Cipollone decried overturning elections. Now he testifies on Trump’s effort.

Hutchinson’s testimony has also spurred a new round of this guessing game when it comes to former White House counsel Pat Cipollone. Hutchinson said Cipollone had warned in advance that Trump’s Jan. 6 strategy could lead to criminal charges — a claim that, if confirmed, could be instrumental in proving Trump corruptly sought to overturn the election. Cipollone has now reached an agreement with the committee to testify behind closed doors and on camera on Friday.

We shouldn’t expect Cipollone to emerge as a similarly explosive and willing whistleblower for a couple reasons. One is because of his reluctance to testify and his emphasis on executive privilege, and two is because of his previously full-throated defense of Trump at Trump’s first impeachment trial.

But that latter instance does suggest Cipollone could be a significant witness for one main and somewhat ironic reason: He professed to be aghast at efforts to overturn an American election.

Cipollone was a relatively unknown quantity, even in Washington, until October 2019. That’s when he stepped forward as perhaps Trump’s most significant defender in his first impeachment. Cipollone sent a thoroughly Trumpian letter to House investigators serving notice that the White House would not cooperate in any way with their inquiry on Trump’s actions vis-a-vis Ukraine. And in the course of doing so, he echoed Trump’s talking point that the effort was somehow meant to overturn the 2016 election.

“Never before in our history has the House of Representatives — under the control of either political party — taken the American people down the dangerous path you seem determined to pursue,” Cipollone wrote. “Put simply, you seek to overturn the results of the 2016 election and deprive the American people of the president they have freely chosen.”

When Cipollone later defended Trump at the ensuing impeachment trial, he made this the overriding feature of his defense.

“They’re asking you not only to overturn the results of the last election, but as I’ve said before, they’re asking you to remove President Trump from the ballot in an election that’s occurring in approximately nine months,” Cipollone said in his opening statement. “They’re asking you to tear up all of the ballots across this country on your own initiative — take that decision away from the American people.”

He added: “And I don’t think they spent one minute of their 24 hours talking to you about the consequences of that for our country. Not one minute.”

In his closing arguments, he repeatedly returned to the idea that this was subverting the will of the voters, and that it was a very bad thing. Several of his comments now take on particular significance in light of Trump’s push to overturn the 2020 election (emphasis ours):

• “What they are asking you to do is to throw out a successful president on the eve of an election with no basis and in violation of the Constitution. It would dangerously change our country and weaken forever all of our democratic institutions. You all know that’s not in the interest of the American people. Why not trust the American people with this decision? Why tear up their ballots? Why tear up every ballot across this country? You can’t do that. You know you can’t do that.”
• “So I ask you … most importantly to respect and defend the sacred right of every American to vote and to choose their president.”
• “Overturning the last election and massively interfering with the upcoming one would cause serious and lasting damage to the people of the United States and to our very country. The Senate cannot allow this to happen. It is time for this to end here and now.”

Cipollone punctuated his argument by saying, at another point, “They’re not here to steal one election; they’re here to steal two elections.” He urged Democrats to “end this ridiculous charade” so “we can go have an election” and slammed his folder shut.

It would be one thing if Cipollone was a Trump true believer who might believe that the former president did ultimately have the 2020 election stolen from him via a different method, as Trump has falsely claimed. But the evidence is that Cipollone — like virtually every other serious-minded, discerning person around Trump — didn’t subscribe to Trump’s bogus claims.

He stood with others in thwarting Trump’s plan to install Jeffrey Clark as acting attorney general, labeling Clark’s draft letter backing up Trump’s claims a “murder-suicide pact,” according to two witnesses. Hutchinson has also testified that Cipollone determined Trump’s plot to use alternate electors on Jan. 6 was not “legally sound.” And then-Attorney General William P. Barr had placed Cipollone in meetings in which those serious-minded people tried to talk Trump out of his claims.

Cipollone also notably declined to again defend Trump at his second impeachment after Jan. 6 because, as The Washington Post reported, he wanted no part of Trump’s legal strategy, which included trying to validate his fraud claims.

Cipollone was acting as an advocate at Trump’s first impeachment, meaning his high-minded invocations of the democratic dangers of trying to overturn an election might have merely reflected the company line. But what we know about his behind-closed-doors actions suggest that posture might come into play in what he reveals to the Jan. 6 committee.

Barr has already proved a significant witness because of his own misgivings and willingness to testify about them. But unlike Barr, who resigned in late December 2020, Cipollone was still around for many of the key, late events. And his willingness to shed light upon them could turn the guy whose big entry into the public’s consciousness was to defend Trump to the hilt into very significant witness against Trump.