EXCLUSIVE Kash Patel claims he was smeared by the January 6 committee for backing Trump's claims he deployed the National Guard
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13215711/kash-patel-donald-trump-national-guard-capitol-riot.html
Kash Patel has faced a years-long smear campaign aimed at discrediting his testimony to the Select Committee investigating January 6 that he claims proves Donald Trump did not engage in insurrection.
Central to the panel's argument that Trump incited the Capitol riot and is an 'insurrectionist' is their finding that he did not 'deploy' the National Guard to Washington, D.C. as his supporters descended on the Capitol.
But Patel testified, and reiterated to DailyMail.com in an interview, that Trump did verbally authorize National Guard deployment during an Oval Office meeting on January 3, 2021 – three days before the now infamous riot.
The Trump advisor and former National Security Council official was in the meeting where he claims Trump gave his approval for Defense officials to communicate to Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and then-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi that they were authorized to deploy the National Guard to the District and the U.S. Capitol building amid threats of violence that day.
Anthony Ornato, who was in charge of chief executive's Secret Service security detail from January 2019 until Trump left office, said that the president was 'willing to ask for 10,000' National Guard troops for deployment to Washington, D.C. on January 6.
'I remember the number 10,000 coming up of, you know, 'The president wants to make sure that you have enough,' Ornato testified to the committee in a transcript unearthed this month by the Republicans reviewing the January 6 Committee's investigation. The Select Committee on the January 6 Capitol Attack did all they could to discredit Patels' testimony and label him a Trump lackey who would say anything to protect the former president, the former national security official claimed.
The disregard for Patel's testimony in the congressional probe was used as a way for a Colorado court to also claim Patel was not provide credible testimony in the case trying to remove the former president from the state's ballot for allegedly participating in an insurrection.
'The Court finds that Mr. Patel was not a credible witness,' a finding reads from the November 2023 ruling by Colorado Judge Sarah Wallace. 'His testimony regarding Trump authorizing 10,000-20,000 National Guardsmen is not only illogically… but completely devoid if any evidence in the record.'
Ornato said, according to the newly released testimony, that Bowser declined the offer for troops, claiming she had enough help with National Guard members mobilized to act in a limited capacity under Metro Police Department direction. The testimony from Ornato was first reported by The Federalist's Mollie Hemingway and was later released in full by House Administration's Subcommittee on Oversight Chairman Rep. Barry Loudermilk earlier this month.
Bowser wrote a letter to Trump's Pentagon officials on January 5, 2021 denying the offer of additional National Guardsmen outside of the 'unarmed members of the DC National Guard' she brought in to act as glorified traffic cops to give support with 'traffic control and crowd management.'
U.S. Capitol Police, who report to the Speaker of the House, also denied the offer for troops.
'The whole point is it defeats their insurrection claim,' Patel said. 'If Trump did not authorize the National Guard before Jan. 6, then how is it factually possible for Bowser and Pelosi to have rejected it, in writing. It's impossible.'
'So, they lose the narrative in the public sphere. Now, they're losing it in the courts with all the litigation,' he added.