Ex-defense secretary denies Trump ordered national guard troops for Jan. 6
Washington, Jul 26 (EFE).- A former United States acting defense secretary denied Tuesday that then-president Donald Trump had ordered him to prepare 10,000 National Guard troops to be deployed to the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot.
His statement contradicts that of Trump, who in June said he had “suggested & offered up” 20,000 national guard troops to be deployed in Washington because “it was felt that the crowd was going to be very large.”
Chris Miller was speaking in a pre-recorded video deposition released by the House select committee investigating the assault.
“I was never given any direction or order or knew of any plans of that nature,” Miller said.
“There was no direct, there was no order from the president,” he said later.
That day, thousands of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol as the certification of Joe Biden as winner of the November presidential election was taking place inside.
Last week, the House committee reproached Trump for not doing anything to stop the assault, despite pleas from senior staff and family, and spending the afternoon watching it live on television.
“Donald Trump ignored and disregarded the desperate pleas of his own family, including (his children) Ivanka and Don Junior,” said committee chairman, Democrat Bennie Thompson.
“Even though he was the only person in the world who could call off the mob he sent to the Capitol, he could not be moved to rise from his dining room table and walk the few steps down the White House hallway into the press briefing room, where cameras were anxiously and desperately waiting to carry his message to the armed and violent mob savagely beating and killing law enforcement officers ravaging the Capitol and hunting down the vice president and various members of Congress.”
The focus of that committee session was on the 187 minutes that elapsed between Trump’s speech until 4.17 pm that afternoon when he told his supporters he loved them but that they should go home.
In total, some 10,000 people participated in the protest – most of them Trump supporters – and about 800 broke into the building. The day left five dead and about 140 injured. EFE
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