Jan. 6 panel announces eight hearings to be held in June

The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack at the Capitol will be holding eight hearings in June, according to lawmakers on the panel.

“Eight’s a lot of hearings,” committee member Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) told CBS’s Robert Costa on Thursday when asked about the specific number following an announcement from Chairman Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.). 

“You know most issues or subjects get one hearing or maybe two hearings. So we looked at essentially the comprehensive story that we have to tell, and we divided it up into chapters that will allow for the unfolding of the narrative, and we hope that it will make sense to people,” Raskin added.

Thompson told reporters earlier on Thursday that eight public hearings will be slated for June, including ones scheduled for prime-time and daytime hours.

“We’ll tell the story about what happened,” the House committee chairman said, according to CBS News. “We will use a combination of witnesses, exhibits, things that we have through the tens of thousands of exhibits we’ve […] looked at, as well as the hundreds of witnesses we deposed or just talked to in general.”

The first of the eight hearings is anticipated to be held on June 9, according to Thompson.

He also said that by the end of the week, three House Republicans — House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) in addition to Reps. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and Scott Perry (R-Pa.) — would be contacted by the committee, CNN reported.

Asked what would happen if any of the lawmakers refuse to testify, as all three of them have in the past, the panel chairman said, “Well, we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it,” according to CNBC.

In Raskin’s interview with Costa, the congressman indicated that the panel had not made up its mind over whether it wanted former Vice President Mike Pence to testify.

“I don’t know that that’s been decided yet. And you know, he’s spoken at length in public as to the major points, and so I think we have what we need from him, but I don’t think the committee’s decided yet,” Raskin explained.