Former SecDef lays to waste Cheney’s claim Trump did not offer to call up National Guard before Jan. 6

Liz Cheney asserts former President Trump is lying about offering to call up 20,000 National Guardsmen two days before the Jan. 6 riot but comments by former Secretary of Defense Chris Miller and his Chief of Staff Kash Patel claim otherwise.

The Wyoming representative told Fox News host Bret Baier that former Defense Secretary Chris Miller rejected Trump’s claim that he offered to call up the Guard and said he never requested the additional National Guard be deployed to protect the Capitol.

(Video Credit: Fox News)

“Several witnesses who say they met with President Trump on Jan. 4th and he offered some 20,000 National Guardsmen to protect the Capitol building on Jan. 6th but the offer was rejected. Is that true? Do you know that to be true?” Baier asked Cheney.

“Well, his own acting secretary of defense says that’s not true. Chris Miller has testified publicly that Donald Trump never issued any order to deploy the Guard, to protect the Capitol. And so I would point people to his own secretary of defense’s public testimony,” Cheney answered.

However, in an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity, Miller and Patel appear to tell a very different version of that story. Both men attended the Jan. 4th White House meeting and both stated on video that Trump requested 20,000 National Guard troops for January 6th. His offer of having the National Guard present for the rally that day was reportedly rejected.

“So, the four of you that I’ve had an opportunity to interview now confirm that on Jan. 4, in the Oval Office, that you heard Donald Trump authorize up to 20,000 troops, Kash Patel, two days before Jan. 6 even happened. Tell us about that meeting,” Hannity said to Patel.

“It’s not one of those meetings you forget. The Secretary of Defense Chris Miller, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley, the Chief of Staff to the President of the United States Mark Meadows, and the President of the United States himself in the Oval Office talk about some of the most serious national security threats we were facing and then we pivoted to setting up for Jan. 6th. Mr. Trump unequivocally authorized up to 20,000 National Guardsmen and women for us to utilize should the second part of the law, the requests comes in. But as you highlighted, those requests did not come in,” Patel commented.

“Let me be clear. Both of you said this under oath, under threat, the penalty of perjury?” Hannity asked.

“Absolutely, Sean. And to be clear, Kash brought it up best. The meeting was one of the most serious, kind of heavy meetings I’ve been in. And it was about a foreign threat that was directed toward the United States which obviously we can’t talk about for fear of ending up in jail. I kind of want to be clear. The president as we’re leaving says ‘Hey, one more thing…’ and we all sat back down and we discussed what was going on for Jan. 6th,” he recounted.

“Cause I think that’s important to bring up so the opposition doesn’t get this idea that this was the purpose of the meeting. The president was doing exactly what I expect a command in chief to do, any commander in chief to do. He was looking at the broad threat against the United States and he brought this up on his own. We did not bring it up,” Miller remarked.

Cheney also said that it was former Vice President Mike Pence who called for the military to defend the U.S. Capitol during the riot, not Trump, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The former president “placed no call to any element of the U.S. government to instruct that the Capitol be defended,” Cheney claimed.

She said that Trump did not call Secretary of Defense Chris Miller on Jan. 6, or speak to his attorney general or the Department of Homeland Security.

“Trump gave no order to deploy the National Guard that day, and made no effort to work with the Department of Justice to coordinate and deploy law enforcement assets,” she stated. “But Mike Pence did each of those things.”

She went on to quote testimony from Gen. Mark Milley, who was the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the time. He testified that he got multiple calls from Pence on Jan. 6.

“He was very animated, and he issued very explicit, very direct unambiguous orders. There was no question about that. And I can get you the exact quotes,” Milley said. “But he was very animated, very direct, very firm to Sec. Miller. Get the military down here, get the guard down here. Put down this situation, et cetera.”

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