Cassidy Hutchinson alleged that President Donald Trump threw his lunch at the wall in response to statements his attorney general made about the 2020 election. Hutchinson, a top aide to President Donald Trump’s chief of staff Mark Meadows, said in her testimony Tuesday before the House committee investigating Jan. 6 that she saw ketchup dripping on the wall after the Dec. 1, 2020 incident.
Attorney General William Barr had told the Associated Press there wasn’t enough evidence to prove widespread fraud during the 2020 election.
Hutchinson told the panel that she was in her office and heard noise coming from down the hall. “I poked my head out of the office and I saw the valet walking towards our office. He said to get the chief down to the dining room, the president wants them,” Hutchinson testified. “Mark [Meadows] went down to the dining room, came back to the office a few minutes later.”
After Meadows returned, Hutchinson went to the dining room and noticed that the door was propped open “and the valet was inside the dining room changing the tablecloth off of the table,” she said.
“He motioned for me to come in. He pointed towards the front of the room near the fireplace mantle and the TV, where I first noticed there was ketchup dripping on the wall and there was a shattered porcelain plate on the floor,” she said.
“The valet had articulated that the president was extremely angry at the attorney general’s AP interview and had thrown his lunch against the wall, which was causing them to have to clean up,” she said. “So, I grabbed a towel, and started wiping the ketchup off the wall to help the valet out.”
“He said something to the effect of, ‘He’s really ticked off about this. I would stay clear of him for right now. He’s really, really ticked off right now,'” she said.
Committee vice chair Rep. Liz Cheney asked if this was the only situation Hutchinson was aware of when Mr. Trump threw dishes. She said it is not.
“Are there other instances in the dining room where you recall he expressed his anger?” the Wyoming Republican asked Hutchinson.
“There will several times throughout my tenure at the chief of staff, that I was aware of him either throwing dishes, or flipping the tablecloth to let all of the contents of the table go onto the floor to likely break or go everywhere,” Hutchinson said.
Barr also testified about how Mr. Trump reacted during their first meeting after that article was published and Barr told the president he would resign. “He pounded the table very hard. Everyone sort of jumped. And he said, ‘Accepted,'” Barr said in previous testimony.
During Tuesday’s testimony, Hutchinson also testified that Anthony Ornato, a senior Secret Service official, told her on Jan. 6, 2020 that Mr. Trump was angry that he didn’t go to the Capitol.
Hutchinson said Ornato told her that as Mr. Trump was being driven back to the White House he “reached up toward the front of the vehicle to grab at the steering wheel,” as head of security at the time, Bobby Engel, drove.
“Mr. Engel grabbed his arm and said, ‘Sir, you need to take your hand off the steering wheel. We are going back to the west wing. We are not going to the Capitol,'” Hutchinson recounted. “Mr. Trump then used his free hand to lunge toward Bobby Engel, he had motioned towards his clavicles.”
Engle was in the room as Ornato told Hutchinson the story and did not correct or disagree with the story, Hutchinson said.
