House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., claims that he does not remember speaking to former White House staffer Cassidy Hutchinson on Jan. 6, 2021 about then-President Donald Trump going to the Capitol.
"I don't recall talking to her that day," McCarthy said during a press conference on Friday. "If I talked to her, I don't remember it. If it was coming up here, I don't think I wanted a lot of people coming up to the Capitol. But I don't remember the conversation," McCarthy said.
He added that he did remember conversations with the former White House deputy chief of staff, Dan Scavino, and Trump's son-in-law and former White House adviser Jared Kushner, as well as Trump himself, on Jan. 6 as the breach of the Capitol building was unfolding.
An aide to former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, Hutchinson testified under oath in a Jan. 6 committee hearing last month that McCarthy called her after Trump gave a speech at the Ellipse, encouraging his supporters to march to the Capitol, and said he would go with them.
"You told me this whole week you aren't coming up here, why would you lie to me?" Hutchinson claims McCarthy said, according to the Independent.
After she responded that Trump was not going to the Capitol, Hutchinson said McCarthy replied, "Well, he just said it on stage, Cassidy. Figure it out."
During his press conference Friday, McCarthy said he does not remember being especially concerned about Trump coming to the Capitol.
"I didn't watch it, so this is what is so confusing," McCarthy said of the former president's Ellipse speech. "I didn't watch the speech. I was working. So I didn't see what was said, I didn't see what went on, until after the fact."
"I had no idea he would come to the Capitol. I had no idea that he was even going to come to the Capitol," he added.
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