WASHINGTON (AP) — House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy told other GOP lawmakers shortly after the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection he'd urge then-President Donald Trump to resign.
That's according to an audio recording posted Thursday by The New York Times and aired on Rachel Maddow’s MSNBC show.
The Times reports the audio is a recording of a Jan. 10, 2021, conversation among House GOP leaders in which they discussed the Democratic effort to remove Trump from office.
McCarthy tells the other lawmakers he'd tell Trump, “I think this will pass, and it would be my recommendation you should resign.”
It's unclear who leaked the audio to the press. A spokesperson for Republican Rep. Liz Cheney told CNN it wasn't her.
Prior to the audio being made public, McCarthy said reports of him calling for the former president to resign were “false and wrong.”
According to CNN, the committee investigating the Jan. 6 attacks has requested to speak with McCarthy, but he has refused.
