I always knew former President Donald J. Trump would be done in by a woman, but I never imagined it would be this woman and in this way.
I always thought the Trumpian comeuppance would come at the skillful hands of the estimable Stormy Daniels or the equally estimable House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, skilled in a different way but with the same results.
But there she is. No, not Miss America but Ms. America, Cassidy Hutchinson — earnest, principled, detail-minded, determined and crisply attired in summer-ready black and white, looking for all the world like something out of a John Grisham movie. (Back in the day, she would’ve been played by Julia Roberts. Today, she’d probably be played by Dakota Johnson.)
Aide to the last of the revolving door cast of Trump’s chiefs of staff, the alliterative Mark Meadows, Hutchinson testified Tuesday, June 28, before the United States House Select Committee on the January 6 Attacks, painting the picture of a megalomaniacal commander in chief who knew the protestors were carrying weapons but didn’t care because they wouldn’t hurt him; wanted the metal detectors removed because they were crowding out the crowd for his speech; and was so determined to join his followers at The Capitol that he tried to seize control of the steering wheel of the Chevy Suburban he was riding in from Secret Service agent Robert Engel, who insisted they return to the White House. When Engel, the special agent in charge on Jan. 6, grasped the then-president’s arm, Trump used his free hand to grab Engel by the clavicle, or collar bone. Historians like to say that had Cleopatra had a shorter nose, the fate of Egypt and long nose-loving Rome might’ve been very different. Had Trump’s reportedly tiny hands been bigger or his fingers longer, the fate of our republic on Jan. 6 might’ve been very different.
Critics will tell you that much of what Hutchinson said was stuff she overheard or was told — hearsay, which is inadmissible in a court of law, which the Jan. 6 hearings are not. There are also reports that the Secret Service will refute Suburban-gate even though Hutchinson testified that she learned of the incident in part from Engel. But say this: The woman knows the difference between a throat and a clavicle. And right now she’s got Trump by both.
In true Trumpian fashion, former El Presidente went on the attack, playing the woman scorned card in which he revealed that even though he didn’t know Hutchinson, he nonetheless knew her well enough to say that she had been refused a job at Mar-a-Lago, the San Simeon of our story. Yes, because everyone who has worked for a boss who throws his lunch at the wall wants to continue that relationship in his or her next job search.
I must admit that I have been feeling pretty low and embittered about our current anti-woman moment. But when I saw that a woman had delivered a decisive blow in this seditious farce, I burst into peals of joy. Hutchinson is the John Dean of the Jan. 6 narrative — a comparison that led the actual Dean to comment that if that is the case, she’s facing some rough days of character assassination. (Let’s hope that’s all she’s in for, although that will be bad enough.
Posters have been reaching for their copies of ancient Greek tragedies and the Hebrew Bible for comparisons. But I don’t see many similarities with those heroines, who are usually older and widowed. Rather Hutchinson reminds me of many of the young women you see in the workforce — young, attractive, self-effacing individuals who are hired for assistant jobs by older men who view them as so much arresting wallpaper, around which they can think out loud (and fantasize about in private). It never occurs to these men that what makes these young women good at their jobs — quiet efficiency, attention to the fine points, traditional female stuff — is what might make them star witnesses should the need arise.
Yet will it matter? It would be tricky to prosecute a former president, George Mason University law professor Jamil Jaffir, a former associate counsel to President George W. Bush, told “PBS NewsHour” anchor and managing editor Judy Woodruff. The court of opinion is another matter, he said:
“At the end of the day, she was in fact witness to a lot of what happened. She saw what happened. She heard the president speak. At the end of the day, there are going to be other witnesses called. Unless they refute what Cassidy Hutchinson said, I think the story sticks. And it's a real, real problem for the (former) president and any Republicans who seek to back (him) in any further election or the like.”
You can imagine that former Vice President Mike Pence, whom Trump was willing to see hanged for not decertifying Joe Biden’s presidential win, and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis would love to see the back of Trump so they can run for president. It’s possible that Trump’s ego could split the Republican Party, guaranteeing a Democratic win.
What could be actionable, Jaffir said were all those Trump minions reaching out to potential witnesses and reminding them of their loyalty.
“I mean, this is something you would see literally in ‘Goodfellas’ or ‘Casino.’ It's straight out of a mafia don movie. And that actually may be actionable, right, maybe not the actions of the president, but potentially the actions of his aides who said these things, and maybe all the way up to the president, just like you would work up to a mafia boss.”
Hutchinson may not have had the power of a mob boss or her bosses — thought let’s not forget that Hutchinson had some influence as an aide who moved fluidly from the White House to Capitol Hill. Yet it was her very seeming inconsequentiality that made her a significant witness. People don’t understand the relationship between power and freedom. They think power gives you freedom. But instead the more powerful you are, the less free you are, because you must always be about maintaining your power and in fear of losing it.
Hutchinson’s relative lack of power gave her the freedom to testify.