Former Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien will not testify before the House Select Committee on January 6 due to a "family emergency," the committee announced Monday.
Stepien was originally expected to be the star witness of Monday's hearing. The event will be the committee's second public hearing, having kicked off with last week's primetime hearing.
The hearing was delayed roughly 45 minutes from its 10 a.m. ET start time due to Stepien's absence.
Stepien has already testified before the committee in private, and the committee may choose to air footage of that appearance. Stepien's legal counsel will enter a statement for the record on Monday regardless.
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Details of Stepien's emergency have yet to be released.
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Monday's hearing is expected to focus on former President Donald Trump's efforts to spread baseless claims that the 2020 election was stolen.
Some conservatives have already dismissed the committee's hearings as a "sham," however. Host Mark Levin of "Life, Liberty and Levin" argued the hearings are little more than a witch hunt put on my House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
"This is a sham. This will go down in history as a dark mark on the American political system," Levin claimed.
"We can’t see it now, [but] the mob is in control, the mob runs the media, the propaganda is full-throated, you can’t see it now but history has a way of sobering events. And we will see this one day as the outrageous attack on our system, on the prior president, on scores of people that it truly is," he added.
"It’s an abomination to the American system, not just of justice but our congressional and representative system."
This is a developing story. Check back soon for updates.
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