that`s the whole reason why we`ve been having these discussions about January 6. And when you look at hypothetical matchups between Trump and Biden, in public polling, Biden does beat Trump in those matchups.
So yes, Biden`s approval rating is very, very, very low. Yes, that`s a problem for Biden and for Democrats. But no, that does not mean that Donald Trump would necessarily defeat President Biden. In fact, if the election were held tomorrow, according to most of these public polls, President Biden would win reelection.
RUHLE: Thank you, Phil Rucker for that important clarification. Phil, Katie`s stick around. Neal, thank you for joining us tonight, and for bringing us a little Stefon. I appreciate it.
Coming up next, more on the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys and the role they played on January 6, were they responding to a call from the White House or working on their own?
And later, he had on fettered access to Donald Trump in the final days of his presidency. Our conversation with documentarian Alex Holder, the 11th Hour just getting underway on this very busy Monday night.
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[23:24:02]
RUHLE: The focus of tomorrow`s January 6 committee is expected to center on the various extremist groups that took part in the insurrection and specifically potential White House ties between America`s most prominent right wing militia groups, the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys.
I want to bring in welcome Ryan Reilly, Justice reporter for NBC News who has been doing excellent reporting on these organizations. Katie Benner and Phil Rucker still with us.
Ryan, these groups are your beat. What are you expecting to hear tomorrow? I mean, I haven`t heard too many Oath Keepers or Proud Boys turn on Donald Trump.
RYAN REILLY, NBC NEWS JUSTICE REPORTER: No, not so far. But I think that we`re going to hear a lot about that overlap because there`s not that many degrees of separation between the individuals who tried to actually storm the U.S. Capitol and physically take over the government on January 6, and this sort of legal effort to try to take over the election through the judiciary system.
[23:25:00]
So there`s just not that much of a not much of a disconnect. There`s a lot of ties, you know, you don`t have to really play that much of a game to find who these individuals are. The latest story I sort of wrote was about Kellye SoRelle, who is the — she was the general counsel for the Oath Keepers.
And during December 2020, she told me, Stewart Rhodes is actually trying to get her to put her — to put him in touch with the White House. This is during the time when you had the Oath Keepers read these open letters saying that they wanted to have Donald Trump enlist them and tried to take them and call them up, invoke the insurrection act and enlist the U.S. military to take over. They wanted to redo elections. They wanted the National Guard to come or the military to be in charge of these elections.
And, you know, all this sounds sort of batty but you have to remember who was being brought into the White House at that point. And how many of those individuals were really connected to the Oath Keepers and connected to the Proud Boys and all of these various efforts, it was sort of really a mess in those final months.
You know, a lot of the people who were being brought into the White House, we had the reference last segment to SNL, you know, a lot of these individuals were similar, I think to Cecily Strong`s character girl you don`t want to — you wish you hadn`t started a conversation with at a party. These were pretty fringe figures out there who were putting out these really crazy beliefs about the election and they were getting an audience at the White House.
RUHLE: Then let`s go back to Donald Trump. One thing that Donald Trump could have done is pardoned a whole lot of these people and he didn`t. Phil, what do you hear about this from Trump`s inner circle? He didn`t need approval from Congress or anyone else. He could have pardoned them, many of them expected hoped he would. Are they now looking to turn on him because he didn`t? Phil?
RUCKER: Steph, I don`t know if they`re looking to turn on him. Yes, I don`t know that they`re looking to turn on him necessarily. But you`re right that he had the power to pardon them. He certainly had the power to pardon anybody. And we know that he was sympathetic to them in some ways, because he saw them as fighting for him.
When my colleague Carol Leonnig and I interviewed Trump after he left office for our book, I Alone Can Fix It, Trump said there was so much love in that crowd on January 6, that those were good people. They were loving people out there. I mean, he wanted — he said he wanted what they wanted when they were going up to storm the Capitol violently.
And so he liked what they were fighting for. But he did stop short of pardoning them. I think what the hearing tomorrow will try to detail is the degree to which they were following him. The way Trump`s tweets and public comments were triggering. So many of these Proud Boys and Oath Keeper members to come to Washington to take up arms and to violently stormed the capitol as they did on January 6.
RUHLE: Which is a reminder, if he pardoned any of those people after the fact they could be complied to come and testify. And they wouldn`t be able to plead the fifth. They`d have to talk.
Ryan, I know you were in court today for the hearing of Steve Bannon`s contempt of Congress trial. The judge I mentioned it earlier has now refused to delay this trial. How worried should Bannon because let`s be honest, for the last six years, we`ve been saying he`s in hot water for all sorts of reasons. And he never seems to be bothered. In fact, he loves his days in court, and then after he talks about it on the radio.
REILLY: Yes, you know, Steve Bannon wasn`t actually present for the hearing today. And I think that was probably good for him, because it was a pretty devastating day. And I don`t know what he would have said if he hadn`t come after those cameras and face those cameras afterwards, because basically, the judge decided that every possible defense that he wanted to put forward isn`t going to fly, that`s not going to be able to be something that`s going to be presented.
In fact that at the end of the tail end of the hearing there his lawyer made some comment about, you know, they have to decide whether or not it makes sense to go to trial. And the judge said, yes, that makes sense to, to look at. So this is going to be a very tough road ahead for Steve Bannon if he pushes to go forward in the next seven days.
And I think that, you know, we very well could see a potential plea there just because you, you know, potentially plead a one or two charges, limit is his potential outcome, this potential exposure to prison sentence there, pleated down, you know, he still has a possibility I think of coming out of this with perhaps probation. he doesn`t have — he doesn`t really have a record to speak of.
So I think that that`s still a possibility for him if you were to plead down, and that might be something his lawyers might seriously tell him to consider because it`s not really going to be much of a trial, considering the facts that are lined up against him.
RUHLE: Katie, before we go, I do want to ask you about the road ahead, or maybe the one she left behind. Cassidy Hutchinson. Obviously her testimony was extraordinary last week. What has it been like for her? Can you explain to our audience what a person in her position has had to endure, has had to give up because she testified?
[23:30:05]
BENNER: Sure. I mean, we had a story yesterday that came out online. One of my colleagues discussed why she was — why she chose to testify in this rushed manner. The committee and she felt that she was being threatened or cajoled by allies of Donald Trump. They worried for her safety. They felt that as they knew more information, they found out more information from her, it was just imperative to get out into the public view as soon as possible for a variety of reasons, including to make sure that none of it was leaked.
And before she testified, and since then she has jumped — she has essentially been in hiding with her family. She is under threat. And she feels that she`s endangered, and she has security.
And so that is what happens when people, you know, turn on the former president when they testify against him. This is something that is really serious. We`ve seen this to some degree with other witnesses, when the Justice former — justice officials testified they had protection to and from the courthouse. You know, this is sort of an ongoing theme that`s been running underneath the hearing.
And Liz Cheney, she spoke about it a little bit more openly when she read some of the threats that witnesses have been receiving. It`s clearly something that`s going to be ongoing, especially in these last two hearings, which we`re going to start pointing more surprising more to Donald Trump.
RUHLE: Speaks to how brave it is for these people to come forward and tell their story in the name of justice and our democracy. Katie Benner, Phil Rucker, Ryan Reilly, thank you all. Ryan, welcome to the show. Thank you for joining us tonight.
Coming up, he says he witnessed the transformation firsthand, as Donald Trump started to actually believe his own big fat lie. We`re going to go one on one with Alex Holder the filmmaker behind unprecedented when the 11th Hour continues.
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[23:36:21]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: It was a sad day. But it was a day where there was great anger in our country, that people went to Washington primarily because they were angry with an election that they think was rigged.
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.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
RUHLE: The former president reacting to the January 6 before he left the White House. That interview is part of the highly anticipated three part Docu series by British filmmaker Alex Holder available now on Discovery Plus.
The January 6 committee subpoenaed the raw footage from the documentary and Holder testified before the committee behind closed doors in June. Here`s a bit more from the film.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You said before you didn`t want to talk about Capitol shooting? Should we move on.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, let`s get to six.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When you`re telling people that a presidential election is being stolen, you can`t be shocked when people believe you and then become violent. At some point, they have to take responsibility.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
RUHLE: The filmmaker behind unprecedented Alex Holder is here with me tonight. Alex, talk about the greatest free PR ever for a documentary, your footage and you get called by the January 6 committee. What did they want to see in your content?
ALEX HOLDER, DOCUMENTARY FILMMAKER: Well, I think this was obviously a really unusual situation. Right? I mean, to have access to the incumbent president of the United States of America and his three kids.
RUHLE: Yes, yes, yes, yes. But I mean, what in your footage did you have on January 6, or before that they were most interested in?
HOLDER” I think they were interested in all of it. I mean, at the end of the day, they were interested in the incredible footage we have of the events on January 6 itself. I mean, that was a warzone. And we captured these remarkable and tragic moments in a way that I think is pretty extraordinary and different to the other material that was out there.
But it also we have a contemporaneous account of what was going on, in the President`s mind a very specific moments whilst he was the president of the United States. And I think that also is obviously very important for the record of the history.
RUHLE: Then given what you know, and you`ve watched the hearings, what is America missing? What don`t we know about what was going on in the mind of Donald Trump and his team during the days weeks leading up to the sixth and the sixth itself?
HOLDER: The truth is, I think people do know. At the end of the day, this was a president who had for since 2016, had been undermining the sanctity of the vote. He had said this in 2016 after the debate with Hillary Clinton, that the only way that he will accept the results of the 2016 presidential election was there`s this theatrical pause, and he says, If I win.
Now obviously he knew that he was joking back then, or he was lying. He was undermining the sanctity of the vote back in 2016. However, fast forward to 2020, he then becomes somebody who believes in this lie, and I`m sitting in the Diplomatic Reception Room with a guy with a nuclear football outside the room with all the Secret Service around, he is the President of the United States sitting down looking in the eye and saying there`s no way that President Biden got 80 million votes.
[23:40:09]
And we need to reopen or the signature votes in Georgia. Four days earlier, his own attorney general is saying that there was no evidence whatsoever to support his claims. So this is the president who is literally talking nonsense, and is lying, but has become somebody who`s detached from reality is unable to converse in debate.
RUHLE: But he`s always talked nonsense. He`s always been a liar. He`s a showman. It`s what he was. Do you actually believe that he believes this big lie? Because you say you witnessed the transformation? Explain that to me.
HOLDER: Yes. So this is in fact what Bill Barr himself said in his deposition that Donald Trump became detached from reality. This man was something —
RUHLE: When was he attached to it?
HOLDER: Well, I think in this particular situation, when you`re undermining democracy, when you`re undermining the vote, that`s incredibly dangerous. And that led to the events of January 6, I mean, there`s no question. He is sitting in the room with a painting of George Washington looking down at him. And he is just telling me things that are absolutely outrageous. And that was a pretty, pretty tragic and scary moment.
RUHLE: Where were you? Where were your cameras on January 6?
HOLDER: So Michael RDP was inside or inside the Capitol on the steps of the Capitol, sort of inside the sort of march, I guess, of people all trying to basically storm and get inside, they`re screaming that they want to hang Mike Pence, they`re coming up with all sorts of crazy conspiracy theories. And these are people who had this deep sort of religious fervor in that Donald Trump might actually be able to intervene in this ceremonial process, and stop the certification of the Electoral College votes.
RUHLE: I want to share a bit more from the documentary really about the influence Trump had his understanding of social media really. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: It`s a shame what Twitter did and what Facebook did. And that`s what they do. These people are thugs.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: YouTube is the latest media platform to block President Trump.
TRUMP: They allow other people to be on who are horrific people. I`m not a horrific person. I have a big voice. I have a voice that had hundreds of millions of people listening.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
RUHLE: How well did he understand his power and influence on social media? And how tragic was it for him to lose that access?
HOLDER: It was absolutely tragic. And in fact, I`ll tell you something that I haven`t told anyone. In Mar-a-Lago, when I interviewed him for the second time. He was in a terrible mood. And before he came in, one of his assistants said, how much of a bad mood he was in, I said, Why is it because you know, he`s no longer in the White House. And she said, It`s because he`s off Twitter. He couldn`t get over the fact that he was banned from social media. He knew how powerful that platform was for him.
RUHLE: And before that, did he embrace that power? Maybe better than anyone else you can think of?
HOLDER: I think so. Yes. I think that`s fair enough. Absolutely. That`s why it was so hard for him to, you know, to not be able to have access to it.
RUHLE: We`re going to take a quick break and you at home better stick around because I have one question for this guy. How the hell did this English guy get this kind of access to Donald Trump and his whole universe? Stick around. I need to know the answer.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[23:48:11]
RUHLE: The makers of the Discovery Plus documentary series Unprecedented had rare access to the political workings of the Trump campaign, but also an unusual window into the Trump family dynamic.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I think a very good father, it`s been very important to me.
IVANKA TRUMP, DONALD TRUMP`S DAUGTHER: My father who`s not conventionally a family man, and the fact that, you know, he didn`t go to our sports games or you know, that wasn`t really his thing. And he was pretty unapologetic about it.
DONALD TRUMP JR., DONALD TRUMP SR. SON: You could always spend time with him, but it was sort of on his terms. So, you know, we grew up with him. And it was, you know, we`re walking the jobsite.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
RUHLE: Alex Holder is still with us. And even though we`ve time for a few questions, I really only have one. How in the hell did you get this kind of access to the Trump family? Was it your English accent? Because I honestly can`t possibly think of what it could be.
HOLDER: I mean, I think it was probably a mixture. It`s a mixture of English acts and maybe a bit of charm and my blue eyes. No, I think it was these guys saw they were going to win the election. They thought it`d be a repeat of the 2016.
RUHLE: But hold on. NBC News would have sat down with them, anybody would have for months. They refused interviews, all the — I think I asked Ivanka Trump for an interview every single day for four years. Why on earth would they give you this kind of access?
HOLDER: I think it was because I wasn`t American. And they had sort of this deep mistrust for the American media. And I think he said, I think the English accent probably helped. But also, I was saying, Look, you guys have been complaining for so long for four years, at least about the way that you`ve been treated by the media.
So look, I`m going to I`m talk to you, talk to me, give me this time and let`s find out who you really are as people.
RUHLE: How did you get access to them and did they think they`d have control of you?
[23:50:00]
HOLDER: No, I don`t think. I mean there was never a scenario where they would ever have control over sort of the film or me or the editorial process whatsoever, no. And that was actually a precondition. I`m not interested in making a film about people who control what the end result is.
RUHLE: What was your last communication with them?
HOLDER: My last communication with them? I mean, look, there`s been —
RUHLE: You`re avoiding. When was the last time you spoke to Jared Kushner, Donald Trump, Ivanka Trump?
HOLDER: The last time I spoke with them was probably well, a few months ago, I would say.
RUHLE: Most if not most, several of the other people who were called to the January 6 Committee we know were spoken to or pressured by Trump allies. Did Trump`s team reach out to you when you were speaking to January 6 Committee?
HOLDER: So I`m not going to answer that question.
RUHLE: Why?
HOLDER: Because, you know, said of the sensitivities and the fact that they`re sort of security concerns. I`m going to keep quiet on that.
RUHLE: So that`s a no comment?
HOLDER: Yes, is a no comment. Yes.
RUHLE: Interesting. You started filming them a year and a half ago. What was your goal versus what you ended up making?
HOLDER: The series is got two narratives. And I think in some ways that we obviously never expected in a million years for them to essentially incite a riot that was intended to sort of destroy the American sort of democratic system.
I mean, we wanted to find out who this family was, who these people are, what`s the dynamic between them, the interaction they have with each other and with their father, and separately to that also follow the trajectory of the election campaign and see what the result of that would be.
And what we basically found out is that the only thing that matters, and I hope people will watch the series and will come to this conclusion, is that the only thing that matters is the brand. That`s it, it`s the brand.
RUHLE: The Trump brand.
HOLDER: The Trump brand. That`s what matters, that`s at the forefront of everything they do. It`s all about making sure Trump wins at all costs.
RUHLE: And they don`t feel that the Trump brand is tarnished, damage, destroyed in any way?
HOLDER: No. And in fact, all they do is ensure that it just continues to be this icon, this important powerful thing in their minds. And I think the idea that it might be tarnished or not, is completely separate to their reality.
RUHLE: So how did you end communications with them? When did you end filming? I mean, it was after he lost, that whole family still thought we`re victorious. We won?
HOLDER: Well, I mean, this is the thing that the kids never really sort of separated themselves, at least with me from their father`s positions, right. They may articulate it slightly differently. But at the end of the day, they always supported what you did.
I mean, Eric just don`t have doubled down entirely. I mean, he come — his comparison or his explanation as to why his father won was because there were more people at his rallies than at Joe Biden`s. That was —
RUHLE: Did you say to him that`s not how voting works, sir?
HOLDER: So my way of dealing with these guys was that I`m not here to change their minds or to debate with them or to be prosecutorial. My approach was to capture what they were saying and what they were thinking in that moment and to allow an audience to come to their own conclusion as to whether or not what they`re saying made sense or whether it was ridiculous.
RUHLE: All right, then I know we`re out of time. Given all that, you know, do you think Donald Trump is at all responsible for what happened on January 6?
HOLDER: I think is impossible to argue that he isn`t responsible for what happened on January 6, in that he essentially said to 75 million people that voted for him that their vote didn`t count. He then asked them to go to the Capitol. He then says on stage that he`s marched down Pennsylvania Avenue, and they need to fight like hell. I mean, what does anyone think is going to happen next?
RUHLE: Wow. Alex Holder, congratulations on this docu series, this project. Four weeks ago, you had a very different life than you have today. I appreciate you joining us.
HOLDER: Thank you very much.
RUHLE: I really appreciate it.
HOLDER: Thank you.
RUHLE: Coming up, we`re going to take you inside the fight to save Yosemite National Park`s giant sequoia trees from a wildfire when the 11th Hour continues.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[23:58:05]
RUHLE: The last thing before we go tonight, the race to save the sequoias a wildfire in Yosemite National Park is threatening the park`s largest grove of sequoia trees. The fire doubled in size over the weekend and firefighters are working to protect the more than 600 sequoia is still at risk.
The Sequoia Grove has a unique place in American history.
NBC News points out President Abraham Lincoln set aside the grove along with Yosemite Valley in 1864 for public use, resort and recreation. According to the park service, it was the first time the government had ordered scenic areas to be protected for public benefit. Our own Cal Perry is on the ground in Yosemite with more.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
CAL PERRY, NBC NEWS CORRESPONDENT (on camera): Stephanie, we wanted to give you a look at it back blaze sort of the anatomy of what is going on here. I`m actually just not far from what would be one of the busiest entrances to the park. And instead of tourists, you`ve got firefighters from various jurisdictions closing in on the area to try to burn some of these areas intentionally.
This one has been burned intentionally. They actually set this back plays about 16 hours ago. The idea is to play defense to get some of these areas burned away so that those very valuable, those natural treasures those sequoias can be protected.
Now so much of this story is about climate change, but how the conditions are changing for firefighters on the ground and how difficult that is making their jobs. Take a listen to what somebody told me on the fire frontline this weekend.
GARRET DICKMAN, YOSIMITE NATIONAL PARK FOREST BIOLOGIST: Climate is making that fire season longer. It`s making it hotter, and it`s making firefighters exhausted. You know, we`ve been fighting fires for months already and it`s July. We still have many, many more months to go.
PERRY: Until there is any kind of containment on this fire resources will continue to pour in and so much of what will determine the success for these firefighters in the coming days is going to be the conditions and unfortunately the forecast is not good.
[00:00:00]
There`s little or no chance of rain in the coming days and the temperature is only supposed to rise, Stephanie.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
RUHLE: Thank you to Cal Perry. Let`s hope the firefighters are able to protect these giant national treasures. We`re thinking about the sequoias tonight is somebody National Park.
And on that note, I wish you a good and safe night. From all of our colleagues across the networks of NBC News, thanks for staying up late with us. I will see you at the end of tomorrow.