The Jan. 6 committee isn't acting in good faith.

Good faith hearings would make its strong case more credible.

According to this estimate, 20 million people watched the first hearing of the January 6 committee, about which I reported here. Presumably, only a small percentage of that number tuned in for today’s non-prime-time second hearing.

However, the committee used the first hearing to preview its entire case against Donald Trump for his behavior leading up to and continuing through the January 6 rioting. A vast audience watched at least part of that preview.

Critics of the committee point out that the opening hearing presented little that was new. That’s true for hard core news addicts. But I assume that many of the 20 million viewers don’t fit that description. To them, much of the presentation was likely new and, for some, eye opening.

I’m glad so many Americans are interested in learning more about the January 6 rioting and events related to it. I’m glad they are learning about Donald Trump’s shameful role in these events. The committee does the country a service by enabling this to happen.

But is the committee providing that service in good faith? I don’t think so.

For example, I have now watched nearly four hours of hearings devoted to hammering home the underlying theme that Trump brought a mob to Washington, assembled the mob, and “lit the flame” that produced the riot. I think there’s plenty of truth to this charge.

However, I’ve yet to hear it noted that, on the day of the riot, Trump encouraged his supporters “to march over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.” (Emphasis added)

In the context of everything else Trump did, does this statement absolve Trump of all moral responsibility for the rioting? Not in my opinion. Does it bear on the extent of his responsibility, moral and legal? Yes, I think it does.

Americans can answer these questions for themselves, but should not have to do so without this piece of information.

Accordingly, a good faith investigation into Trump’s conduct would present all evidence of what Trump told his followers on January 6 — that which may have persuaded them to riot and that which may have dissuaded them. As far as I can tell, this hasn’t happened, at least not yet.

Today’s hearing provides another, albeit less egregious, example of the committee’s bad faith selectivity. It was devoted to showing that (1) Trump’s claims that the election was stolen — the predicate for assembling and firing up the January 6 protesters — were baseless and (2) Trump was repeatedly informed of this by his campaign staff and other counselors he had trusted in the past.

The committee put on a strong case through deposition testimony from witnesses like Trump’s campaign manager Bill Stepien and his attorney general Bill Barr. They demonstrated to my satisfaction that in conversations with the president, they demolished certain claims of election-determinative fraud. Yet Trump continued to push these claims.

Particularly telling was evidence that Trump peddled claims of (1) ballot dumping in Detroit and (2) manipulation of voting machines the day after Barr had explained to Trump why there was nothing to these claims. In my view, Trump either knew or should have known at least that these particular claims were baseless. It’s outrageous that Trump, without having questioned what Barr told him, pushed them nonetheless.

The committee considered briefly what has become the leading presentation supporting Trump’s claim of massive election fraud — Dinesh D’Souza’s film “2,000 Mules.” It used testimony from Bill Barr to attack that film.

This was fine as far as it went. But a good faith investigation would have included, or at least permitted, testimony from a witness, perhaps D’Souza, supporting claims of election fraud.

Did the committee attempt to line up such testimony? I doubt it.

The apparent unwillingness of the committee to present any evidence that casts Trump and his election fraud claims in a favorable light is the foreseeable result of its unwillingness to include Republicans members of the leadership’s choosing. I assume this was the intended result.

Had Jim Jordan, for example, been allowed to serve on the committee, we surely would have heard about Trump telling the January 6 protesters to be peaceful. Would we have heard a defense of “2,000 Mules” or other aspects of Trump’s election fraud claims? I don’t know. But if such a defense has even superficial plausibility, I assume we would have heard it. As it is, we have only Barr’s take.

Including minority members like Jim Jordan would have made life more difficult for the Democrat members and Liz Cheney. It likely would have entailed plenty of smoke blowing.

Yet, I think the committee shot itself in the foot by not including them. Their exclusion and the resulting exclusion of evidence that cuts against the committee’s narrative cost the committee credibility, making it too easy to dismiss the hearings as hyper-partisan. This undercuts the committee’s goal of persuading the undecided and influencing the views of those who don’t see Trump as culpable but have kept an open mind.

Imagine a conversation in which a convert to the view that Trump sparked a violent attack on “our democracy” hears from a friend that Trump urged the January 6 protesters to be peaceful. The new adherent might feel hoodwinked by the committee, and justifiably so.

In any case, it’s simply unfair for a congressional investigation to squelch one side of the story. Every hearing of this type I’ve ever watched, from Watergate to Benghazi, allowed both sides to participate.

There’s no good excuse for making the January 6 hearings an exception.