Grand Jury Declines to Indict Cassidy Hutchinson for Her J6 Testimony

A grand jury has declined to indict former White House staffer Cassidy Hutchinson for her testimony about President Donald Trump’s alleged conduct during the January 6 riot on Capitol Hill in 2021.

The Justice Department sought to prosecute Hutchinson for reasons that have not yet been made clear due to the confidentiality of the case, but President Trump and Republicans had previously accused her of lying under oath during her testimony about January 6 before the House committee. Sources close to the case confirmed to the Associated Press (AP) that the grand jury declined to prosecute while providing few details:

A grand jury in Washington rejected prosecutors’ request to return an indictment against Cassidy Hutchinson, said the people, who spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the case. Details of prosecutors’ allegations against Hutchinson were not immediately clear, but Republican lawmakers had accused her of lying under oath in her explosive testimony in 2022 about Trump’s behavior on Jan. 6. She described an angry, defiant president who was trying to let armed protesters avoid security screenings at a rally that morning to protest his 2020 election defeat and who later grabbed at the steering wheel of the presidential SUV when the Secret Service refused to let him go to the Capitol. And when the events at the Capitol spiraled toward violence, with the crowd chanting “Hang Mike Pence,” she testified that Trump declined to intervene.

Hutchinson did, however, admit during her testimony that she was only relaying information she had obtained from a White House security official, emphasizing that she was not a personal eyewitness.

Trump had called Hutchinson a “total phony” and “bad news,” denying her allegations.

In 2024, House Republicans also released a transcript of the January 6 Committee’s interview with the Secret Service officer who drove the presidential SUV, which contradicted some of Hutchinson’s claims. While the driver did say that President Trump was insistent about going to the Capitol during the riot, he rejected the claim that the president tried to grab the steering wheel.

“I didn’t see him, you know, lunge to try to get into the front seat at all,” the driver said.

According to Fox News, the federal grand jury “had heard evidence concerning possible false statements Hutchinson made to the congressional committee.”

“The grand jury’s decision not to indict Hutchinson does not establish whether her congressional testimony was truthful or false. Hutchinson has previously maintained that she stands by her testimony,” it added.