about mike pence, that served to whip up the crowd. one of the rioters read it aloud. watch this. you just heard that mike pence is not going to reject any fraudulent elector votes! you re a traitor! that s right. you heard it here first. mike pence has betrayed the united states of america! [ bleep ] you, mike pence. it was clear it was escalating and escalating quickly. hang mike pence. hang mike pence. so when that tweet, mike pence tweet, was sent out, i remember us saying that that was the last thing that needed to be tweeted at that moment. the situation was already bad. and so it felt like he was pouring gasoline on the fire by tweeting that. the danger to pence was very real, and very close as we have now learned, that angry mob got about 40 feet away from the vice president. mr. jacob, you were there, seeing that for the first time, does it surprise you to see how close the mob was to the evacuation route that you took? 40 feet is a distance from me t
attorney john eastman and others, presented a clear and dangerous threat to american democracy. listen to this. had vice president pence obeyed the orders from his president, and the president of the united states of america, that declaration of donald trump as the next president would have plunged america into what i believe would have been tantamount to a revolution within a constitutional crisis. revolution within a constitutional crisis. the committee also revealing just how close to serious danger mike pence was on during the day of the insurrection. rioters coming within 40 feet of the former vice president. as the committee prepares to hold more hearings next week, it is also trying to speak to ginni thomas, the wife of supreme court court justice clarence thomas about her role in trying to overturn the results of the 2020 election. let s take you to capitol hill and lauren fox is there for us. what were the main takeaways from thursday s hearings? reporter: well
acknowledging that americans are, quote, really, really down right now after this strain of the pandemic. and as they struggle with inflation and rising interest rates. we want to welcome our viewers here this the united states and around the world. i m wolf blitzer. you re in the situation room. we begin with the first public response by former president trump to the damning evidence and testimony presented by the january 6th select committee. cnn s jessica schneider is following all the new developments in the investigation. i never called mike pence a wimp. i never called him a wimp. mike pence had a chance to be great. he had a chance to be, frankly, historic. but just like bill barr and the rest of these weak people, mike, and i say it sadly, because i like them, but mike did not have the courage to act. former president trump using his platform at a conservative political conference to deny the evidence against him and blast the january 6th committee. they con p
senate chamber. retired republican federal judge j. michael luttig is expected to condemn trump for instigating as he is expected to put it a war on democracy so that he could cling to power. judge luttig is expected to say had the vice president of the united states obeyed the president of the united states, america would immediately have been plunged into what would have been tantamount to a revolution within a paralyzing constitutional crisis. joining us now is democratic congressman jamie raskin of maryland, a member of the select committee investigating january 6th. congressman raskin, thank you so much for being with us. i want to focus on the new revelations from the new york times starting with this email they report on between a pro trump lawyer and john eastman, who, of course, was working for donald trump and you focused on quite a bit. he writes, odds of action by the supreme court before january 6th will become more favorable if the justices start to fear tha
reporter: it will all focus on the pressure on mike pence to take that unconstitutional action on january 6, 2021 to overturn the electoral certified votes of the states here on january 6, something of course that he rejected doing. but going to the genesis of how this theory first came about. looking at the trump attorney john eastman who is a prominent supporter of this and directly tie donald trump s words to the violence that occurred on january 6 as words about mike pence into exactly what happened here in the capitol. now, two people will be testifying who are very close to mike pence, we expect to hear from greg jake sob who is a former counsel for mike pence and as well as judge mike luttig, former judge and adviser of sorts to pence to understand what the vice president was thinking at the time. we do also expect to see video deposition from his former chief of staff marc short, who will be featured prominently in today s hearing. we ve gotten a copy of judge lutti