A handwriting expert hired by House Republicans investigating the since disbanded Jan. 6 Committee said the panel’s star witness was not the author of a note she took credit for at a congressional hearing two years ago.
On Monday, journalist Julie Kelly published the conclusions of a graphologist commissioned to analyze the handwriting on a note displayed by Jan. 6 Select Committee Vice Chair Liz Cheney during the public appearance of former Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson before the panel. The note in question included a proposed statement for then-President Donald Trump to issue as rioters descended on the U.S. Capitol.
“That’s a note that I wrote at the direction of the chief of staff on Jan. 6, likely around 3 o’clock,” Hutchinson said under oath at a hearing of the Select Committee in June 2022.
Authorship was immediately disputed by former Trump White House staff.
“The handwritten note that Cassidy Hutchinson testified was written by her was in fact written by Eric Herschmann on January 6, 2021,” a spokesperson for the former White House lawyer told ABC News at the time.
According to Kelly, Republican investigators now probing the misconduct of Cheney’s select panel have independently “confirmed Herschmann’s account.”
“Cassidy Hutchinson appears to be a pathological liar and perjurer,” Kelly stated of Cheney’s blockbuster witness, who was promoted during the 2022 midterms because she made a series of explosive allegations surrounding the Jan. 6 riot, none of which have been substantiated.
While Hutchinson publicly testified she was “disgusted” by the “unpatriotic” events that unfolded in the nation’s capital on Jan. 6, 2021, the former aide for ex-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows said privately afterward that she would “rather shoot [her]self dead into the Potomac than see marine one flying around this city without 45 again.” Hutchinson had also joked about the riot she now claims left her with emotional scars.
Six days after she was issued a subpoena by Cheney’s probe, Hutchinson called the select panel a “phony committee” engaged in “bs.” Hutchinson had also commiserated in a private group chat by sharing the tweet below from another former White House colleague.
Hutchinson had even tried to follow Trump down to Florida upon the president’s exit from the White House, looking for work.
Hutchinson would later go on to claim in her public testimony before the “phony” committee that Trump had tried to violently hijack the presidential limousine to drive himself to the Capitol on Jan. 6. The claim was denounced as fabricated hours later by the alleged eyewitnesses who pledged to discredit the claim under oath.
In March, Hutchinson was sued by Tony Bobulinski, a former business partner of the Biden family, over claims she made in her memoir released last year, Enough. According to the lawsuit, Hutchinson lied about a meeting between Bobulinski and Meadows, her former boss in the Trump White House.
The lawsuit specifically highlighted the dramatic excerpt from the book:
In the shadows of the bleachers, I observed Mark and Tony Bobulinski’s interaction through a gap in the vehicles. When they said their goodbyes, I saw Mark hand Tony what appeared to be a folded sheet of paper or a small envelope. Mark walked toward me, staring at the ground. He was silent for several moments as we made our way back to the staff holding area.
“You and I, we have seen a lot together, done a lot together,” Mark said, his head still tilted toward the ground. I cleared my throat. “Yes, Mark. We have.” He abruptly stopped walking and stuck his arm out to stop me. Our eyes locked.
“Oh, don’t look so frightened.” He dropped his arm. “I just want to thank you for working so hard. It’s quite difficult to find someone as loyal as you.’”He flashed a smile, the kind of smile that doesn’t change the shape of your eyes. He disappeared around the corner, his Secret Service agents trailing him.
Hutchinson’s claims became the subject of a CNN news story and a target line of questioning in House lawmakers’ own interview with Bobulinski.
“[Meadows] didn’t hand me a single thing,” Bobulinski testified under oath.
Hutchinson, along with ousted Rep. Liz Cheney, has continued to capitalize on the NeverTrump stardom, endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris and other Democrats down the ballot this fall.
