Joe Kovacs dutifully wrote in a March 10 WorldNetDaily article:
A new report reveals former U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney’s Jan. 6 Committee suppressed evidence President Donald Trump pushed for 10,000 National Guard troops to protect the nation’s capital on that fateful day in 2021.
According to a a previously hidden transcript obtained by the Federalist, “Cheney and her committee falsely claimed they had ‘no evidence’ to support Trump officials’ claims the White House had communicated its desire for 10,000 National Guard troops.
“In fact, an early transcribed interview conducted by the committee included precisely that evidence from a key source. The interview, which Cheney attended and personally participated in, was suppressed from public release until now.”
The report says on Jan. 28, 2022, Deputy Chief of Staff Anthony Ornato was interviewed by the committee, during which he told Cheney and investigators he overheard White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows press Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser to request as many National Guard troops as she needed to protect the city.
Ornato testified Trump had actually specified the number of 10,000 troops should be in place to keep the peace at protests scheduled for Jan. 6, 2021.
He also said the White House was frustrated with Acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller’s slow deployment of help on the mayhem-packed afternoon of Jan. 6.
“Not only did the committee not accurately characterize the interview, they suppressed the transcript from public review,” the Federalist reports.
[…]“The former J6 Select Committee apparently withheld Mr. Ornato’s critical witness testimony from the American people because it contradicted their pre-determined narrative,” said U.S. Rep. Rep. Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga., chairman of the House Administration’s Subcommittee on Oversight.
“Mr. Ornato’s testimony proves … President Trump did in fact offer 10,000 National Guard troops to secure the U.S. Capitol, which was turned down.”
“This is just one example of important information the former Select Committee hid from the public because it contradicted what they wanted the American people to believe,” Loudermilk said.
“And this is exactly why my investigation is committed to uncovering all the facts, no matter the outcome.”
This is all pretty much false. As we documented when Newsmax peddled the same narrative, Ornato’s interview transcript wasn’t suppressed by Cheney; the Secret Service stopped release of the transcript and that of other Secret Service employees until sensitive security information could be redacted. Further, Trump never made an “offer” or any other formal request for National Guard troops for that day — Trump had authority over merely 2,000 Guardsmen, so he could not have offered 10,000 troops even if he had actually done so — and troops that were being talked about in informal discussions were for the protection Trump and his supporters, not the U.S. Capitol.
Unlke Newsmax, however, Kovacs has made no effort to correct his erroneous article. Narratives are more important than the truth at WND, after all.
UPDATE: Bob Unruh repeated these bogus claims in a March 12 article:
Democrats long have claimed Trump actually tried to grab the wheel of his Secret Service vehicle to go to the Capitol that day. And Democrats, as now is known, suppressed confirmation that Trump offered to have 10,000 troops at the Capitol to protect it.
Democrats long have denied that, even though the records that already have been made available show Democrats responsible for the building refused his offer.
The report explained it was the House Administration Oversight Subcommittee, led by Rep. Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga., that made public transcripts and more in an interim report that confirmed Pelosi’s committee “withheld from the public evidence that contradicted its final conclusions.”
This article has yet to be corrected as well.