Jan. 6 hearing shows Barr saying Trump 'detached from reality' in pushing 'big lie'

After the second panel of witnesses was sworn in, Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif started questioning Byung "Bjay" Pak, who served as U.S. Attorney in the Northern District of Georgia during the Trump administration and was appointed by Trump.

Pak said Attorney General Bill Barr "asked me to find out what I could" about claims of voter fraud in Georgia raised by Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani in a public hearing, but said both he and his successor were "unable to find any evidence of fraud which affected the outcome of the election."

Lofgren then questioned Al Schmidt, the former GOP city commissioner who supervised the 2020 election in Philadelphia, about investigating claims about thousands of dead people voting in Philadelphia.

"Not only was there no evidence of 8,000 dead voters voting in Pennsylvania -- there was not even evidence of eight," Schmidt said.

Chairman Bennie Thompson gaveled the hearing back in shortly after 12:15 p.m. for the second panel of witnesses.

The three witnesses are Al Schmidt, a former Republican city commissioner in Philadelphia who repeatedly debunked claims of fraud in the state, Ben Ginsberg, a veteran GOP election lawyer, and Byung "BJay" Pak, a former U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia and Trump appointee.

Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-California confirmed publicly that Rich Donoghue, a former acting Deputy Attorney General at the Justice Department, will testify in person before the committee. ABC News has previously reported he was in talks to testify.

Donoghue will appear in Wednesday's hearing that will focus on Trump's "pressure" campaign against the Justice Department to investigate fraud, as vice-chair Rep. Liz Cheney announced in last week's hearing.

Chairman Bennie Thompson called a 10-minute recess for the committee's Monday hearing shortly after noon.

The committee played a video of Trump's former Attorney General Bill Barr recalling his December meeting with Trump after he told the Associated Press that there was no evidence of election fraud.

"The president was as mad as I've ever seen him, and he was trying to control himself," Barr recalled. Trump said, ""You didn't have to say this, you must've said this because you hate Trump.'"

I thought, boy, if he really believes this stuff, he has lost contact with — he's become detached from reality," Barr said, adding, "There was never any indication in interest in what the actual facts were."

"I felt that before the election, it was possible to talk sense to the president. And while you sometimes had to engage in, you know, a big wrestling match with him, that it was possible to keep things on track. But I was -- felt that after the election he didn't seem to be listening," Barr recalled. "And I didn’t think it was—you know, that I was inclined not to stay around if he wasn’t listening to advice from me or the Cabinet secretaries."