The House select committee investigating the Capitol riot has found gaps in official White House call logs from Jan. 6, "finding few records of calls by President Donald J. Trump from critical hours when investigators know that he was making them," The New York Times reports Thursday.
Investigators have not, however, found evidence of tampering or deletion, the Times notes. Trump also routinely used his personal cellphone or those of his aides to make calls.
The logs given to the committee only document calls to the White House switchboard, "and any calls that were being made from the White House to others." Trump had a habit of working around that system, "making it far more difficult to discern who he was communicating with."
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The "sparse call records" are but "the latest major obstacle" facing the panel, which is working to recreate what Trump was doing "behind closed doors during crucial moments of the assault on Congress by a mob of his supporters," writes the Times.
Earlier Thursday, the Times reported that the National Archives and Records Administration requested the Justice Department look into Trump's handling of classified information among the boxes of White House records he brought with him to Mar-a-Lago upon leaving office. It was also reported Thursday that White House staff used to occasionally find wads of printed paper clogging a toilet and believed Trump had tried to flush it down.
-
Margaret Atwood’s ‘deliciously naughty’ memoirIn the Spotlight ‘Bean-spilling’ book by The Handmaid’s Tale author is ‘immensely readable’
-
Being a school crossing guard has become a deadly jobUnder the Radar At least 230 crossing guards have been hit by cars over the last decade
-
Crossword: November 4, 2025The Week's daily crossword
-
Trump’s White House ballroom: a threat to the republic?Talking Point Trump be far from the first US president to leave his mark on the Executive Mansion, but to critics his remodel is yet more overreach
-
‘Not every social scourge is an act of war’Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
-
Pentagon unable to name boat strike casualtiesSpeed Read The Pentagon has so far acknowledged 14 strikes
-
41 political cartoons for October 2025Cartoons Editorial cartoonists take on Donald Trump, ICE, Stephen Miller, the government shutdown, a peace plan in the Middle East, Jeffrey Epstein, and more.
-
Trump limits refugees mostly to white South AfricansSpeed Read The administration is capping the number of refugees at 7,500
-
Judge rules US attorney ‘unlawfully serving’Speed Read Bill Essayli had been serving in the role without Senate confirmation
-
Trump ends Asia trip with Xi meeting, nuke threatSpeed Read Trump had spent the last six days in Asia
-
What does history say about Trump’s moves in Latin America?Today's Big Question ‘Bitter memories’ surface as the US targets Venezuela
