Newly revealed audio recordings confirmed House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy planned to tell former President Donald Trump to resign after the 2021 Capitol riots – hours after he called the claim “totally false.”
McCarthy had told fellow members of the GOP of his displeasure with Trump in the days following the Jan. 6 siege on the Capitol by a pro-Trump crowd that disrupted Congress’ certification of Joe Biden’s win in the 2020 presidential race, the New York Times reported Thursday.
But a spokesman for the Republican leader flatly denied that McCarthy had planned to call Trump to tell him to resign. Then McCarthy himself tweeted to say an article on the topic was “totally false and wrong.”
The Times report was adapted from “This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden and the Battle for America’s Future,” the forthcoming book by Times writers Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns.
On Thursday night, The Times then released an audio clip backing up the reporting, which also aired on MSNBC’s “The Rachel Maddow Show.”
In one clip that aired on the show, McCarthy is heard discussing with Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming and other Republicans the likelihood of an impeachment effort getting through Congress. McCarthy tells those on the call he plans to speak with Trump.
“It would be my recommendation you should resign,” McCarthy planned on telling Trump. Mikhail Palinchak / SOPA Images/“Now, this is one personal fear I have,” the minority leader says. “I do not want to get into any conversation about Pence pardoning.”
“Again, the only discussions I would have him is that I think this will pass, and it would be my recommendation you should resign,” he goes on. “I mean that would be my take, but I don’t think he would take it – but I don’t know.”
He then reiterates that Trump likely wouldn’t heed that advice.
McCarthy denied his plans to tell Trump to resign, calling the claims “totally false and wrong.” AP/Jose Luis Magana“From what I know of him, I mean you guys all know him too – do you think he’d ever back away?” McCarthy says. “But what I think I’m going to do is I’m going to call him.”
In a separate call, McCarthy called Trump’s conduct on Jan. 6 “atrocious and totally wrong,” adding that the then-president “incited people,” the Times reported. The former president’s comments at the infamous “Stop the Steal” rally ahead of the siege were “not right by any shape or form,” McCarthy said, according to the times.
The California Republican also said “I’ve had it with guy,” the new book said.
