Jan. 6 Committee Closed-Door Hearing Was ‘Cordial,’ Patrick Byrne Says

Former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne testified on July 15 before the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, breach of the Capitol, including about his key role in a post-election White House meeting where he urged then-President Donald Trump to investigate 2020 election fraud allegations.

Byrne told The Epoch Times in an interview that his eight hours of closed-door testimony covered a wide range of topics—from his meeting with the president on Dec. 18, 2020, to his concerns over the integrity and safety of election equipment.

Byrne, who was the latest witness to testify before the committee, described the meeting as “surprisingly friendly, cordial, and professional.”

Former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne is surrounded by private security as he arrives at the Thomas P. O’Neill Jr. House Office Building to be interviewed by the House select committee investigating the events of Jan. 6, 2021, on July 15, 2022. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

“Notwithstanding the fact that we weren’t going to agree” about the Nov. 3, 2020, election, “we agreed that there was a lot for me to fill in from Nov. 4 until Jan. 7 [2021]. I think they seemed to be appreciative,” he told The Epoch Times on July 16.

“They had a lot of questions, and they really did not know the answers, and I was happy to provide them with the answers. I do feel that if they knew the truth about everything, they would understand the truth was different than [what] they were guessing—and significantly more benign.”

The White House Meeting

Byrne had hoped to engineer a meeting with Trump when he used a prior invitation from a staffer to tour the White House with former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn and attorney Sidney Powell. The trio met with Trump in the Oval Office after the president

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