In their relationships with President Donald Trump in recent years, Roger Stone, his longtime political adviser, and Michael Flynn, who was briefly his national security adviser, have followed a similar trajectory.
Both were either convicted of or pleaded guilty to charges stemming from the investigation into the Trump campaign's connections to Russia. Both were pardoned by Trump after the 2020 presidential election. And both supported Trump in his relentless, multilayered efforts to reverse its outcome and remain in power.
The two were, in a sense, together again on Tuesday, when both were mentioned within an instant of one another at the House select committee hearing by Cassidy Hutchinson, an aide to Mark Meadows, Trump's final chief of staff. Hutchinson told the panel that on Jan. 5, 2021, a day before the Capitol was stormed, Trump had directed Meadows to reach out to Stone and Flynn.
Hutchinson acknowledged that she did not know what her boss may have said to the men. But her testimony was the first time it was revealed that Trump, on the eve of the Capitol attack, had opened a channel of communication with a pair of allies who had not only worked on his behalf for weeks challenging the results of the election, but who also had extensive ties to extremist groups like the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers, who were soon to be at the forefront of the violence.
The question of whether there was communication or coordination between the far-right groups that helped storm the Capitol and Trump and his aides and allies is among the most important facing the Jan. 6 investigators.
Barring a criminal prosecution — or something else that could force the details of the calls into the public sphere — it could be tough to be figure out exactly what Meadows discussed with Stone and Flynn.
Since late last year, Meadows has refused to comply with a committee subpoena that seeks his testimony about the weeks leading up to Jan. 6 — a move that risked his indictment on contempt of Congress charges. As for Stone and Flynn, both repeatedly exercised their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination during their own interviews with the committee.
Flynn's interview was especially remarkable, according to a recording of it played at the hearing on Tuesday. A former three-star general who still collects a military pension, Flynn pleaded the Fifth Amendment even when he was asked if he believed the violence at the Capitol was wrong, and whether he supported the lawful transfer of presidential power.