Conservative media figures have been working overtime to discredit the bombshell testimony of Cassidy Hutchinson, the former aide of Mark Meadows who told the House Jan. 6 Committee on Tuesday of a number of damning episodes in former President Donald Trump’s last days in office.
On Wednesday, Newsmax even resorted to seeking out the input of body language expert Gregory Hartley, who remarked that one aspect of Hutchinson’s manner of speaking was “concerning” to him, while another was a “red flag.”
Hartley was asked to react to three clips from Tuesday’s hearing. In the first, Hutchinson recalled what she had been told by a Secret Secret agent who was with Trump when he was unwillingly transported away from the Capitol on Jan. 6.
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Hartley begins by saying that Hutchinson showed a “flight or flight” response. “We expect that. She’s sitting in front of Congress. What is she, 26? I would be, too.”
Putting that aside, he continued, “When she talks about Trump, she does a very primitive thing that we all do: She pushes her tongue through her lips… Usually we see that associated with deception.”
“She also pauses after that tongue jut, before she says anything about Trump in every one of these clips. That would make me concerned. It doesn’t mean she’s lying; it means that I have concern,” Hartley said. “And again, there’s a lot more that you could go into here. There’s no passion, there’s no animation, and her mannerisms—her hands moving and illustrating—don’t match her story exactly. But it’s not her story, it’s secondhand information.”
Of the second clip, in which Hutchinson describes a note she said Meadows dictated to her, Hartley told Newsmax host Hogan Gidley he couldn’t really take away “a whole lot” from it but did comment about the positioning of her forehead.
That wasn’t the case for the third clip. In that one, Hutchinson described the aftermath of Trump throwing a plate of food against the wall in response to then-Attorney General Bill Barr telling the Associated Press in December 2020 that there was no widespread voter fraud.
Gidley, who served as Trump’s 2020 campaign press secretary, made sure to point out that his former boss denied Hutchinson’s account on Truth Social.
Turning to Hartley, Gidley then said, “So, a lot of hand movements in that one, Gregory. What’s your take on that part of the testimony?”
“Listen to the lilt all throughout the story. She’s lilting up at the end,” Hartley said, referring to the upward inflection of Hutchinson’s voice.
“And then she changes word patterns—always a red flag for me,” he continued. “She changed to ‘the valet had articulated’ instead of ‘the valet told me this.’ She’s been saying ‘said, said, said,’ and now… there’s a word pattern shift. That’s a red flag. You jump on that any time you hear it.”
