How to Defend Democracy After the January 6th Hearings Close

Startling testimony and powerful words have to lead to action, but so far no one has offered a plan for what to do next

The hearings of the House Select Committee on January 6th have been going great. Each session has offered a gripping narrative of the efforts of President Trump and a small army of his acolytes to corruptly hold onto power after losing the 2020 election first in the balloting and then in their court challenges to those results. Every hearing has included shocking new revelations, often from the direct testimony of members of the White House staff or other Republicans and sometimes from contemporary documents or communications discovered by the committee during its investigation. The committee’s members have each taken turns leading the questioning of witnesses, with none of the grandstanding so common to most other congressional hearings. And many have spoken eloquently about the importance of the story they are piecing together of a power-hungry president willing to knowingly bring down violence on his political enemies and those, like Vice President Pence, who wouldn’t do his bidding. Whether you’ve watched every minute live (like me) or just caught the highlights on the news or elsewhere online, you have to admit the committee has vastly…