Liz Cheney was willing to do anything to destroy Donald Trump.
She thought January 6 was going to end his political career.
Now the tables are turned and Cheney is the one who needs a lawyer.
Cassidy Hutchinson Perjury Claim and the Limo Story That Fell Apart
Cassidy Hutchinson was a 25-year-old aide to White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows when January 6 happened.
She wasn't in the Situation Room. She wasn't in the motorcade. She wasn't in any meeting where strategy was decided.
The limo story was always a lie without legs.
Hutchinson testified in June 2022 that White House deputy chief of staff Tony Ornato told her Trump erupted in the presidential SUV after learning he wouldn't be driven to the Capitol. According to Hutchinson, Trump grabbed for the steering wheel and lunged at Secret Service agent Bobby Engel with his free hand.
The problem: she wasn't in the car. She wasn't in the room. She heard it secondhand – from a man who later said that never happened.
Hutchinson became the star witness for Liz Cheney’s January 6 Committee.
Within hours of her nationally televised testimony, both the SUV driver and Engel were prepared to testify under oath that Trump never grabbed the steering wheel and never lunged at anyone.
The driver said flatly that Trump "never grabbed the steering wheel" and that he didn't see him "lunge to try to get into the front seat at all."
Rep. Barry Loudermilk's oversight subcommittee later pulled together testimony from four White House employees who were present for Trump's Ellipse speech. Not one of them backed up Hutchinson's account.
Four witnesses. Zero corroboration. And Liz Cheney put the story on national television anyway.
How Liz Cheney Built the January 6 Witness Behind Closed Doors
Hutchinson didn't walk into the J6 committee with this story. She was recruited.
The whole thing ran through back channels Cheney controlled. She used former Trump communications director Alyssa Farah Griffin as the go-between, arranging contact with Hutchinson while Hutchinson was still represented by her own attorney – and while she was still a subject of the committee's investigation.
Texts obtained by the House Administration's Subcommittee on Oversight show Griffin acknowledged the ethical problem in writing. Cheney "can't really ethically talk to you without him" – meaning without Hutchinson's attorney, Stefan Passantino, present.
Cheney did it anyway, communicating with Hutchinson directly on the encrypted app Signal for days without Passantino's knowledge.
The next move: Cheney connected Hutchinson with new attorneys from the firm Alston and Bird, provided pro bono. Hutchinson fired Passantino, took Cheney's recommended lawyers, and returned to the committee with a new round of testimony – including the steering wheel story.
America First Legal later filed a D.C. bar complaint against Cheney for violating Rule 4.2 of professional conduct, which bars an attorney from contacting a represented party without that party's lawyer present.
The complaint was filed on behalf of Passantino, whose reputation Hutchinson and Cheney methodically destroyed.
DOJ Investigation Into January 6 Testimony Now Led by Harmeet Dhillon
The DOJ's Civil Rights Division – led by Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon – opened the investigation into Hutchinson in recent weeks after receiving a criminal referral from Loudermilk's committee.
The referral accuses Hutchinson of lying to Congress about Trump's awareness of potential violence on January 6.
Todd Blanche held his first press conference since Bondi got pushed out, and somebody had to ask about the optics.
"We have thousands of ongoing investigations and prosecutions going on in this country right now," Blanche said at his first press conference since Pam Bondi's departure. "It is true that some of them involve men, women and entities that the president in the past has had issues with and believes should be investigated. That is his right and indeed it is his duty."
Cheney – a sitting member of Congress and a licensed attorney – secretly recruited a witness, helped fire that witness's existing lawyer, installed her own approved counsel, and put the witness on national television to testify to a story the people actually in the car denied under oath.
Jack Smith reviewed Hutchinson's account and concluded her stories were largely secondhand hearsay – inadmissible in court – and that investigators found direct conflicts between what she said and what other witnesses described. He never charged anyone based on her testimony.
Cheney put it on national television in primetime and never looked back.
That investigation now sits in Harmeet Dhillon's hands. She's the same lawyer who called Cheney's secret texts "a very serious ethical violation" in 2024.
Cheney wanted a witness. She got one. Now that witness is under federal investigation – and so is everything Cheney did to put her there.
Sources:
- Alan Feuer and Michael Schmidt, "Justice Dept. Opens Inquiry Into Jan. 6 Witness Cassidy Hutchinson," The New York Times, April 8, 2026.
- Bob Hoge, "Report: DOJ Investigating J6 Committee 'Star Witness' for Perjury," RedState, April 8, 2026.
- "New Texts Reveal Liz Cheney Communicated with Cassidy Hutchinson About Her Select Committee Testimony – Without Hutchinson's Attorney's Knowledge," House Committee on Administration, October 2024.
- Ali Swenson and Farnoush Amiri, "Trump's Driver Contradicts Cassidy Hutchinson About Jan. 6 SUV Altercation, GOP Report Says," ABC News, March 18, 2024.
- "America First Legal Files Bar Complaint Against Former Congresswoman Liz Cheney," America First Legal, October 2024.
- "Jan. 6 Committee Witness Cassidy Hutchinson Under DOJ Civil Rights Investigation," Washington Examiner, April 8, 2026.
