As members of the official bipartisan task force investigating the assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump met in Butler, Pennsylvania, on Monday, a small group of conservative lawmakers sat down with Dan Bongino, a right-wing talk show host and former Secret Service agent, for what they billed as part of their own probe into the shooting.
Kicking off their separate, partisan review of the assassination attempt, the unofficial group met at the Heritage Foundation headquarters to record a live podcast aired on Rumble and host an expert testimony panel styled like a congressional hearing (during which Bongino also joined as an expert).
“You take the risk to come and testify before Congress like this,” Rep. Eli Crane said to the panelists, which included Blackwater founder Erik Prince and Ben Shaffer, a police SWAT officer who was at the July 13 assassination attempt, sitting in a room a few blocks away from the actual Capitol.