
The Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol has rescheduled its next hearing for 1 p.m. ET on Oct. 13 and look for news nets to provide extensive coverage if NBC is any indication. NBC Nightly News anchor Lester Holt will anchor the broadcast coverage, which will also stream on NBC News Now. Coverage will actually begin on the streaming platform at 12:30, in advance of the hearing, again with Holt.

The House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol tweeted that it will hold its next hearing at 1 p.m. ET Wednesday, Sept. 28. It will be the panel’s first hearing since the FBI searched Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence on Aug. 8.

Many of Donald Trump’s allies in the media believe the reports about violence and criminal conduct committed by Trump supporters have been exaggerated. Even as the Jan. 6 committee’s vivid depiction of Trump’s failure to intervene led two influential outlets on the right, The New York Post and The Wall Street Journal, to denounce him over the weekend, many top conservative media personalities have continued to push a more sanitized narrative of Jan. 6, 2021.
The Jan. 6 Hearings Did A Great Service, By Making Great TV

Investigating a threat to democracy was always going to be important. But this time, it also managed to be buzzworthy.

ABC, as it did in early June, led the primetime Thursday coverage of the House Select Committee’s latest public hearing on the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. ABC’s two-hour coverage averaged 3.6 million total viewers (per early numbers), compared to CBS’s 2.6 million and NBC’s 2.5 million.

The top-rated news network, Fox News Channel, stuck with its own lineup of commentators. Sean Hannity denounced the “show trial” elsewhere on TV just as he was featured in it, with the House’s Jan. 6 committee examining his tweets to Trump administration figures.

The next Jan. 6 hearings will take place on Thursday at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT, which means they will be replacing several networks’ planned scheduling, including Thursday’s eviction from Big Brother on CBS. CBS Evening News will air a live special report on Thursday. That bumps the Big Brother eviction to Friday at 8 p.m. ET for a one-time pairing with the Season 2 premiere of the Paramount+ series Blood & Treasure at 9, followed by a repeat of Blue Bloods at 10.

An Atlanta newspaper has been issued a subpoena by the special grand jury investigating possible criminal activity of former President Trump and his allies following the 2020 election. The Fulton County grand jury is looking to obtain the full audio recording of a leaked Jan. 11, 2021, conference call involving former U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia Bobby Christine, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. The AJC reported on the call in question at the time.

The Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol said Tuesday that its next televised hearing will be Tuesday, July 12, starting at 10 a.m. ET/7 a.m. PT.

The House committee is laying out the facts in a way optimally designed to cultivate trust.

NEW YORK (AP) — Fox News Channel is airing the Jan. 6 committee hearings when they occur in daytime hours and a striking number of the network’s viewers have made clear they’d rather be doing something else. During two daytime hearings last week, Fox averaged 727,000 viewers, the Nielsen company said. That compares to the […]
The Jan. 6 Committee Produces A Very Special Episode

At a surprise appearance, former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson tells a jaw-dropping story of broken dishes and fragile democracy.

The broadcast networks were shifting gears into committee coverage mode after the House Jan. 6 select committee investigating the attack on the Capitol announced a surprise June 28 hearing, reportedly due to some new evidence that has turned up. The hearing is scheduled to begin at 1 p.m., but the committee did not say who, if anyone, will be testifying.

The five sessions have revealed a storyteller’s eye, with focus, clarity, an understanding of how news is digested in modern media, and strong character development — even if former President Donald Trump’s allies suggest there aren’t enough actors. The hearings are pausing for a break until next month, leaving Americans much to digest.

The panel probing the Capitol attack is trying to turn its investigative grind into must-see television. Above, James Goldston, former president of ABC News, is helping the committee on its televised hearings. (Andrew Harnik/Associated Press)
The Jan. 6 Hearings And The Spectacle Of Competence

The televised hearings have offered a rare glimpse at a version of Congress we want to see that may soon disappear.
House Select Committee Is Giving Jan. 6 The ‘60 Minutes’ Treatment

Turns out the best way to conduct a congressional hearing is to treat it like a story on 60 Minutes. The House Jan. 6 Select Committee is in the middle of rewriting an old political script, dispensing with some well-worn rituals that seem frozen in time. Those have been replaced in these hearings with something that looks more like a fast-moving segment of investigative television — strong emotions, urgent soundbites, and a clear portrayal of good guys vs. bad guys.

Public television built its reputation for news on the Watergate hearings. But on many PBS stations, the hearings are losing out to the likes of Daniel Tiger and Curious George, being consigned to second-class status, airing them only on secondary digital channels instead of their better-known and more widely accessible flagship channels.
Chris Stirewalt Lost His Job At Fox News. But He Knows He Was Right
The politics editor behind the Arizona call in 2020 that enraged Trump brought his journalism bona fides to the House Jan 6. hearing.

At Fox News, there was little drama over the decision to project Joseph R. Biden the winner of Arizona. But the relationship between Trump and the network was never the same.

Those tuning in on Fox’s coverage of Monday’s hearing experienced a somewhat awkward moment as the focus turned to the network itself and the testimony of a former politics editor there, Chris Stirewalt, who helped with coverage of the 2020 election.


A little more than 20 million people watched the televised hearings of the House of Representatives’ January 6 committee Thursday night. ABC and MSNBC drew the biggest audiences for the two-hour hearings about the storming of the Capitol last year. They were televised live across a dozen cable and broadcast outlets. Fox News, which pointedly did not offer full coverage of the hearings, drew an audience in line with its recent average from 8 to 10 p.m. ET, while MSNBC and CNN came in well above their usual ratings.

“So many bombshell scoops,” said CNN’s Jake Tapper about the committee’s revelations. “Absolutely nothing new, multi-hour Democratic fundraiser,” said Fox’s Sean Hannity.
A Harrowing American Moment, Repackaged For Primetime

Presented in primetime and carefully calibrated for a TV-viewing audience (itself increasingly an anachronism), the debut of the Jan. 6 hearings was, in essence, a summer rerun. Designed as a riveting legislative docudrama about an event that most of the country saw live 18 months ago, it tried mightily to break new narrative ground in a nation of short attention spans and endless distractions.

In a letter to the Fox News personality, Mississippi Rep. Bennie Thompson, Democratic chairman of the House panel investigating the Capitol insurrection, said the panel wants to question him regarding his communications with former President Donald Trump, former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and others in Trump’s orbit in the days surrounding the evemt.