House GOP Deletes Tweet Calling Its Staffer 'Liar and Pawn' as She Testifies at Jan. 6 Committee

Former communications staffer Sarah Matthews, who now works for House Republicans, gave testimony about goings-on at the White House during the attack at the U.S. Capitol

The official Twitter account of House Republicans posted, then deleted, a tweet attacking one of its own staffers who testified at a televised Jan. 6 committee hearing on Thursday.

"Just another liar and pawn in Pelosi's witch-hunt," the account, whose handle is @HouseGOP, said in a Thursday night tweet, referring to Sarah Matthews, a former White House communications aide who now works as the communications director for Republicans on the House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis, according to Insider.

The Twitter post included images of Matthews from a tweet she sent out on Jan. 20, 2021 thanking former President Donald Trump and his vice president, Mike Pence, for their service.

The @HouseGOP account deleted the tweet but former White House communications director Alyssa Farah, who is now an outspoken adversary of Trump, posted a screen shot of it as well as her own commentary:

Matthews testified in front of cameras Thursday night before the Jan. 6 committee, which has presented evidence from its investigation into the attack on the Capitol and shared its conclusions with the American people during a series of televised hearings this summer.

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In her testimony, Matthews said that if Trump had wanted to make a statement from the White House's press briefing room, it would have taken him less than a minute to walk there from his location on Jan. 6, 2021.

She also told investigators that Kayleigh McEnany, the White House press secretary at the time, told her that President Trump "did not want to include any sort of mention of peace" in his initial tweet about the riot at the U.S. Capitol that disrupted the electoral vote count for the 2020 presidential election that Joe Biden won.

DOUG MILLS/POOL/AFP/getty

Matthews also testified about Trump's tweet on Jan. 6 that said Vice President Pence "didn't have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country."

"I thought the tweet about the vice president was the last thing that was needed in that moment," Matthews told lawmakers on Thursday.

Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021. Michael Nigro/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty

"It was essentially him giving the green light to these people — telling them that what they were doing at the steps of the Capitol, and entering the Capitol, was okay, that they were justified in their anger," Matthews also said. "And he shouldn't have been doing that. He should have been telling these people to go home and to leave and to condemn the violence that we are seeing."

The @HouseGOP tweet was timestamped 7:35pm on Thursday, according to the screenshot Farrah shared.

According to CNN's Capitol Hill reporter Melanie Zanona, the @HouseGOP account is run by Rep. Elise Stefanik's office.

Farrah also claimed in a now deleted tweet of her own that Stefanik was "allowing the official @HouseGOP account to be used to defame a fellow Republican woman for bravely testifying before Congress under oath," according to The Hill.

An anonymous source told Politico, "The tweet was sent out at the staff level and was not authorized or the position of the conference and therefore was deleted."