UPDATE: Battle over executive privilege following conflicting Trump reports

Sen. Dick Durbin: “This report, which we have brought to the attention of the public, as well as members of the (Senate Judiciary) Committee, obviously, went into detail as to what happened during that two-week period of time. It was an incredible moment, which most Americans didn’t even know was going on. We were a half-step away from a full-blown constitutional crisis.”

“The net result of it was a fateful day — I believe it was January 3rd of this year — when the President called (acting Attorney General Jeffrey) Rosen, (acting Deputy Attorney General Richard) O’Donohue, (Assistant Attorney General Jeffrey) Clark to the White House to pursue his effort to replace Rosen with Clark, a more complicit person in the process.

At that moment, two things happened which were significant: the White House counsel, Pat Cipollone, dissented from the President’s position and said it was a ‘murder – suicide pact’ for him to engage in this.

Secondly, at that point, the eight leading officials in the Department of Justice all signed a letter, saying that they would resign en masse if there was a replacement of the Acting Attorney General by Mr. Clark.

The president hesitated and decided, at the very last minute, not to pursue that course: not to replace him.

That was significant, I’ll tell you, because, had it happened otherwise, it would have been a possibility that there would have been a contest on the election results.”

“What followed? We know what followed.

In a matter of three days, this President–, former President, desperate in his situation, having failed in every court case, having failed to take over the Department of Justice, decided to take his cause to the streets.

We saw it in the United States Capitol three days later on January 6th.

The President turned loose a mob, a mob that was supposed to stop us from counting the electoral votes and electoral ballots.

Now, most people say, ‘Well, we’ve heard most of this story before; so what’s the point of it?’

The point of it is that we were so close to a constitutional crisis at that moment, that it bears continued investigation and disclosure so the American people know that we should never be complacent when it comes to our rights as citizens and to our responsibilities to our constitution.

This President–, former President Trump would have shredded the Constitution to keep his office and the presidency.”