Cassidy Hutchinson calls Trump ‘dangerous’ and ‘un-American’ and describes fleeing DC after testimony
Cassidy Hutchsinson, former Trump administration aide turned key whistleblower in the January 6 investigation, had to flee Washington after her testimony against the former president and his allies, she claimed.
Ms Hutchinson, author of a forthcoming memoir about her time in the Trump administration, told CBS News in an interview that will air on Sunday that her lawyers advised her to get out of the US capital.
"I could not go back to my apartment," Ms Hutchinson told CBS News. "I ended up moving down to Atlanta for several months."
Ms Hutchinson, a former advisor to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, said that she remains a Republican but will no longer be supporting Mr Trump.
"I would … like to make clear. I would not back the former president of the United States," she said. "He is dangerous for the country. He is willing and has showed, time and time again, willingness to proliferate lies to vulnerable American people so he could stay in power. … To me, that is the most un-American thing that you can do."
Her book, titled Enough, is set to be released at the end of September, and contains other shocking and embarrassing revelations.
The former aide writes that Mr Trump allegedly refused to wear a mask - even during the earliest days of the Covid pandemic - because his orange bronzer would leave embarassing stains on the straps.
“The press would criticise him for not wearing a mask,” Ms Hutchinson wrote, “not knowing that the depth of his vanity had caused him to reject masks – and then millions of his fans followed suit.”
Ms Hutchinson also alleges that she was sexually assaulted by attorney Rudy Giuliani on January 6 as other Trump advisors watched.
“I feel [Mr Giuliani’s] frozen fingers trail up my thigh,” she wrote. “He tilts his chin up. The whites of his eyes look jaundiced. My eyes dart to John Eastman, who flashes a leering grin.”
Mr Giuliani and Mr Eastman have denied that the incident took place.
“It’s fair to ask Cassidy Hutchinson why she is just now coming out with these allegations from two and a half years ago, as part of the marketing campaign for her upcoming book release,” Ted Goodman, a political adviser to Mr Giuliani, told The Independent in a statement.
“This is a disgusting lie against Mayor Rudy Giuliani—a man whose distinguished career in public service includes taking down the Mafia, cleaning up New York City and comforting the nation following September 11th.”
Ms Hutchinson, once an obscure White House figure, emerged during the January 6 investigation as a key source of damaging testimony about the former president’s conduct at the time of the insurrection.
In a televised hearing last year, Ms Hutchinson made a slew of allegations before Congress. She claimed that Trump allies had sought pardons and that Mr Meadows had burned documents.
She also said that Mr Trump had lunged for the wheel of a Secret Service vehicle when agents refused to take him to the US Capitol, and that the former president claimed to be unworried about armed protesters in Washington because they weren’t there to hurt him.
She also alleged that Mr Trump had hurled a plate of food against a wall when he learned that William Barr, the former Attorney General, announced he hadn’t found any instances of election fraud.
“The woman is living in fantasy land,” Mr Trump said of Ms Hutchinson’s sworn testimony. “She’s a social climber, if you call that social. I think it’s just a shame that this is happening to our country.”