- Eric Herschmann said he brutally mocked a plan to use the DOJ to provide cover to Trump's baseless claims.
- The White House lawyer said he told a Trump loyalist that his plan was illegal and he would be "committing a felony."
- Herschmann's testimony to the January 6 committee has been a key part of public hearings.
Former White House attorney Eric Herschmann told the House January 6 committee that he brutally mocked a plan from a Trump loyalist to hijack control of the Justice Department in a last-ditch effort to overturn the 2020 election.
"And when he finished discussing what he planned on doing, I said, 'good, fucking, excuse me, f-ing, a-hole, congratulations you just admitted that your first step or act you would take as attorney general would be committing a felony and violating rule 6c," Herschmann told the panel, per an excerpt of his previously private deposition that was released on Thursday.
Herschmann, who has garnered a reputation for his blunt testimony, added that sarcastically offered his congratulations to Jeffrey Clark, a Trump loyalist working at the DOJ, who was pitching Trump on a plan to take control of the department.
"'You are clearly the right candidate for this job,'" Herschmann said he told Clark, adding later that the plan was simply "asinine."
Thursday's January 6 committee hearing is focused on Clark's plan that would see him installed as the nation's top law enforcement official. Once in power, Clark, as acting attorney general, would then write letters to Georgia and other state officials telling them that the department had found evidence to support Trump's baseless claims of voter fraud. According to Rep. Liz Cheney, the top Republican on the committee, then-acting Deputy Attorney General Rich Donoghue, no such evidence existed.
Instead, Clark's draft letter was seen as an effort to give federal cover to those who wanted to cast doubt on the 2020 election. In the ensuing chaos, Trump could have found a way to cling to power.
"What was his only qualification?" Rep. Adam Kinzinger, an Illinois Republican, said of Clark during the hearing, "that he would do whatever the president wanted him to do — that he would overturn a free and fair election."