Jan 6 hearings ratings – live: Trump slams Ivanka as committee preps for day 2

Christ Stirewalt, the former Fox News editor who blames the network for fuelling the Capitol riot, is set to testify at the January 6 Committee hearings.

He told NewsNation on Friday morning that he will testify on Monday.

When host Adrienne Bankert pushed him about what he might be testifying about, Mr Stirewalt said: “Well, I am not in a position now to tell you what my testimony will be about. I just want to make sure that folks know that I am so that it so so that I’m not playing any hidden ball tricks here. I was asked to testify and I, and I got to go.”

Ms Bankert asked if it was about some of the reporting at Fox News that went out that day, but Mr Stirewalt remained tight-lipped.

“As I say, I’m not in a position to tell you what I’m going to testify about. I just wanted to make sure that folks knew that I was going to participate there.”

Liz Cheney, the anti-Trump Wyoming Republican representative, who has put her career on the line as one of just two members of the GOP on the January 6 Committee, has been widely praised for her prosecutorial performance in last night’s public hearing.

Supreme Court lawyer Neal Katyal described her opening statement as “on fire”, calling it: “Just perfect. Balanced, sober, methodological.”

She delivered a “damning indictment of Donald Trump” and “left her mark for history” said others.

The Bulwark editor Bill Kristol tweeted: “Liz Cheney’s presentation will, in my judgment, go down in the history books: Congress at its best, truth-telling at its best, American democracy at its best.”

Conservative lawyer and commentator George Conway called her: “A profile in courage for the 21st century.”

Former presidential candidate Andrew Yang said: “All respect and admiration to Liz Cheney for having both courage and principles.”

Dave Aronberg, state attorney for Palm Beach County, observed that while her performance may not sway public opinion much, sounding like a prosecutor surely go the attention of the Department of Justice regarding what the committee had found out about Donald Trump’s actions.

More succinctly, actor and activist George Takei tweeted: “Liz Cheney has come bearing the receipts.”

Tweeting soon after the panel’s hearing on Thursday, Jason Miller said January 6 committee vice chair Liz Cheney “failed to play” the full recording, claiming the testimony was edited.

Legal experts have praised the January 6 committee’s decision to include part of former first daughter Ivanka Trump’s testimony in the first public hearing.

Former federal prosecutor Kimberly Wehle noted that Ms Trump saying she accepted Bill Barr’s conclusion that there was no election fraud translates as the committee “making its case using Trump loyalists”.

Fellow former federal prosecutor Shanlon Wu noted: “The focus on Trump & evidence of Trump’s inner circle – including his daughter – rejecting Trump’s lie about the non-existent fraud makes explicit the choice that Republican members of Congress are now making to support the Trump’s plot to overthrow the country.”

Senior fellow at Brookings and CNN legal analyst Norm Eisen was more visceral: “I have been telling everyone who would listen all week long that we would hear from Ivanka early, but I didn’t think it would be this early! Committee is going right for the jugular. Good.”

Mr Trump furiously slammed former Attorney General Bill Barr on Truth Social after parts of his interview with the committee was shared with the puluc

“I had three discussions with the president that I can recall,” Mr Barr told the committee. “One was on November 23, one was on December 1 and one on December 14, and I’ve been through sort of the give and take of those discussions and in that context, I made it clear I did not agree with the idea of saying the election was stolen and putting out this stuff, which I told the president was bulls**,” he added during the prerecorded interview first shared with the public on Thursday night.

“And I didn’t want to be a part of it and that’s one of the reasons that went into me deciding to leave when I did. I observed, I think it was December 1, you know, he can’t live in a world where the incumbent administration stays in power based on its view, unsupported by specific evidence that there was fraud in the election,” he added.

“Bill Barr was a weak and frightened Attorney General who was always being ‘played’ and threatened by the Democrats and was scared stiff of being impeached,” Mr Trump wrote.

“How do you not get impeached? Do nothing, or say nothing, especially about the obviously rigged and stolen election or, to put it another way, the crime of the century! The Democrats hit pay dirt with Barr, he was stupid, ridiculously said there was no problem with the election, and they left him alone. It worked for him, but not for our Country!” Mr Trump added.

Mr Trump wrote in a second post on Mr Barr that he “was a coward who would not let his US Attorney in Philadelphia, where election fraud was rampant, to even think about looking at it … I believe that by their inaction, others were told this also!”

Donald Trump has said his daughter Ivanka had “checked out” before the 2020 election after she was used in the evidence against him during the January 6 House Committee hearing.

The House panel played parts of their interview with Mr Barr on Thursday night. Mr Barr said that Mr Trump’s false claims of fraud were “bulls***” and that he didn’t want to be “a part of it”.

Ms Trump, one of her father’s most trusted advisors, told the panel that she didn’t think the 2020 election was stolen.

She said that what Mr Barr told her about the election changed her point of view. “It affected my perspective,” she told the committee. “I respect Attorney General Barr so I accepted what he said.”

“Ivanka Trump was not involved in looking at, or studying, Election results,” Mr Trump claimed on his social media platform, Truth Social, on Friday morning. “She had long since checked out and was, in my opinion, only trying to be respectful to Bill Barr and his position as Attorney General (he sucked!).”

Rep Liz Cheney, vice-chair of the select committee investigating the 6 January attack on Congress, unleashed on her own party during the panel’s first hearing on Thursday.

“Tonight, I say this to my Republican colleagues who are defending the indefensible: There will come a day when Donald Trump is gone, but your dishonor will remain,” Ms Cheney said.

She was referring to a number of Republican lawmakers who sought pardons from President Trump over the 6 January violence.

Andrew Feinberg has more: