Trump COUP

10/21 trying to pull together diff nodes

tag traitr

see thom 3 pelosi amicus quash reconvene stopped alito bless coup?

see fake electors

see sedition caucus

see raga rule of law

confirm war room attendees

see ronna rnc

this is big lie 4

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see LIE any means

see gaslighting

see dirty tricks

see trump

see coup

see bannon

see eastman

see fraudit

see 2nd civil war

see escalator/echo

see smartmatic hugo ghost

SEE FAKE ELECTOR GRN BAY SWEEP

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see wray fail [?]

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1 25 politico

special counsel Jack Smith’s just-released report provides fresh insights into his bid to hold Donald Trump responsible for his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

Smith insisted he amassed enough evidence to win a conviction if the case had made it to trial, and he laid out a comprehensive compendium of the facts he might have presented to a jury. At the same time, his report struck a defensive tone, as he sought to explain why the case never made it that far.

The public report is also incomplete. Its second volume, which pertains to Smith’s investigation of the classified documents found at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate after he left office in 2021, remains secret.

Attorney General Merrick Garland does not intend to publicly release that portion of the report, though he wants to share it with select lawmakers. U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon has blocked any dissemination of it outside the Justice Department. And once Trump is inaugurated next week and assumes control of the department, it will be easy for him to forestall any formal release of Smith’s final assessment of the documents case.

Trump slams 'nut job' Jack Smith after judge temporarily blocks report

Still, the 137-page write-up on the election case is a final accounting of how Trump sought to derail the transfer of power four years ago, how investigators built and litigated an unprecedented conspiracy prosecution against a former president, and how that prosecution fizzled when Trump won back the White House.

Here are POLITICO’s top takeaways from the historic document.

Smith comes to Garland’s defense

A common sentiment on the left is that Garland was too deferential to Trump after Joe Biden took office and failed to unleash the full might of the department on the former president for nearly two years. The delay, critics say, made it much more difficult for Smith — once he was appointed in November 2022 — to bring Trump to trial before the 2024 election.

But Smith’s report emphasized that the Justice Department was aggressively investigating leads related to Trump long before the special counsel’s tenure began. Litigation tactics by Trump and his allies, Smith argued, were the key factors that slowed the process to a crawl.

For example, Twitter, newly purchased by Elon Musk, delayed Smith’s effort to access Trump’s account data for weeks despite a court order that ultimately resulted in the company being held in contempt and fined $350,000.

It took Smith more than a year to obtain text messages between Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) and Trump DOJ official Jeffrey Clark. And the department spent months fighting to access communications of John Eastman, a lawyer who helped devise Trump’s last-ditch efforts to remain in power.

The most protracted battles of all stemmed from Trump’s “broad invocation of executive privilege to try to prevent witnesses from providing evidence,” Smith wrote. It took months of secretive legal proceedings to secure testimony from Trump White House aides such as Mark Meadows, Dan Scavino and Pat Cipollone. Former Vice President Mike Pence also resisted testifying until a court ordered him to reveal some — but not all — details about his interactions with Trump. Smith noted that judges broadly rejected Trump’s privilege claims, with one holding that he was engaged in an “obvious” effort to delay the investigation.

Smith also drew attention to what may have been his biggest foil: the Supreme Court. He pointed out that the justices rebuffed his effort to put Trump’s presidential immunity claims on a similar timetable to the one the court adopted five decades earlier in litigation over Watergate and President Richard Nixon’s tapes.

And Smith argued that the Supreme Court’s resolution of Trump’s immunity assertion essentially guaranteed another round of litigation that would have been all but certain to return to the justices if Trump had not won the election and the prosecution had continued.

Smith’s path not taken: An insurrection charge

Much of Smith’s report amounts to a justification of the special counsel’s “charging decisions” — his reasons for bringing four felony counts against the former president. Smith also explained publicly for the first time his decision not to charge Trump with one of the gravest potential crimes in DOJ’s arsenal: inciting insurrection.

The bottom line, Smith said, was legal uncertainty about the federal insurrection statute. The law had not been used in 100 years. It may not have applied to a situation in which a sitting president sought to illegally retain power rather than an outside force seeking to depose a lawful administration. And, in a notable concession to Trump, Smith acknowledged the evidence didn’t show that Trump intended to cause “the full scope” of violence that occurred on Jan. 6, 2021.

“The evidence established that the violence was foreseeable to Mr. Trump, that he caused it, that it was beneficial to his plan to interfere with the certification, and that when it occurred, he made a conscious choice not to stop it and instead to leverage it for more delay,” Smith concluded. But federal investigators, he said, “did not develop direct evidence — such as an explicit admission or communication with co-conspirators — of Mr. Trump’s subjective intent to cause the full scope of the violence.”

A few tantalizing tidbits of evidence

Much of the evidence that Smith recounted has already appeared in prior court filings or was unearthed by the congressional investigation into Jan. 6. But there were a few striking new details in Smith’s report:

A Signal exchange between Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) and Trump DOJ official Jeff Clark in which Clark indicated a classified review of potential voter fraud evidence found “nothing helpful to P” — shorthand for President Trump.

Details of interviews with Trump’s fake electors in which some described concerns about being duped into a plan intended to “overthrow the government.”

An analysis that found Trump was watching Fox News on Jan. 6 when the broadcast aired an interview with a supporter marching to the Capitol who berated Pence for refusing Trump’s pressure to overturn the election. Moments later, Smith noted, Trump tweeted an attack on Pence, fueling the anger of the mob just as Pence was being evacuated to safety.

Will the public get to see the primary documents?

Smith’s report described the trove of evidence he assembled in narrative form. But the fate of the trove itself could be even more significant than his ultimate conclusions.

The House Jan. 6 select committee similarly mounted a two-year investigation and produced a voluminous final report. But it was the committee’s enormous cache of witness transcripts and primary source documents — drawn from Trump’s files in the National Archives, emails obtained through subpoenas and evidence produced during court battles — that has proved more enduring.

Smith reached into areas the select committee could not, getting grand jury testimony from Pence, Meadows and other top aides, including some returning to the White House next week. Those transcripts remain sealed, but there are several legal efforts underway to bring them into public view.

The Justice Department is due to respond to two of those efforts this week, a potential window into whether prosecutors may deem the public interest in the underlying materials of greater value than their continued secrecy, particularly now that the criminal case has been dropped.

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an 10 24

On Wednesday, October 2, Judge Tanya Chutkan unsealed a 165-page legal brief in which special counsel Jack Smith makes a detailed, comprehensive case for moving forward with his election interference indictment against former President Donald Trump.

The document is mindful of the U.S. Supreme Court's controversial 6-3 immunity ruling in Trump v. the United States, which declared that a president enjoys immunity from criminal prosecution for "official" acts committed as part of "core" duties but not for "unofficial" acts. And Smith, in the court filing, zeros in on acts he considers "unofficial" and therefore, subject to criminal prosecution.

In a listicle published by Politico, reporters Kyle Cheney and Josh Gerstein lay out 11 of the "most significant and striking details in Smith's brief."

"Much of Smith's brief focused on Trump's state of mind in the weeks leading up to the Capitol riot on January 6, 2021," Cheney and Gerstein explain. "Smith described a slew of conversations suggesting that the then-president knew his claims of election fraud were spurious. And Smith laid out evidence that Trump's sole objective was to stay in power — not, as he and his lawyers have claimed, to exercise legitimate authority over election integrity."

The details that Cheney and Gerstein highlight are: (1) Trump "alone with his phone," (2) "Trump asked, 'So what'?," (3) Trump "disregarding the" election "results," (4) "inventing statistics," (5) "broken promises of evidence," (6) "mocking Sidney Powell," (7) "Trump's January 5 call to Steve Bannon," (8) "a view of forensic evidence," (9) "make them riot," (10) former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani's "rise," and (11) "Rudy's follies."

Powell, like Giuliani, was among the Trump attorneys who promoted the debunked conspiracy theory that the 2020 election was stolen from him. And according to Smith's filing, Cheney and Gerstein note, the special counsel cites examples of Trump calling Powell "unhinged" and "crazy."

The Politico reporters point out that "well before" January 6, 2021, an "unidentified Trump campaign employee" described in Smith's brief "enthusiastically spoke of the potential for a riot in Michigan."

"The employee, whom prosecutors described as a co-conspirator, allegedly sought to 'create chaos' at a polling center in Detroit when it became clear a batch of election returns favorable to (Joe) Biden was legitimate," Cheney and Gerstein note. "'Find a reason it isn't,' the alleged co-conspirator said to a colleague, prosecutors wrote. When the colleague said an outbreak of violence appeared imminent, the campaign employee replied: 'Make them riot' and 'Do it!!!'"

*Read the full Politico article at this link.

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an 5 24

alternet-no lnx

The supreme scheme: How Alito and Thomas are fueling the ongoing Trump coup

Associate Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas sits with his wife and conservative activist Virginia Thomas while he waits to speak at the Heritage Foundation on October 21, 2021 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Thom Hartmann May 20, 2024

Senator Dick Durbin, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, needs to act.

Supreme Court Associate Justice Sam Alito was just caught red-handed promoting Trump’s fascist “stop the steal” campaign to overthrow the 2020 election and end democracy in America by flying the upside-down flag at his home. He then went on Fox “News” and lied that it was his wife’s fault and that she did it because schoolchildren at a nearby bus stop saw a neighbor’s “F*ck Trump” yard sign.

In fact, as the Lincoln Project’s Steve Schmidt pointed out this past weekend:

“Mrs. Alito was so alarmed by the degradations and profane, yet protected speech that she went immediately home, and inverted the American flag signaling distress. Here’s the problem: there were no school buses and no school children on them in January 2021 in Alexandria, Virginia. Schools in the city were closed for a full year as a result of the pandemic and didn’t re-open until March 2021.”

READ: America in the final stage of a 40-year transition

But Alito’s fingers were apparently far deeper in the January 6th coup attempt than most Americans realize. Trump lawyer Sydney Powell pointed out on Stew Peters’ rightwing YouTube channel that she, Louie Gohmert, and Kari Lake (among others) had filed a lawsuit against Vice President Mike Pence to prevent him from certifying the Electoral College vote on January 6th.

It was a legal attempt to try to do what Trump sent a mob to do when the legal strategy failed:

“We were filing a 12th Amendment constitutional challenge to the process that the Congress was about to use per the Electoral Act provisions that simply don’t jibe with the 12th Amendment to the United States Constitution, and Justice Alito was our circuit court justice for that. Louie Gohmert was the plaintiff in our lawsuit and we were suing the Vice President to follow the 12th Amendment as opposed to the Electoral Count Act.” (emphasis mine)

The 12th Amendment, ratified in 1804, is the provision under which a contested election for president gets thrown to Congress, as happened in the 1876 election where Democrat Sam Tilden got more electoral and popular votes than Republican Rutherford B. Hayes by the first count.

That election ended up thrown to the House because three states had submitted two sets of Electoral College votes (just like Trump’s are fake electors), so Congress cut a deal to end Reconstruction in exchange for making Hayes president, even though he arguably lost the election.

The lawsuit, filed by Gohmert, Kari Lake, and a handful of Republican operatives, demanded the delay so Republicans on the Supreme Court could decide who’d be president, just like they did in the 2000 election. It called for:

“[R]espondent Vice President of the United States to refrain from invoking the dispute-resolution provisions of the Electoral Count Act of 1887 … for the duration of this Court’s consideration of a timely filed petition for a writ of certiorari. As set forth in the argument below, the ECA violates the Electors’ Clause, the Twelfth Amendment, and the Constitution’s structural protections of liberty.”

If Alito would rule that Pence must defer to Congress per the 12th Amendment, the election of 2020 would be thrown to the House with each state having one vote. There, the presidency would have gone to Trump 27-23, because 27 states’ congressional delegations were then controlled by Republicans.

This was not a brand-new or hastily organized plan. I wrote on March 13, 2020 — eight months before the election — that Republicans I knew in Washington DC had informed me that the Trump folks were planning this exact strategy.

And, sure enough, here it was, with Sam Alito as the inside man.

The invasion of the House chamber by the “stop the steal” traitors was, by the theory of this plan, supposed to delay the counting of electoral college votes at least for a day, to give Alito time to act on the next day, January 7th. He and the courts would then rule that the 12th amendment took precedent to law made since then, Congress would declare Trump the winner, and that would be the end of the discussion.

But Nancy Pelosi got wind of the plot and blew it up by re-convening Congress at 8 pm to count the votes, just two hours after the last of the rioters had left the building and before Alito could rule. As Trump‘s senior attorney Powell told Peters:

“Nancy Pelosi had finagled to file an amicus brief in it — there had been inside goings on in Congress where I believe it was Steve Scalise and [Speaker Kevin] McCarthy [who] kept her from being an actual party; she wanted to work herself inside the case as a party but somehow that didn’t happen — so she got notice when we made our filing because she’d filed an amicus brief. And then everything broke loose and she really speeded up reconvening Congress to get the vote [count] going, or [Bill Barr’s] Justice [Department] might have issued an injunction to stop it all, which is what should have happened.”

In the end, Alito had to turn down the lawsuit on the morning of January 7th because Congress had already voted to certify the election for Biden.

As a result, we’ll never know how close we came to having a single corrupt Supreme Court justice overturn the election, but that flag flying outside his house gives us a pretty good clue as to what he may well have done the morning of January 7th had Pelosi not quickly acted the previous evening.

But Alito’s attempts to overturn our democracy weren’t limited to his support for Trump’s treasonous acts on January 6th. Were it not for Alito, Clarence Thomas, and at least two other Republicans on the Court, Donald Trump would by now have almost certainly been convicted in federal Judge Tanya Chutkan’s courtroom of seditiously trying to overthrow our government.

That federal criminal case was rapidly moving along when Trump’s lawyers made the absurd assertion that he was immune from prosecution for his attempted sedition because of a brand new, previously unheard of, and totally bizarre, made-up doctrine of presidential immunity. Even Richard Nixon didn’t have the cojones to try that one: he simply admitted his guilt and accepted a pardon to avoid going to prison.

It only takes four members of the Court to grant certiorari, allowing the Court to hear a case: four or more Republicans on the Court went out of their way to give Trump the delay he desperately needed. On February 28th, they granted cert and scheduled oral arguments for the very last day of their 2023-2024 session, the week of April 22nd.

To add insult to the injury to our republic, in oral arguments Alito dropped this little bomb on America, turning the case against Trump inside-out and claiming Trump should get a free pass to crime all he wanted:

“I’m sure you would agree with me that a stable democratic society requires that a candidate who loses an election, even a close one, even a hotly contested one, leave office peacefully, if that candidate is an incumbent?

“All right. Now if an incumbent who loses a very close, hotly contested election knows that a real possibility after leaving office is not that the president is going to be able to go off into a peaceful retirement, but that the president may be criminally prosecuted by a bitter political opponent, will that not lead us into a cycle that destabilizes the functioning of our country as a democracy?

“And we can look around the world and find countries where we have seen this process, where the loser gets thrown in jail.”

Thankfully, at least for the historical record, the Attorney representing Jack Smith’s Justice Department, Michael Dreeben, immediately replied:

“I think it’s exactly the opposite, Justice Alito.”

But Alito, not Dreeben, is on the Court and is the decision-maker. Alito thus gave — and continues to give — Trump a desperately needed further delay by slow-walking his own part of the Court’s decision in the Trump immunity case.

Even if they rule against Trump, which everybody assumed would happen before Alito dropped that rhetorical turd into the proceeding, by giving Donny the delay he wanted, the Republicans on the Court reduced the chance that Trump will ever be held to account for his crimes.

While the Court typically releases their decisions during the summer, they have the option of waiting as long as they want — even until well past the November election date. So, if Trump is elected, he can fire Jack Smith and end the prosecution himself.

And it’s not like Alito and Thomas don’t have a stake in this fight. If Biden is re-elected, by the 2028 election Alito will be 78 and Thomas 80. Insiders have speculated that both would like to retire soon and have their replacements appointed by a Republican president.

And it won’t be the first time a corrupt Republican on the Court threw an election just to insure that body remained in Republican hands. You’ll recall, in 2000 Sandra Day O’Connor’s husband told friends that the reason she voted to stop the Florida Supreme Court-ordered recount and make George W. Bush president was simply because she didn’t want Al Gore to choose her replacement.

Arguably the most galling part of this entire pathetic drama is the response of Democrats with subpoena power in the US Senate. Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin, for example, issued a miserably weak request for Alito to recuse himself from cases having to do with January 6th, rather than demand the man resign and calling a hearing to make it happen.

We all know what would have happened if the shoe was on the other foot.

A Republican-controlled Senate confronting a Democratic Supreme Court appointee accused of corruption would be holding nationally televised public hearings, dragging that justice and his family and intimates before Congress for a grilling, and demanding both prosecution and impeachment.

That’s exactly what happened in the spring of 1969, when Republicans on the Senate Judiciary committee — along with a coordinated effort by President Nixon and Republicans in the media — accused the most liberal member of the Court, Abe Fortas, of being corrupt.

This was Nixon’s chance to flip the balance of the Supreme Court, while conservatives across the nation were still angry about the Brown v Board decision.

Fortas had taken a $20,000 payment from a man he’d defended years earlier; the man hadn’t been able to pay at the time, and finally came up with the money a year or so after LBJ put Fortas on the Court. Not exactly a crime, by any measure.

Fortas was also paid a $15,000 advance for a book he wrote, and Republicans alleged his wife had evidence of tax evasion, although it later turned out that charge was entirely manufactured out of thin air. No crimes here, either.

Nonetheless, the complaints about “Supreme Court corruption” and accompanying threats and pressure from Congressional Republicans against Fortas and his wife — and the firestorm in the media stirred up by Republican commentators — was so intense that Fortas resigned on May 14, 1969 just to get the torture to stop.

Consider that when you think about Alito’s wife hanging the upside-down flag, or her close association with hard-core rightwing causes including her alleged involvement in “Operation Higher Court.” Or Ginni Thomas’ involvement with the January 6th coup attempt itself, texting Trump Chief of Staff Mark Meadows:

“Watermarked ballots in over 12 states have been part of a huge Trump & military white hat sting operation in 12 key battleground states,” and “Biden crime family & ballot fraud co-conspirators (elected officials, bureaucrats, social media censorship mongers, fake stream media reporters, etc.) are being arrested & detained for ballot fraud right now & over coming days, & will be living in barges off GITMO to face military tribunals for sedition.”

Keep in mind that in the 2016 election, the singular thing that caused millions of Republicans — who otherwise considered Trump a fraud, con man, and sexual pervert — to vote for him was that Mitch McConnell was holding Merrick Garland’s seat on the Supreme Court open.

As Vox reported:

“One in five [2016] voters told CNN in an exit poll that the Supreme Court was one reason they had cast a ballot. Of the voters who said it was the ‘most important factor’ in their decision, 56 percent voted for Trump. According to the Washington Post, 26 percent of all Trump voters polled said that the Supreme Court was the basis of their decision.”

This fall, the corruption of the Supreme Court by corporate, billionaire, and fossil fuel interests should be at the top of Biden’s re-election campaign: polls show a majority of Americans are horrified by it.

Both Thomas — whose bribe-taking in exchange for his votes on Citizens United and other cases is well documented — and his rightwing buddy Sam Alito must resign or face impeachment. If Republicans could pull it off against a totally innocent Abe Fortas back in the day, Democrats should be able to do it now against two guys whose corruption is obvious to everybody.

Democrats in Congress — particularly on the Senate Judiciary Committee — need to grow a damn spine and make it happen.

NOW READ: The Supreme Court's wealth-driven corruption crisis

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an 4 24

Reps. Andy Biggs (R-AZ) and Paul Gosar (R-AZ) have been subpoenaed by Arizona investigators to testify for a grand jury in connection to their efforts to overturn the 2020 election, Politico exclusively reports.

Politico notes as far-right Freedom Caucus chair at the time, Biggs, along "with Gosar were among the most vocal congressional supporters of Trump’s efforts to overturn Biden’s victory in Arizona," and both GOP lawmakers sought "to challenge the state’s presidential electors on Jan. 6, 2021, when Congress met to certify the results of the Electoral College."

The news outlet adds, "Gosar was mounting that challenge at the same moment a pro-Trump mob broke into the Capitol and halted proceedings."

READ MORE:['We have to worry about physical violence': AZ elections chief preps for threats from MAGA

Although there's no proof Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes will bring criminal charges against the pair, "the subpoenas themselves — in conjunction with a series of other aggressive recent moves — show that Mayes, a Democrat, has cast a far wider net in her probe than previously understood," Politico notes.

"Getting a subpoena to testify in front of a grand jury is kind of rare," American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona Legal Director Jared Keenan said. "And that’s why I think no one has challenged the secrecy law."

Some of the Arizona lawmakers' attempt to overturn the election according to investigators, includes Gosar's ongoing "relationships with activists organizing 'Stop the Steal' protests targeting Congress’ Jan. 6 session."

Regarding Biggs' actions, Politico reports, "text messages obtained by the Jan. 6 committee" show that "Biggs quickly contacted Trump’s White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, after Election Day 2020 to push for state legislatures to overrule the results in multiple states Biden won."

READ MORE:['Resigning as Lake requested': AZ GOP chair quits amid threat of more leaks from Kari Lake

Additionally, "Biggs also told Meadows that Trump should not concede the election and reportedly worked with other Arizona Republicans to advance the fake elector effort."

*Politico's full report is available here.

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an 4 24

although Democrats have been struggling in Florida, they have gained a lot of ground in Arizona, Georgia and Virginia — all of which were once deep red but have evolved into full-fledged swing states. Arizona was once synonymous with the conservatism of Sen. Barry Goldwater and his successor, Sen. John McCain; now, it has a Democratic governor (Katie Hobbs), two non-GOP U.S. senators (Democrat Mark Kelly and ex-Democrat turned independent Kyrsten Sinema), and a Democratic state attorney general — who has been leading a thorough criminal investigation of MAGA efforts to overturn the state's 2020 presidential election results.

One of 2020's political bombshells came when now-President Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump in Arizona. Although Trump falsely claimed that he won the state, meticulous recounts thoroughly debunked that claim.

According to Politico, Democratic Arizona AG Kris Mayes has subpoenaed two far-right MAGA congressmen who were major promoters of the Big Lie: Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar.

READ MORE:[CNN sues for recordings of President Biden’s interview in classified docs probe: report

Politico reporters Betsy Woodruff Swan and Kyle Cheney note that although "there is no indication that" Mayes "is considering bringing criminal charges against either lawmaker," the subpoenas "show that Mayes…. has cast a far wider net in her probe than previously understood."

"Mayes appears to be nearing a decision on whether to ask the grand jury to issue indictments in the case," Swan and Cheney report in an article published on April 4. "If she does, she will become the fourth state or local prosecutor to bring criminal charges over the efforts by Trump and his allies to submit fake electors in states that Joe Biden won."

The Politico journalists add, "In recent weeks, Mayes' office has sent out a wave of grand jury subpoenas. She also has required Arizona Republicans who falsely claimed to be the state's presidential electors to assert their Fifth Amendment rights in front of the grand jury — an unusual step that has generated criticism from some former prosecutors."

Swan and Cheney note that Arizona "was one of seven states won by Biden where Trump's allies organized slates of so-called alternate electors."

READ MORE:['Wrong!' AOC schools Ted Cruz on RICO laws

"Prosecutors in Georgia, Michigan and Nevada have brought criminal charges against false electors in those states, and special counsel Jack Smith has called the scheme a central element of Trump's bid to subvert the election," according to the Politico reporters. "Subpoenas to members of Congress in criminal investigations are rare, in part because lawmakers enjoy robust constitutional protections from criminal proceedings connected to their official business."

Swan and Cheney add, "But Biggs and Gosar are not the first lawmakers to face scrutiny from criminal investigators probing Trump's efforts to fight the 2020 election results. In 2022, the FBI seized the phone of Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA) as part of the Justice Department's election-subversion probe."

Legal journalist Luke Johnson, in response to the subpoenas, notes the connection between them and far-right MAGA conspiracy theorist Ali Alexander Akbar.

On X, formerly Twitter, Johnson posted, "More to the Story: Ali Alexander Akbar BRAGGED that Paul Gosar & Andy Biggs were his partners on the #StopTheSteal rallies that led to the #Jan6 violent riots. They all must be held accountable, they've laughed it off for years."

The Daily Beast notes that in 2022, the January 6 Select Committee "found that both Biggs and Gosar attended a White House meeting with Trump on December 21, 2020, to strategize on ways that then-Vice President Mike Pence could block the certification of the election results."

READ MORE:[Fani Willis fights back against House GOP efforts to derail Trump RICO case

*Read Politico's full report at this link

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an 2 24 tpm

as he moves closer and closer to the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, Donald Trump continues to face four criminal prosecutions and a variety of civil lawsuits. Two of the criminal prosecutions — one by special counsel Jack Smith for the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), the other by Fulton County, Georgia District Attorney Fani Willis for the State of Georgia — involve Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election results.

In Willis' case, some of the co-defendants are attorneys who joined him in falsely claiming that the 2020 election was stolen from him — including Rudy Giuliani, Kenneth Chesebro, Jenna Ellis and Sidney Powell.

In an article published on February 12, Talking Points Memo's Josh Kovensky reports that newly uncovered documents illustrate the role that attorneys played in Trump's plan to stay in the White House despite losing the 2020 election to now-President Joe Biden.

"In late 2020, a group of conservative movement attorneys set out to build a legal pathway by which Donald Trump could stay in power, having lost the election," Kovensky explains. "We've known about the outcome of their work for three years now: how it led to the violence of January 6, and fed the dream of Trump's supporters that he might continue to serve after January 20, 2021. But TPM can now reveal the ways in which their theorizing, in early stages, went even further than previously known, imagining a January 6 that lasted for not hours but days, an intervention by Supreme Court justices that they presumed to be loyal to President Trump, and a vice president who upended his constitutional duties, allowing the U.S. to descend into chaos.

A "trove of documents" that TPM has obtained, according to Kovensky, "details many of the conversations among Trump campaign lawyers, and, in particular, the theories offered by Kenneth Chesebro, an attorney who worked with the campaign in the months leading up to January 6."

Chesebro, like Ellis and Powell, has flipped on Trump and agreed to fully cooperate with the Fulton County DA's Office in order to avoid prison. But in 2020, he was determined to help keep Trump in the White House.

"Chesebro, an appellate lawyer, provided a legal framework in which, he contended, Trump could still win — or at least cause enough confusion and chaos that the conservative Supreme Court would have to get involved in picking the president," Kovensky reports. "His plan envisioned several gambits which have now become familiar building blocks of the legal portion of the coup attempt, and the basis for criminal charges across the country: creating slates of fake electors, having Mike Pence refuse to count Biden's electoral votes on January 6, and ultimately tossing the whole issue to the High Court."

Kovensky notes that "TPM obtained the trove of documents after Ken Chesebro supplied e-mails, texts, and memos from his time with the Trump campaign to Michigan prosecutors in Attorney General Dana Nessel (D)’s office, which has been investigating the fake electors scheme."

The reporter adds, however, that "the thousands of e-mails, memos and texts only represent what Chesebro experienced directly and what he chose to share."

In other words, Trump lawyers' efforts to overturn the election results went way beyond the documents TPM has obtained.

"The records are not comprehensive of the Trump campaign's entire effort to reverse the President’s loss," Kovensky points out. "They reflect what Chesebro provided as he sought to avoid further prosecution, and what reached TPM."

READ MORE:[Fani Willis admits to relationship with Nathan Wade but dismisses 'irrelevant allegations

*Read the full Talking Points Memo report at this link.

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'Huge, systematic plot’: Trump’s Detroit audio 'sounds like a classic case of bribery': experts - Alternet.org

12 23 an

as Donald Trump's legal troubles continue to aggressively mount, The Detroit News issued a bombshell report by Craig Mauger revealing audio recordings Thursday of the former president pressuring two Michigan county GOP canvasser's not to certify the 2020 election results.

Per Mauger's reporting, Trump and Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel told Wayne County canvassers Monica Palmer and William Hartmann on the November 17, 2020 call that "they'd look 'terrible' if they signed the documents after they first voted in opposition and then later in the same meeting voted to approve certification of the county's election results, according to the recordings."

Special counsel Jack Smith's former colleague Karen Friedman Agnifilo and former special counsel at the Department of Defense, Ryan Goodman, during an interview with CNN's Erin Burnett, insisted the recordings are "damaging" to Trump, and "powerful for Smith.

"[Trump] said, from Craig's reporting, that it would be 'terrible' if these two canvassers signed the documents," Burnett emphasized, noting the MAGA hopeful "continues to say, 'We've got to fight for our country. We can't let these people take our country away from us.' How big of a deal is this recording now that we know some of what's on it, Karen?"

Agnifilo replied, "For a prosecutor, there's nothing better than a defendant's own words on tape doing and saying the exact thing you accused them of doing. So for Jack Smith, this is extremely powerful evidence of Donald Trump's corrupt intention, and his pressure campaign on the local level, which is part and parcel of what he's charged with in this sweeping Jack Smith indictment — the January 6 indictment — there's a whole section on there on the pressure campaign to the states, including Michigan. And so this is just direct evidence for Jack Smith and will be front and center at the trial. I also think that the fact that he's saying, 'We'll get you lawyers. We'll pay for your lawyers' — In some ways, I would argue that that's evidence that he knows what he's asking them to do is illegal. And so I think it's extremely powerful evidence for a prosecutor."

Burnett asked, "Ryan, what's your takeaway?"

Goodman replied, "Similarly, I think that this is very damaging information against Donald Trump. The one line that also stuck out to me is Ronna McDaniel on that call says quote, 'Do not sign it, we will get you attorneys.' So, who's the 'we'? It's her and they're on the call with somebody else — President Trump at the time. 'We'll get you attorneys' means they're all aware that they're, at minimum, skating the line of illegality, if not going right over it. It fits in with the pattern of conduct that is the theory of the case for Jack Smith. And it's not only the pattern of conduct that's in the indictment in which Donald Trump is pressuring Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in Georgia, pressuring [former] Arizona [Congressman] Rusty Bowers (R). But also [former Vice President] Mike Pence, which is a key part of the case, and here is the same kind of pattern of conduct. What is the president doing? He's pressuring the individual to do something that is completely outside the bounds of their legal authority to throw the election. I think that's the way in which Jack Smith will present it to the jury, and it's as Karen said, the fact that it's the defendant himself on audio, makes its incredibly credible for the jury."

Watch the video below or at this link.

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just weeks after the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals unsealed documents revealing U.S. Congressman Scott Perry's (R-PA) conversations in his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, a federal judge on Tuesday gave the Department of Justice permission to access almost "1,700 records recovered" from the Pennsylvania lawmaker's cell phone, The Washington Post reports.

Politico reported a few of Perry's interactions, including:

{A Dec. 12, 2020, text exchange with Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel discussing efforts to challenge Joe Biden’s victory in the election.}:

{A series of exchanges between Perry and a former DOJ colleague, Robert Gasaway, between Dec. 30, 2020, and Jan. 5, 2021, in which Perry embraced a plan to have then-Vice President Mike Pence 'admit testimony' prior to the counting of electoral votes on Jan. 6, 2021. Perry agreed to 'sell[] the idea' with a call to Trump, Pence and Trump adviser John Eastman, but Perry later alerted Gasaway that Pence’s chief of staff, Marc Short, 'will not allow access.'}:

The "most revealing" interaction, Politico noted, was a conversation the GOP leader had with ex-U.S. Department of Justice official Jeffrey Clark — and Donald Trump Georgia co-defendant — in which Perry told Clark that Trump was upset with Clark for using the Justice Department to defend Pence against a lawsuit brought by another House member, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas)."

Per the Post, on Tuesday, "Chief U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg of Washington, D.C., gave investigators access to 1,659 records and withheld 396 others after a federal appeals court directed him to individually review 2,055 communications from Perry's phone to decide which were protected by the Constitution’s 'speech or debate' clause, which grants members of Congress immunity from criminal investigation when acting in their official capacities."

According to the report, "Tuesday's order will determine which messages investigators with special counsel Jack Smith can actually use as potential evidence in any case, pending an expected renewed appeal by Perry, part of legal fight that has tied up the records for more than a year."

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the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals unsealed documents containing U.S. Representative Scott Perry's (R-PA) interactions and efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, Politico reports.

Per Politico, Perry's conversations with former U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) official Jeffrey Clark — who was indicted alongside former President Donald Trump and 17 others the ongoing Georgia election case — "are perhaps the most revealing."

During one conversation, the news outlet reports, "Perry told Clark that Trump was upset with Clark for using the Justice Department to defend [ex-Vice President Mike] Pence against a lawsuit brought by another House member, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas)."

The Texas lawmaker "was seeking a court ruling declaring that Pence had the power to unilaterally reject Biden's electoral votes, but DOJ’s civil division — then under Clark’s leadership — stepped in to defend Pence against the suit, which failed," the report notes.

The Pennsylvania GOP leader texted Clark on December 30, 2020, "POTUS seems very happy with your response. I read it just as you dictated," to which the former DOJ official replied, "I'm praying. This makes me quite nervous. And wonder if I'm worthy or ready."

Perry said, "You are the man. I have confirmed it. God does what he does for a reason."

Politico listed the "extraordinary web of communications between Perry, who is now the chair of the House Freedom Caucus, and key figures in Trump's orbit," including:

A Dec. 12, 2020, text exchange with Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel discussing efforts to challenge Joe Biden’s victory in the election.*}:

A series of exchanges between Perry and a former DOJ colleague, Robert Gasaway, between Dec. 30, 2020, and Jan. 5, 2021, in which Perry embraced a plan to have then-Vice President Mike Pence “admit testimony” prior to the counting of electoral votes on Jan. 6, 2021. Perry agreed to “sell[] the idea” with a call to Trump, Pence and Trump adviser John Eastman, but Perry later alerted Gasaway that Pence’s chief of staff, Marc Short, “will not allow access.”

A description of numerous exchanges between Perry and top Trump administration officials, including Clark, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, senior adviser Eric Herschmann and Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, a former House colleague of Perry.}:

*Politico's full report ishere.

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no lnx an 8 23

Busted: Trump's fascist coup exposed again

Joe Conason August 19, 2023

Now that former President Donald Trump has been indicted not once but twice for attempting to steal the 2020 presidential election, his apologists say he was merely pursuing his constitutional right to contest the results. They insist that he truly believed his campaign was undone by massive voter fraud and that all the post-election machinations carried out by him and his cronies were innocent and sincere.

Unfortunately for them, evidence continues to emerge showing not only that their claims of fraud were fabricated -- and ruled to be false in 61 lawsuits -- but that Trump had planned to carry out a conspiracy against democracy well before the election results were even fully tabulated.

Nobody should be surprised to learn that the latest confirmation of the Trump's campaign's nefarious intent features Roger Stone, the veteran dirty trickster and pardoned felon, who must have coined his "Stop the Steal" slogan while peering into a mirror. If there was an attempted "steal," he was one of the perps.

POLL: Should Trump be allowed to hold office again?

In his boundless vanity, Stone allowed himself to be videotaped by Danish documentarian Christoffer Gulbrandsen while dictating a memo that outlined a plan to substitute fake electors supporting Trump for legitimate electors supporting Joe Biden. That moment occurred on Nov. 5, 2020 -- two days after the election and two days before Biden was declared the election's winner

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Speaking slowly as an aide typed on a laptop, Stone declared: "Any legislative body may decide on the basis of overwhelming evidence of fraud to send electors to the electoral college who accurately reflect the president's legitimate victory in their state, which was illegally denied him through fraud."

Stone is not a lawyer, and that notion of an "independent state legislature" acting to overturn the actual election result in any state was thoroughly discredited before the Supreme Court rejected it. John Eastman, the conservative Trump attorney who conceived the fake electors scheme, has confessed that he knew all along the theory was hollow and that even Republican-appointed judges would dismiss it.

But the validity of the theory was beside the point, as Stone himself suggested in another interview with Gulbrandsen. The coup plot formulated by Stone and the rest of Trump's team foresaw a sudden assertion of illegitimate authority to seize control and void the election. Michael Flynn, Trump's pardoned former national security adviser, even urged a plot that would conclude with the imposition of military dictatorship. They meant to force the country to accept the outcome they demanded, with a spasm of military violence wherever that proved necessary.

That was why Stone -- and Steve Bannon, the fascistic former White House strategist, also pardoned by Trump - both predicted, quite accurately, that Trump would declare himself the victor on Election Night regardless of the tabulated results. "I really do suspect that it'll still be up in the air," Stone said on November 1, 2020, anticipating the election a few days later. "When that happens, the key thing to do is to claim victory. Possession is nine-tenths of the law."

Speaking in the voice of Trump, he enunciated what he thought his client should say: "No, we won." If those tabulated results showed Biden in the lead, Stone added, then Trump should say:

"Sorry, we're not accepting them. We're challenging them in court." And not just in court, where all but one of Trump's challenges were repudiated by judges of both parties. "If the (Biden) electors show up at the Electoral College, armed guards will throw them out," Stone warned. Speaking again in Trump's voice, he went on, "I'm challenging all of it, and the judges we're going to, are judges I appointed."

None of that worked out according to Stone's expectations, as even Trump's appointees and his own vice president, Mike Pence, resisted the fake fraud charges, the phony electors and the entire coup plot. As articulated repeatedly by Stone, Bannon, Flynn and others around Trump, the intent couldn't have been more brazenly authoritarian and illegal. In early September 2020,Stone echoed Flynn on Alex Jones'"Infowars" show that in the event of a contested election, Trump should invoke the Insurrection Act, and arrest Bill and Hillary Clinton, the late Senate majority leader Harry Reid, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and "anybody else who can be proven to be involved in illegal activity." He also urged Trump to shut down any publication that could supposedly be shown to have engaged in "seditious and illegal activities," and with its entire staff "arrested and taken into custody."

In short, the extremists around didn't hide their vision of a violent fascist takeover. That they couldn't execute the plan does not in any way exonerate them or Trump, who followed that plotline until it led to the mob attack on the Capitol. The latest video of Stone, preening and pontificating, is simply further proof of the criminal intent -- what the law calls mens rea -- that drove their attempt to overturn American democracy.

To find out more about Joe Conason and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA), a close ally of former President Donald Trump, reportedly testified before special counsel Jack Smith's grand jury investigating the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

This comes after Gingrich was also targeted for testimony in the election interference probe going on in Georgia — and he further came under fire for appearing to advocate violence in response to the FBI's search for classified documents at Trump's Mar-a-Lago country club.

Speaking to CNN, correspondent Sara Murray outlined the role Gingrich may have played in the plot to undermine the 2020 election.

"A source tells me that former Speaker Newt Gingrich was testifying before the grand jury," said Murray. "He spent half a day in front of that jury, and of course those proceedings are behind closed doors. We don't know exactly what prosecutors asked him."

However, Murray noted, the House January 6 Committee turned their sights on Gingrich last year.

"According to documents the committee was able to uncover, they say Gingrich was allegedly in communication with senior advisers to Donald Trump about the television strategy around the 2020 election including, you know, ads that would push some of these false allegations of election fraud," said Murray. "The January 6th Committee also alleged that Gingrich may have played some sort of role in coordinating some of these slates of fake electors that we saw in a number of battleground states that Donald Trump lost, but of course wanted to continue to try to contest. One of the people that Gingrich was in touch with was Mark Meadows, which of course, we reported also, has testified recently before these grand juries as part of the ongoing special counsel probe."

"I think, you know, one of the things that's striking ... is of course we're waiting for a potential indictment in the classified documents case," said Murray. "It looks like that could be looming kind of at any point, and it seems clear that these two probes could be moving on different time lines. You know, it's relatively late in the game to see a big name like Newt Gingrich going in before a grand jury. We also learned in recent weeks, prosecutors have been interviewing new witnesses, and of course we reported yesterday that just a couple of weeks ago,Steve Bannon got a subpoena for testimony and documents."

Watch below...

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critical

https://www.alternet.org/jericho-march-extremists-illustrate-threat/

an 5 23

no lnx

as Donald Trump plots a return to the White House in 2025, his past courtship of militant far-right groups — some of whom led the mob that overran the U.S. Capitol — highlights an ongoing threat of political violence in the United States.

Trump has continued to signal to violent extremists since Joe Biden’s inauguration in January 2021. In February, the former president amplified a user on the Truth Social platform who pledged that his supporters will “physically fight for him” to win the Republican nomination while warning that “we Are Locked and LOADED.”

Jacob Glick, a former investigative counsel for the January 6th Committee, told Raw Story it’s largely beside the point whether Trump directly or indirectly coordinated with the militant groups that attacked the Capitol — including, most prominently, leaders of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers, who have been convicted of seditious conspiracy.

“The scheme is in plain sight,” said Glick, who now serves as policy counsel at the Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection at Georgetown University Law Center. “The fact is that both Trump’s authoritarianism and the fascistic bloodlust of the militant groups who aligned with him were out in the open. They each saw each other without necessarily communicating directly. That doesn’t make it any less dangerous. That’s how this anti-democratic dynamic has operated throughout history.”

A patch on a tactical vest worn by a Trump supporter at the Jericho March rally reads: "Water boarding is how we baptize the terrorists." Jordan Green/Raw Story

Glick pointed to one particular strand of the Jan. 6 story as exemplifying Trump’s proximity to the militant groups.

:{:{}:

Robert M. Weaver, then employed in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, co-organized the Jericho March — a series of quasi-religious gatherings attended by a loose coalition of Trump supporters who staged weekly rallies in state capitols that culminated with a major demonstration in Washington, D.C., in December 2020.

The Jericho March helped set the stage for what transpired less than a month later on Jan. 6, 2021.

Texts obtained by the January 6th Committee show that Weaver communicated extensively with Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes, a featured speaker at the rally, and also received confirmation of Trump’s approval through an undisclosed contact within the Trump camp.

:{:{}:

“What the messages show is a really egregious instance of a pro-Trump political operative serving in the administration at the time who was extremely active in Stop the Steal — welcoming the help of armed extremists and didn’t reject it,” Glick told Raw Story.

A representative for the Trump campaign could not be reached for comment.

Weaver’s collaboration with Rhodes — now among six Oath Keepers convicted of seditious conspiracy — represents a “mainstreaming and normalization of political violence” seen in multiple instances of crossover between political operatives and militants in the runup to Jan. 6, Glick said, adding, “The Jericho March was 1,000 percent in that category.”

‘Let his church roar’

Weaver presented an unlikely candidate to lead the Christian nationalist wing of the election denial movement. It’s a movement that materialized quickly, one bent on keeping Trump in power after 2020 election returns showed the former president losing the electoral vote to Democrat Joe Biden.

A member of the Quapaw Tribe in Oklahoma with a business background in healthcare and employee benefits, Trump had made Weaver part of his administration. Then-President Trump first tapped Weaver to lead the Indian Health Service in 2017. But Weaver withdrew following a report by the Wall Street Journal that indicated his resume inaccurately stated his qualifications.

Despite being denied the leadership post, which required Senate confirmation, Weaver in July 2020 joined U.S. Department of Health and Human Services staff as anadviser to the Center for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships.

While other political operatives such as Ali Alexander, Amy Kremer, Felisa Blazek and Tomi Collins began organizing weekly rallies to sow doubt about the result of the 2020 election, Weaver launched a similar effort tomobilize Christians and a smaller subset of conservative Jews behind Trump. Weaver teamed up with Arina Grossu, a former Family Research Council spokesperson who was also working at Health and Human Services at the time, to lead what they called the Jericho March.

A self-described “holy roller, speaking-in-tongues” Pentecostal Christian, Weaver recalled during a Dec. 9, 2020, interview with Christian radio host Eric Metaxas that two days after the election he cried out to God in prayer, and then heard a voice telling him: “It’s not over.”

Weaver told Metaxas: “And the vision was of people all over the crowd, shofars blowing. I saw Catholics. I saw evangelical Christians. Charismatic Christians. I saw all kinds of nuns. I saw Jewish rabbis. I saw people praying. The church was united. And I knew that we were supposed to march on the 12th, that God was showing us that. And I knew we were also supposed to go to the contested states, and do the same thing. And it wasn’t just one time. God said to do it every day at noon, so we’ve been doing it since.”

]A man holding a pro-Second Amendment flag raises his hand during a praise song at the Jericho March in Washington, D.C. on Dec. 12, 2020. Jordan Green/Raw Story

As described by Weaver and others, the Jericho March was inspired by the Book of Joshua in the Old Testament, in which Joshua, the successor to Moses, leads an army of Israelites who conquer the ancient city of Jericho by marching around it seven times while blowing horns, with the walls crumbling at the seventh pass.

“God had told me that this was about unity,” Weaver said. “He told me to let his church roar.”

On the same day he described his vision to Metaxas, Rhodes added Weaver to the “Dec. 12 DC Security/Leadership” Signal chat, according to the communications which Weaver turned over to the January 6th Committee.

In a separate text obtained by the January 6th Committee, Weaver introduced Rhodes to Stephen Brown, whom the organizers hired to handle logistics for the event, writing: “Steve meet Stewart with Oathkeepers security. Please get with him to work on extra security.” Not only did the Oath Keepers provide additional security for the rally, but Rhodes spoke from the stage during the event.

Responding to news on the eve of the rally that the Supreme Court would refuse to hear a challenge filed by the Texas attorney general, Rhodes launched into a rant in the “Dec. 12 DC Security/Leadership” chat labeling the justices as “compromised or deep state traitors” and calling on Trump to invoke the Insurrection Act.

:{:{}:

“We are at war,” Rhodes wrote. “At war with China and all its American proxies, who are the domestic traitors and insurrectionists. Trump needs to be a wartime president and wage war on our enemies. That is all he has left. If he doesn’t do that, then we will have to fight against an illegitimate Biden regime and all of the deep state with him. It will be a bloody and desperate fight.”

Rhodes' comments on theSignal chat previewed his remarks when he took the stage the next day.

“He had these grand visions of being a paramilitary leader,” Jason Van Tatenhove, a former spokesperson for the Oath Keepers, told the January 6th Committee during a public hearing last July. “And the Insurrection Act would have given him a path forward with that. The fact that the president was communicating, whether directly or indirectly messaging that gave him the nod. All I can do is thank the gods that things did not go any worse that day.”

Trump ‘encouraged by’ Jericho marches

While Stewart Rhodes, the Oath Keepers founder, was emboldened by Trump’s flirtation with the Insurrection Act in 2020, the Jericho March organizers were able to cite the president’s approval to galvanize supporters. Trump’s benediction was passed down to Weaver through a contact at the White House, his co-organizer told the January 6th Committee.

:{:{}:

In a Nov. 10, 2020 Jericho March newsletter obtained by the committee, Arina Grossu wrote: “President Trump is also aware of the Jericho Marches and is encouraged by them.”

One of the staff members asked Grossu how she knew that Trump was aware of the marches.

“So that is a question for Rob,” she responded. “I don’t have — I was not in those conversations or in any of those — I did not have that kind of connection.”

Grossu also told the committee thatin the days leading up to the Dec. 12 rally, “there was talk that maybe he would fly over,” and indeed Trump did signal his approval to the rally by flying over in Marine One that day.

President Trump flies over the Jericho March in Washington, D.C. on Dec. 12, 2020. Jordan Green/Raw Story

Again, Grossu said her information came from Weaver.

“Rob would probably know more about details of that,” she said. Grossu said she did not know the identity of Weaver’s point of contact at the White House.

The committee did not depose Weaver, although he did provide documents. Reached by phone by Raw Story last week, Weaver abruptly hung up.

The Dec. 12, 2020, Jericho March event in Washington, D.C. was a pivotal moment in the lead-up to the insurrection,in Glick’s view.

Two days later, the duly appointed electors would meet to cast electoral votes on behalf of their respective states. And in the early morning hours of Dec. 19, following a late-night meeting at the White House at which Trump’s allies urged him to call out the National Guard to seize voting machinery, Trump would summon his supporters to Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6 with his infamous “be there, will be wild” tweet.

:{:{}:

“It’s all of the January 6th story compressed into one disturbing arc,” Glick said. “December 12th was such an important day in terms of proving that model of political-militant coordination can work. They were able to replicate it on January 6th.

“December 12th was also important because Trump flew over the rally,” he continued. “That night D.C. descends into violence. He sends out his tweet a week later. We see Trump witnessing firsthand the violent potential of the Stop the Steal movement on the ground in D.C. Then, a few days later, when his paths to victory are all but closed off, he calls out his supporters again.”

“Be there, will be wild” was only the culmination of Trump’s courtship of militant groups, Glick said.

“The dynamics are crystal clear in the January 6th Committee report, in the DOJ prosecutions and in public reports,” Glick said. “Trump leaned into the potentially violent power of his base, while he was simultaneously orchestrating multiple illegal schemes to undermine the election. His extreme base followed those cues. They engaged in a call and response that stretched back for months and years before January 6th.”

Trump cultivated militant far-right groups throughout the 2020 campaign.

The former president kicked off his last re-election campaign with a speech in Orlando, Fla. in June 2019 in which he complained that “our patriotic movement has been under assault from the very first day” as members of the Proud Boys street gang prowled the streets outside the venue chanting, “Pinochet did nothing wrong” in homage to the late Chilean dictator known for extrajudicial execution of political opponents.

Days before a January 2020 Second Amendment rally in Richmond, Va. that attracted militia members, neo-Nazis and conspiracy theorists, Trump tweeted: “Your 2nd Amendment is under very serious attackin the Great Commonwealth of Virginia.” As protests against COVID restrictions took shape across the country — including one in which men in tactical gear carried assault rifles into the Michigan state capitol — a couple months later, Trump tweeted, “LIBERATE MICHIGAN,” and, “LIBERATE VIRGINIA, and save your great 2nd Amendment. It is under siege.”

During his first debate with Joe Biden in September 2020, Trump infamously instructed the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by.” And in the closing days of the campaign, he minimized a plot by Three Percenters to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer,telling supporters at a rally in Lansing that “people are entitled to say maybe it was a problem, maybe it wasn’t.”

‘2024 is the final battle’

The same contours of desperation that drove Trump’s 2020 campaign are in place again for his 2024 bid.

While Trump is the early favorite to again win the Republican presidential nomination, significant trouble looms for him. The multiple criminal investigations against Trump may only increase the incentive for him to inflame his supporters with appeals to base fears. He will also face a 2024 Republican primary featuring several legitimate, conservative candidates intent on ending Trump’s political career for good.

Recalling that the Trump campaign sought to link civil unrest that erupted during his administration to Biden, Kristofer Goldsmith — a military veteran who leads the anti-sedition group Task Force Butler — predicted that Trump will encourage rioting during the 2024 election in order to inflict political damage on his Democratic opponent.

“Any opportunity he has to inspire a riot, especially in American cities — what are traditionally considered Democrat-controlled areas — he has every incentive to inspire riots, and there are tons of neo-Nazis around the country who are desperate for that kind of permission structure,” Goldsmith said.

While militant leaders such as Rhodes looked to Trump for approval to carry out acts of violence, Trump signaled to extremists at key moments during the 2020 campaign when he needed to energize his base by invoking fears about federal investigations, gun control, urban crime, and pandemic restrictions.

Goldsmith said Trump shows every sign of similarly exploiting anti-LGBTQ hate as the 2024 campaign unfolds.

RELATED ARTICLE: How Trump-backing Jan. 6 ‘marshals’ ditched their pink vests and staged an insurrection

“The way that the last two years have gone with the radicalization of the Republican Party and the adoption of legislation specifically targeting, taking away the rights of, and imposing restrictions on the LGBTQ community, I expect Trump to use that,” Goldsmith told Raw Story. “I expect Trump to use the LGBTQ community as a punching bag to further radicalize the Republican Party — to give permission to elements of the far right that have a desire to go out and use violence.”

:{:{}:

During a campaign rally in New Hampshire last month, Trump demonstrated how his rhetoric has evolved since he left the White House in January 2021. Specifically, he used anti-LGBTQ language and apocalyptic political imagery to excite his supporters.

“Does anybody really believe what’s going on in this country?” Trump asked. “I will sign a law prohibiting child sexual mutilation in all 50 states. And this is what we must do to save our country from destruction. 2024 is the final battle. If we don’t take it over, we’re not going to have a country anymore.”

Far from condemning those who committed violence on his behalf, Trump has offered symbolic support.

The former president glorified the rioters who attacked the Capitol by playing a recording of Jan. 6 defendants housed at the D.C. jail singing “The Star-Spangled Banner” during a recent rally in Waco, Texas. And last week, during a CNN town hall in New Hampshire, Trump said he was inclined to pardon many of those who face criminal charges in the attack. That signaling gives a green light to future violence, Goldsmith said.

“He wants to assure his fascist troops and out-and-out neo-Nazis that he will go to bat for them if they commit violence on his behalf,” Goldsmith said.

Again, as in 2020, Trump is refusing to acknowledge the legitimacy of any outcome in the 2024 election that does not make him the victor, while claiming that America’s very nationhood is at stake.

“I’m just telling you,” he said during his campaign rally in New Hampshire last month, “if we allow them to cheat, because that’s the only way they’re going to win the election — if we allow them to cheat again, you’re not going to have a country.”

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https://www.alternet.org/he-admits-it-damning-recording/

4 23 raw

mSNBC's Ari Melber on Tuesday said that he had acquired a "damning" new recording of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) discussing how to potentially overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.

"I think that the country deserves to have a credible assessment of these claims and what the evidence shows and the mechanism to try to force that is denying certification on the sixth," Cruz told Fox host Maria Bartiromo on Jan. 2, 2021.

"'Forcing this reassessment,' as he so dryly put it, of [Joe] Biden's actual win," alleged Melber, "was for Cruz one step in a larger coup plot. And that's what the next tape I'm going play for you shows after the violence on Jan. 6th, there was, of course, the ongoing process of trying to overthrow the election Cruz early in that day right before the Capitol was breached was one of 11 senators denying. I should point out, the majority of senators didn't go that far. That's just one thing. Then there's step two, which you can hear yourself tonight."

"Who's deciding who gets inaugurated?" Bartiromo asked.

"It would be the results of the commission and what they find, and if they found credible evidence of fraud that undermines confidence in the electoral results in any given state they would report on that," Cruz told her.

Melber explained that this is a tape of Cruz thinking that he was talking in secret.

"He admits it," Melber continues. "You heard the question — who decides who gets inaugurated that's what this is all about. You have a certified winner. You have the courts having passed up any potential challenge. So, at that point, it was President-elect Biden, and Cruz answers this fake, made-up commission he and his Trump buddy were planning to create to bureaucratize a coup. That's what they were trying to do. That was his answer. That's how they were trying to steal the race. The references to fraud, we know, one, he didn't believe in those we have that on tape.B. more importantly, the judges and fact-finding we have in the country didn't find there was that kind of fraud and then 3. that's all just talk anyway because they're literally trying to steal it for Trump, so all the words in the middle are just the words to get there."

Hear the recordings below or at the link here.

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https://www.mediamatters.org/foxdominion-lawsuit/new-audio-shows-fox-news-anchor-maria-bartiromo-followed-trump-campaign

no lnx vid

New audio shows Fox News anchor Maria Bartiromo followed Trump campaign directives to promote January 6

The Trump campaign told Bartiromo to push January 6, 2021, as the date to overturn the 2020 election. Then she did it.

WRITTEN BY ERIC KLEEFELD

PUBLISHED 04/14/23

New audio revealed as part of Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News — which Fox allegedly failed to provide to Dominion in the discovery process — shows how Fox News and Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo took directives from the Trump campaign to promote the campaign’s plan to overturn the 2020 presidential election results on January 6, 2021.

The new evidence was revealed by former Fox producer Abby Grossberg as part of her separate lawsuit against the network for allegedly setting her and Bartiromo up as scapegoats for Fox’s clear pattern of spreading lies and conspiracy theories about the 2020 election. While the paper trail released so far in the case shows that Grossberg herself promoted conspiracy theories in the pursuit of ratings, she has also brought forward additional evidence that has already produced big legal results in the Dominion case. The judge in the case reportedly sanctioned Fox on Wednesday for failing to turn over Grossberg’s audio recordings in a move that will give Dominion an opportunity to conduct further legal discovery at Fox’s expense.

On Wednesday night, MSNBC host Alex Wagner played exclusive audio excerpts from the key pieces of evidence that Grossberg had preserved and Fox had allegedly withheld from Dominion, including aphone call on November 8, 2020, in which then-Trump campaign attorney Rudy Giuliani admitted that he did not have evidence for his outlandish claims about Dominion. (Bartiromo and other Fox hosts continued to host Giuliani, anyway.)

In another phone call, from December 5, 2020, an unnamed Trump campaign official admitted that Georgia’s statewide recount of ballots was “pretty darn close to what the machine count was,” and that the secretary of state’s office found that “that there weren’t any physical issues” with the voting machines. In a key piece of audio that Wagner played Wednesday night, theTrump campaign official also gave one of the earliest signals that the campaign intended to use the January 6, 2021, joint session of Congress in an attempt to overturn the election results,and that then-Vice President Mike Pence would supposedly “have to decide” which votes to count.

In another key section from the December 5, 2020, phone call that Grossberg’s lawyer provided to Wagner, the unnamed Trump campaign official suggested that media outlets should cover this date as a supposed milestone for determining the election — indeed, this had been his entire purpose for getting on this phone call.

Video From the April 12, 2023, edition of MSNBC’s Alex Wagner Tonight

Bartiromo immediately picked up on the Trump campaign’s instruction. On both her weekday morning Fox Business show, as well as her Sunday show on Fox News that Grossberg regularly produced, Bartiromo pushed the January 6 date many, many times, furthering the Trump campaign’s efforts to move the goal posts from its many legal and electoral defeats. These examples included instances in which Bartiromo either mentioned the date first, or she was clearly teeing up the guest to talk about the date, which Bartiromo depicted as an alleged point in time when Congress or Pence could realistically overturn the election.

On December 8, 2020, which was known as the “safe harbor” date against any legal challenges for the election results, Bartiromo hosted then-Trump campaign attorneyJenna Ellis, asking her, “So what do you see as, you know, today's date in terms of the safe harbor date? How does that complicate your challenges?” Ellis responded that “the ultimate date of significance is January 6,” which she said justified the campaign’s continued litigation. This was three days after Bartiromo’s call with the Trump campaign official. [Fox Business, Mornings with Maria Bartiromo, 12/8/20]

On the December 13 edition of her Sunday show, Bartiromo hosted Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), asking him, “I want you to walk us through what happens on January 6,” which she described as “another date, as we approach a potential transition” of the presidency. Jordan then described the efforts that congressional Republicans would make to object to the election results, in order to prevent the “potential transition” that Bartiromo had described. [Fox News, Sunday Morning Futures, 12/13/20]

Video

Citation From the December 13, 2020, edition of Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo

On December 14, the date when the Electoral College delegates voted across the country, Bartiromo hosted then-House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy. “What's your take on where we are?” she asked. “Is it the end of the line now for the president's campaign to stop and overturn this election as the Electoral College will meet, or are you looking at January 6 as a pivotal date or what?” [Fox Business, Mornings with Maria Bartiromo, 12/14/20]

The next day, December 15, Bartiromo read a news headline about the Electoral College results. Following a video clip of President-elect Joe Biden calling for the country “to unite, to heal,” Bartiromo said in a seeming rebuttal: “The next major step in the election process is on January 6. This is the date we are looking forward to, when Vice President Mike Pence is going to preside over the joint session of Congress while they officially tabulate the electoral votes.” [Fox Business, Mornings with Maria Bartiromo, 12/15/20]

Video

Citation From the December 15, 2020, edition of Fox Business’ Mornings with Maria Bartiromo

On December 18, Bartiromo hosted former pro football player and future Republican U.S. Senate candidate Herschel Walker and his son, right-wing social media personality Christian Walker. Bartiromo played a video clip that Christian Walker had posted in which he declared, “The electors might have cast their votes today. They're not counted until January 6, when Congress meets. … This isn’t over yet.” Bartiromo responded: “I just love that.” [Fox Business, Mornings with Maria Bartiromo, 12/18/20]

On December 20, Bartiromo hosted Herschel and Christian Walker again on her Sunday show, once again praising Christian Walker’s online video and telling him, “You were basically underlining Section 1, Article 2 in the Constitution.” After Christian declared on “January 6, the vice president will count the votes,” Bartiromo did not challenge the apparent contention that Pence could determine the election results, but instead just praised Christian further: “Yes, and that's pretty much what you said on Instagram, which was great. It went viral.” [Fox News, Sunday Morning Futures, 12/20/20]

On the January 3, 2021, edition of her Sunday show — the weekend prior to the joint session of Congress — Bartiromo hosted multiple Republican members of Congress who were planning to challenge the election results. At the conclusion of one segment, she remarked to Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL): “If you're going to object to six states, and then you’ve got a two-hour debate, we’re not going to learn the results here until — well, we're not going to learn on January 6, that’s for sure. This goes into January 7.” (The electoral votes were indeed certified after midnight, under what had become truly unprecedented circumstances.) [Fox News, Sunday Morning Futures, 1/3/21]

Video

Citation From the January 3, 2021, edition of Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo

The manner in which Grossberg has sought to substantiate the main claim in her lawsuit against Fox — that the network was allegedly setting up her and Bartiromo to take a fall in the Dominion lawsuit — is turning out to be a very strange thing indeed. Fox executives must bear ultimate responsibility for the lies the network helped to spread, but at the same time the new evidence that Grossberg has brought to bear in this case makes Bartiromo look worse and worse by revealing more of her reckless on-air behavior and coordination with the Trump campaign’s effort to subvert a national election result.

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Pagination

Current page1

…

IN THIS ARTICLE

Fox/Dominion Lawsuit

Fox News host Mark Levin demands judge in Dominion lawsuit “step aside”

04/14/23 11:01 AM EDT

Listen to Media Matters' Angelo Carusone explain how the Dominion lawsuit could impact Fox News’ cable contract negotiations

04/13/23 6:38 PM EDT

Judge in Dominion case admonishes Fox lawyers for allegedly withholding discovery and misleading the court about Rupert Murdoch's role

04/12/23

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cut off

https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-J6-REPORT/html-submitted/ch3.html

j6 report ch 3

As discussed further in Chapter 5, that email contained Eastman’s 2-page memo proposing a strategy for January 6th based on the incorrect legal theory that Vice President Pence could assert some authority as President of the Senate to prevent or delay the election of former Vice President Biden during the joint session. Eastman’s memo relied on the fake votes, which the memo featured in the very first line: “7 states have transmitted dual slates of electors.” 120 When Eastman submitted his memo toEpshteyn, he also copied Chesebro, who had edited the memo and called it “[r]eally awesome.” 121

:{By that point, :{Chesebro and Eastman}: were coordinating their arguments about the fake-elector votes and how they should be used:{. On January 1, 2021, Chesebro sent an email to Eastman and Epshteyn that recommended that Vice President Pence derail the joint session of Congress. In it, he raised the idea of Vice President Pence declaring “that there are two competing slates of electoral votes” in several States, and taking the position that only he, or possibly Congress, could “resolve any disputes concerning them.” 122}:

Two days later, Eastman completed his second major memo advising President Trump and his team on strategies for January 6th, again arguing that there were “dual slates of electors from 7 states,” and calling for Vice President Pence to assert power to act “[a]s the ultimate arbiter” to take steps that could overturn the election, either by sending the election back to State legislatures to reassess or by rejecting Biden’s certified electoral votes from States in which there were also fake Trump electors.123

By early January, most of the fake elector votes had arrived in Washington, except those from Michigan and Wisconsin.124 Undeterred, the Trump team arranged to fly them to Washington and hand deliver them to Congress for the Vice President himself. “Freaking trump idiots want someone to fly original elector papers to the senate President . . .” Wisconsin Republican Party official Mark Jefferson wrote to Party Chairman Hitt on January 4th.125 Hitt responded, “Ok I see I have a missed call from [Mike] Roman and a text from someone else. Did you talk to them already? This is just nuts. . . .” 126

The next day, Trump Campaign Deputy Director for Election Day Operations G. Michael Brown sent a text message to other campaign staff suggesting that he was the person who delivered the fake votes to Congress.127 After sending the group a photo of his face with the Capitol in the background, Brown said, “This has got to be the cover a book I write one day” and “I should probably buy [Mike] [R]oman a tie or something for sending me on this one. Hasn’t been done since 1876 and it was only 3 states that did it.” 128 The reference to 1876 alludes to a controversy during that election about certain States’ electoral college votes.129

President Trump and his Campaign apparently had assistance from allies on Capitol Hill for this effort, including Senator Ron Johnson, his chief of staff, and the chief of staff to Representative Mike Kelly, although Senator Johnson has said that “[his] involvement in that attempt to deliver” fake elector paperwork “spanned the course of a couple seconds.” 130 On the morning of January 6th, Representative Kelly’s then-chief of staff texted anaide to the Vice President, Chris Hodgson, about hand-delivering the fake elector votes to the Vice President’s team before the joint session, a message that Hodgson ignored: “Just following up-any chance you or someone from your team can meet to take the Michigan and Wisconsin packets.” 131

According to the office of Senator Ron Johnson, Representative Kelly’s chief of staff then had a phone call with Senator Johnson’s chief of staff at 11:58 a.m. “about how Kelly’s office could get us the electors [sic] because they had it.” 132 Shortly after 11:30 a.m., the Trump Campaign’s lead attorney in Wisconsin had texted Senator Johnson expressing a “[n]eed to get a document on Wisconsin electors to you [for] the VP immediately. Is there a staff person I can talk to immediately.” 133 Senator Johnson then put his chief of staff in touch with the campaign to handle the issue.134

Shortly afterwards, Senator Johnson’s chief of staff texted Hodgson: “[Sen.] Johnson needs to hand something to VPOTUS please advise.” 135 When Hodgson asked what it was, the response he got was, “Alternate slate of electors for MI and WI because archivist didn’t receive them.” 136 Hodgson did not mince words: “Do not give that to him [the Vice President]. He’s about to walk over to preside over the joint session, those were supposed to come in through the mail.” 137

Those fake electoral votes, which the Trump team tried for weeks to manufacture and deliver, never made it to the Vice President. But they would have been invalid even if they did arrive on time. The Trump team’s activities were based on the false pretense that these fake electoral votes had a decisive role to play at the joint session of Congress. And yet any such role that they could have played would have helped unlawfully obstruct an official proceeding that determines how our Nation carries out the peaceful transfer of power between Presidents.

Indeed, as the joint session approached, Senator Mike Lee had expressed grave concerns about the fake elector effort in a series of text messages to one of the Trump team’s senior legal advisors. Although Senator Lee had spent a month encouraging the idea of having State legislatures endorse competing electors for Trump, he grew alarmed as it became clear that the Trump team wanted the fake electors’ votes to be considered on January 6th

...

On December 30th, Senator Lee texted Trump advisor Cleta Mitchell that January 6th was “a dangerous idea,” including “for the republic itself.” 139 He explained that, “I don’t think we have any valid basis for objecting to the electors” because “it cannot be true that we can object to any state’s presidential electors simply because we don’t think they handled their election well or suspect illegal activity.” 140 Senator Lee even questioned her about the plan’s dangerous long-term consequences: “[w]ill you please explain to me how this doesn’t create a slippery slope problem for all future presidential elections?” 141

ENDNOTES

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wellll....

https://www.alternet.org/kansas-mayor-trump-like-coup/

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an 1 23

The Jan. 6 insurrection testimony of General Mark Milley revealed that there were conversations among members of the Trump administration to court-martial retired military officers who criticized Trump’s handling of 2020 civil unrest in published op-eds, Insider reports.

A 20th Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and top military aide to Trump since 2019, Milley’s testimony was part of a trove of documents the committee released earlier this week.

The testimony includes Rep. Elaine Luria (D-VA) asking if Milley considered approaching former Trump advisor, Michael Flynn, about the administration's desire to enforce military action against the retired officers. Milley said he was “concerned about the politicization of the military” after op-eds “very critical of then President Trump” by retired military officers were published.

Milley said, "There was actually discussions with me: Bring him back on Active Duty, court-martial him, you know, make him walk the plank sort of thing, right? I advised them not to do that, because that would further politicize, in my personal view."

Retired military officers the administration targeted for court-martialing were not named during testimony, but according to Insider, a few did publish op-eds criticizing the way Trump responded to nationwide protests following George Floyd’s murder in 2020.

For Foreign Policy, retired Marine Corps General John Allen wrote, “Donald Trump expressed only the barest of condolences at the murder of George Floyd, but he also said nothing about the fundamental and underlying reasons for the unrest: systemic racism and inequality, a historic absence of respect, and a denial of justice.”

Allen also highlighted that Trump "threatened to deploy the U.S. military against American citizens."

Navy Admiral Mike Mullen said in his Atlantic op-ed titled “I Cannot Remain Silent” that he was “deeply worried that as [the military] execute their orders, the members of our military will be co-opted for political purposes.”

Mullen wrote, “Even in the midst of the carnage we are witnessing, we must endeavor to see American cities and towns as our homes and our neighborhoods. They are not 'battle spaces' to be dominated, and must never become so.”

Milley mentioned during testimony that he “was worried about the ‘broader implications’ of politicization of the military, taking action against retired officers who speak out shouldn't be done lightly," Insider reports.

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https://www.alternet.org/unequal-justice-crime-and-punishment/

j6 comm good at narr]

...

Trump’s prosecution, at least at the federal level (he’s also under serious investigation in the states of Georgia and New York), now rests in the hands of the Justice Department and special counsel Jack Smith. The DOJ has received criminal referrals from the committee for four overlapping federal felonies committed by the former President:

Obstruction of an official proceeding, referring to the joint session of Congress convened on January 6, 2021, to confirm the election of Joe Biden, and the effort to pressure Vice President Mike Pence to refuse to certify Biden’s victory;
Conspiracy to defraud the United States, referring to the former president’s multi-phase scheme to overturn the election;
Conspiracy to make a false statement, referring to the plan to submit false slates of electors to Congress and the National Archives; and
Inciting, assisting, or giving aid and comfort to an insurrection, referring to Trump’s incendiary speech immediately prior to the riot at the Capitol and his behavior during the riot.

The committee has also referred five of Trump’s former aides and associates to the Justice Department: John Eastman, Mark Meadows, Rudy Giuliani, Kenneth Cheseboro and Jeffrey Clark. Trump, however, is the only member of the crew who has been referred for insurrection. The report singles out the ex-commander-in-chief on the insurrection charge, stating “the central cause of January 6th was one man, former President Donald Trump.”

Although the referrals are non-binding, Smith is already in the thick of investigating the insurrection and the plot to overturn the 2020 election, presenting evidence to at least two grand juries. The special counsel is also leading the investigation into Trump’s removal of top-secret government documents to his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.

Convicting Trump will not be easy, especially on charges related to January 6. Each of the felonies referred to the Department of Justice requires proof of criminal intent. The government will have to establish beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump knew he had lost the election and was acting with a “corrupt purpose” to obstruct the work of the joint session of Congress or, on the conspiracy referral, that he had an intent to defraud the nation with the submission of fake slates of electors.

It will be particularly challenging to prove that Trump incited or assisted the insurrection as Trump would likely mount a First Amendment defense. In its landmark 1969 decision in Brandenburg v. Ohio, the Supreme Court articulated a two-part test for punishing incendiary speech, holding that the First Amendment protects advocating the use of force or lawbreaking “except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action” (emphasis added).

Still, it’s easy to understand why the committee chose to cite Trump for insurrection. Trump knew that members of the crowd who had gathered to hear him talk were armed when he urged them to march to the Capitol to “fight like hell.” And amid the ensuing melee, he accused Pence of cowardice for not using his authority as Vice President to change the outcome of the election, seething in a Tweet, “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution…USA demands the truth!” Almost immediately after the Tweet was posted, the report notes, “the crowd around the Capitol surged, and more individuals joined the effort to confront police and break further into the building.”

Should Trump be tried and convicted of insurrection, he would face a prison sentence of up to ten years. He would also be barred from holding federal office for life.

So, what are the odds that Trump is finally held to account? Will Jack Smith prove to be Trump’s Porfiry Petrovich, the police investigator who brought Raskolnikov to justice, or will he turn out to be another Robert Mueller? We may have the answer in a matter of months.

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an ah 12 22

No one can accuse the January 6 Select Committee’s final report of not being comprehensive; the report, which National Public Radio (NPR) has published in its entirety on its website, is 845 pages long. One of the many things the Committee covers in the report is the fake electors plot of late 2020, which found MAGA Republicans in swing states circulating bogus Electoral College documents in an effort to give electoral votes that now-President Joe Biden legitimately won to Donald Trump.

In an article published by the conservative website The Bulwark the morning after Christmas 2022, attorney/columnist Philip Rotner examines what the January 6 Committee’s final report has to say about that plot and lays out some reasons why it makes a strong argument for criminally prosecuting Trump.

“On December 14, 2020,” Rotner explains, “Republican operatives in at least five states — each of which had already officially certified Joe Biden as the winner — forged and submitted to Congress and the National Archives fake Electoral College certificates purporting to certify Donald Trump, not Biden, as the ‘duly elected’ winner. The left-leaning watchdog group American Oversight first blew the whistle on the fake elector scheme in March 2021, but it wasn’t until Rachel Maddow devoted a series of shows to it in January 2022 that it really captured public attention.”

The attorney/columnist continues, “The fake electors were hardly the worst of what Trump visited on us. For sheer journalistic sex appeal, a scheme by a bunch of unknown, bumbling state functionaries to phony up some documents just can’t compete with a president siccing an armed mob on the Capitol. But the fake elector scandal, while not the most shocking of Trump’s predations, has long looked like the straightest route to cracking open the entire 2020 election scheme, and to getting Donald Trump indicted and convicted of a crime — at least until the Mar-a-Lago stolen documents scandal was revealed, but that’s another story.”

Rotner stresses that if Trump was a “knowing participant” in the “fake elector scheme,” that would be damning whether or not he honestly believed that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

“Even if he really, truly believed the election was stolen, it would not be a defense to criminal charges for participating in a fraudulent scheme to submit forged documents as the official results of state presidential elections,” Rotner argues. “To the contrary, his belief that he was stealing back a stolen election would be highly incriminating proof of his motive, not a defense…. If it can be proved that Trump intentionally participated in the scheme to try to pass off forged documents as official state documents, and then use the phony documents to overturn an election, it wouldn’t make any difference why he did so. The act of participating in the scheme, in and of itself, regardless of his purported reasons for doing so, would still run afoul of all kinds of state and federal criminal laws.”

Rotner continues, “The path to prosecuting Trump for the fake elector scheme — either as a standalone crime or as a crucial element of a larger conspiracy to overturn the results of a presidential election —became much clearer last week with the publication of the final report of the House January 6 Committee.”

The January 6 Committee’s final report, according to Rotner, shows that “the scheme went all the way to the top, right up to Trump himself” and that “while some of the lower-level participants in the scheme — most likely some of the state-level GOP operatives who actually signed the phony certificates — may have been duped into believing that that it was acontingencyplan, the higher ups who created and executed the scheme knew better."

“According to the report, by December 8, 2020 — less than three weeks after (attorney Kenneth) Chesebro first laid the groundwork for the scheme in a November 18 memo — ‘President Trump had decided to pursue the fake elector plan and was driving it,’” Rotner notes. “By mid-December, Trump had enlisted the assistance of RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel in the scheme, worked with Rudy Giuliani on its implementation, and been informed that litigation would be filed in four states ‘to create a pretext to claim that it was still possible for the fake electors to be authorized retroactively.’ So, it appears that the previously missing link — the link between the fake elector scheme and Trump himself — is no longer missing. Trump not only ‘participated’ in the fake elector scheme, he orchestrated it.”

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an me 12 22

A new transcript is shedding light on Julia “Julie” Fancelli's intent to offer $3 million to support for those who were involved in the Jan. 6 protests that transpired prior to Trump supporters storming the U.S. Capitol.

According to HuffPost, documentation of the Publix heir's testimony before the House Select Committee includes details about the donations she was willing to provide.

The report also noted that InfoWars host and conspiracy theorist Alex Stone, Trump aide Roger Stone and Charlie Kirk also benefited from Fancelli's contributions.

"Extremist conspiracy peddler Alex Jones apparently scored $200,000 from Fancelli, longtime Donald Trump aide Roger Stone was provided a private flight to Washington, D.C., and young Trump disciple Charlie Kirk — head of Turning Point USA — received $1.25 million ostensibly to transport masses of Trump supporters to the capital, according to the transcript of her questioning released by the committee Thursday," the news outlet reports.

Out of Fancelli's donation, Stone was supposed to use a quarter of the $200,000 for the "rally operating budget."

The latest on the transcript follows a previous Washington Post report about Fancelli's contribution. According to that report, she was listed as one of the largest publicly known contributors to former President Donald Trump's January 6 "Stop the Steal" rally.

"The Washington Post earlier reported that Fancelli was the largest publicly known donor to the rally — and had wired $650,000 to groups behind the 'Stop the Steal' organizing," the news outlet reports. "But the transcript of her questioning, which cites wire transfers and various communications, has revealed that her financial role was even greater than previously known. She has told the Post she had no idea the event would become violent."

As reports began circulating about Fancelli's contribution, Publix previously released a statement distancing from her actions. “We are deeply troubled by Ms. Fancelli’s involvement in the events that led to the tragic attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6,” the company said last year when questioned about her role in the rally efforts.

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an 11 22 badash

Political experts are warning about a group of nearly 60 far-right wing politicos including Ginni Thomas, Matt Schlapp, and Cleta Mitchell who reportedly will issue a letter calling for the House and Senate to delay votes on leadership positions including Speaker of the House and Senate Majority Leader.

Axios’ Jonathan first reported the news, posting at least part of the letter and the list of signatories (below).

Some of the other more recognizable names on the letter include Mark Meadows, the former Trump White House chief of staff; Cleta Mitchell, the attorney who The New York Times calls the “architect of Donald J. Trump’s failed efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election”; former Trump attorney Jenna Ellis; former U.S. Senator and former Heritage Foundation president Jim DeMint (R-SC); former Trump deputy campaign manager David Bossie, the right wing activist and head of the organization responsible for the Citizens United Supreme Court lawsuit that made countless billions of dark money in political elections legal.

Also, white supremacist and disgraced former U.S. Congressman Steve King (R-IA); convicted felon and disgraced former U.S. Congressman Steve Stockman (R-TX), right-wing religious extremist Kenneth Blackwell of the Family Research Council, which is on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s list of anti-LGBTQ hate groups, and others.

“The Republican Party needs leaders who will confidently and skillfully present a persuasive coherent vision of who we are, what we stand for, and what we will do,” the letter reads. “Many current elections are still undecided. There should be no rushed leadership elections.”

“Conservative Members of the House and Senate have called for the leadership elections to be delayed,” it adds, not naming which ones. “We strongly urge both Houses of Congress to postpone the formal Leadership elections until after the December 6 runoff in Georgia and all election results are fully decided.”

Experts are weighing in and issuing warnings.

“Note at least 3 people on this letter–Mark Meadows, Jenna Ellis, and Cleta Mitchell–are almost certainly subjects of the Jan6 investigation,” observed civil rights and national security journalist Marcy Wheeler. “So this is partly a crime-protection racket, signed by Clarence Thomas’ spouse.”

HuffPost’s White House correspondent S.V. Dáte, who once in a press conference asked Donald Trump if he regretted “all the lying,” likened the list to “a coup-plotters reunion.”

Politico Senior legal affairs reporter Kyle Cheney, who has done extensive reporting on the January 6 insurrection, commented, “some of these people are experts at seeking delays of elections.”

Investigative journalist and columnist Dave Troy, who has done extensive reporting on Vladimir Putin, noted: “All this makes me ask is what these clowns (Ginni Thomas, Cleta Mitchell, Mark Meadows et al) are planning between now and December 6, and how to stop whatever it is. Are they planning to poison someone? What is it this time?”

“Why aren’t these people in jail, anyway?” he also asked.

The American Independent’s senior political reporter Emily C. Singer simply called it a “who’s who of insurrection supporting Republicans.”

“So you’re telling me that Ginni Thomas, Mark Meadows and Matt Schlapp want to interfere in an ANOTHER election,” wrote Attorney Adam Cohen of Lawyers for Good Government. “Folks, even if the Democrats retain the House, we cannot rest. Because these people won’t.”

Read the letter below or at this link.

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an 10/17/22

When Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia debated Marcus Flowers, her Democratic challenger in the 2022 midterms, on October 16, he lambasted her for encouraging the insurrectionists who attacked the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6, 2021. Greene angrily responded that it was unfair to blame her for that attack in any way. But an article written by journalist/author Hunter Walker and published on SubStack following that debate demonstrates that Greene promoted the Big Lie after the 2020 election and encouraged MAGA efforts to overturn the election results.

Greene, during the debate, told Flowers, “You cannot accuse me of insurrection. I was a victim of the January 6 riot just as much as any other member of Congress. That was the third day I had on the job. I had nothing to do with what happened there that day, and I will not have you accuse me of that. That is wrong of you to do. You’re lying about me, and you will not defame my character in that manner.”

But text messages that Greene sent to former White House Chief of Starr Mark Meadows before January 6, 2021, according to Walker, “indicate” that she “was involved in organizing the efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election at the U.S.”

Walker has had a lot to say about the January 6, 2021 insurrection. He wrote the new book, “The Breach: The Untold Story of the Investigation into January 6th,” with former Rep. Denver Riggleman — a conservative/libertarian who served in the U.S. House of Representatives via Virginia before losing a GOP primary and has been vehemently critical of the MAGA movement.

In one of her pre-January 6, 2021 messages to Meadows, according to Walker, Greene wrote, “Good morning Mark, I’m here in DC. We have to get organized for the 6th. I would like to meet with Rudy Giuliani again. We didn’t get to speak with him long. Also anyone who can help…. We are getting a lot of members on board. And we need to lay out the best case for each state.”

In another text, Greene told Meadows, “Last night Sen (Lindsey) Graham told me that if I found 100 names of dead voters in GA that he would object. I have 100 dead voters names!!.... Tell President Trump!”

After the insurrectionists attacked the Capitol, Walker reports, Greene promoted the bogus conspiracy theory that they were members of Antifa.

“Mark we don’t think these attackers are our people,” Greene told Meadows. “We think they are Antifa. Dressed like Trump supporters.”

On January 7, 2021, Greene told Meadows, “Yesterday was a terrible day. We tried everything we could in our objection to the 6 states. I’m sorry nothing worked. I don’t think that President Trump caused the attack on the Capitol. It’s not his fault. Antifa was mixed in the crowed and instigated it, and sadly people followed. But when people try everything and no one listens and nothing works, I guess they think they have no other choice.”

Greene continued, “Absolutely no excuse and I fully denounce all of it, but after shut downs all year and a stolen election, people are saying that they have no other choice. I defended Trump last night on Newsmax. He has been the greatest President. I will continue to defend him.”

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an 10 22

Former President Donald Trump and his aides crafted a proclamation that he won the 2020 election days before it took place, according to an email obtained from the National Archives by the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol.

Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren (D-California), who serves on the bipartisan nine-member panel, stated at Thursday's hearing that "the draft statement which was sent on October 31st declares 'we had an election today and I won.'"

Trump wrote to Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton that "the Ballots counted by the Election Day deadline show the American people have bestowed upon me the great honor of reelection of President of the United States."

While prepping victory speeches in advance is not unusual under normal circumstances, Lofgren noted that Trump's instructions to Fitton signify an "intentional" and "premeditated" effort to subvert the democratic process.

"The Fitton memo specifically indicates a plan that only the votes counted by the Election Day deadline – and there is no Election Day deadline – would matter," Lofgren said. "Everyone knew the lawful counting would continue past Election Day. Claiming that the counting on Election Night must stop before millions of votes were counted was, as we now know, a key part of President Trump's premeditated plan."

Watch below or at this link.

10 22 hearing subpoena dt &? "They do expect it to be a unanimous vote by the committee, but what we saw here today was Liz Cheney really lay out Donald Trump — and I use the word coconspirators," Gangel reported. "Roger Stone, Michael Flynn, John Eastman, Jeff Clark, Steve Bannon, Peter Navarro, and Mark Meadows, the former chief of staff who's refused to testify."

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https://www.joemygod.com/2022/09/oath-keepers-lawyer-arrested-on-conspiracy-charges/

Washington Post reports:

An attorney for the Oath Keepers who was with the group’s founder, Stewart Rhodes, outside the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, was arrested Thursday in Texas on charges related to the attack on Congress, federal prosecutors announced.

Kellye SoRelle, 43, was arrested in Junction, Tex., and is scheduled to make an initial appearance Thursday afternoon before a federal judge in Austin, according to the U.S. attorney’s office for Washington.

SoRelle was charged in an indictment returned Wednesday on four counts — conspiracy, obstruction of a federal proceeding, tampering with documents and misdemeanor trespassing in a restricted building or grounds — prosecutors said.

Read the full article. SoRelle last appeared on JMG in January 2022 when she declared herself to be the new leader of the Oath Keepers after the arrest of Stewart Rhodes. SoRelle is a failed candidate for the Texas House, finishing third in the 2020 GOP primary.

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edit bd

Last week, I wrote about an overlooked feature of the former president’s failed hostile takeover of the United States government. Lacking a better term, I called it Donald Trump’s congressional coup.

Last night’s hearing, however, suggested one more layer.

A cover-up of the congressional coup.

By the Congress.

Hinting hard

The goal appears to have been getting enough members of the US Congress to vote to overturn the results of the 2020 election. The GOP had a Senate majority at the time. They could have, in theory, overruled the will of the people, at least temporarily. Ultimately, however, just 147 Republicans, including eight senators, objected.

I don’t know, had they amassed enough votes in the Senate, where things would have gone after that. Perhaps it would have triggered the 12th Amendment. Perhaps it would have thrown the process back to red states that Joe Biden had won, where friendly Republican legislators would have fixed things so Trump could stay in office.

In any case, the former president spent a lot of time talking about congressional Republicans and talking directly to congressional Republicans to such a degree as to suggest there was another layer of his grand seditious conspiracy that’s only now coming into light. That’s certainly what the J6 committee has been hinting hard at.

Co-conspirators?

Last week, the panel’s Stephanie Murphy said Trump met in late December with US Reps. Matt Gaetz, Andy Biggs, Brian Babin, Jody Hice, Louie Gohmert, Andy Harris, Mo Brooks, Paul Gosar, Scott Perry and Jim Jordan. Margaret Taylor Greene was there. So were Mike Pence, Mark Meadows and Rudy Giuliani. (Seven of these members asked for pardons. Ditto Meadows, Giuliani and Greene.)

They tried getting the former vice president to go along with the conspiracy. It called for him to reject the count all by himself or send it back to the states where state GOP legislators were waiting.

Pence had refused before. I’m guessing those at the meeting expected him to again. He did. The next step was finalizing a scheme to bring tens of thousands of Trump loyalists to the capital, including armed paramilitaries (eg, Proud Boys and Oath Keepers), in order to terrify not only Pence but GOP senators into reinstalling Trump.

Terrifying GOP senators

According to the J6 committee’s Elaine Luria, Trump was told 15 minutes after returning to the White House after his speech on the Ellipse that the US Capitol was under siege by an armed mob. After the briefing, Luria said, Trump began calling GOP senators for the purpose of persuading them to overrule the results of the election.

On the one hand, the former president had insurgents sacking and looting the seat of government, threatening lawmakers with death – in Mike Pence’s case, with hanging from a makeshift gallows. (It was revealed last night that Pence’s Secret Service detail believed they were going to die. They sent messages of love to their families.) On the other, Trump pushed GOP senators by phone to get on board.

During that time, White House staffers tried and failed to persuade Trump to respond to the assault. (He did not issue orders to anyone, not the secretary of defense, the secretary of homeland security, the attorney general, no one.) Instead of telling them to go home, as staffers had hoped, he posted a tweet accusing Pence of betrayal.

After “pouring gasoline on the fire,” as witness Sarah Matthews said, the former president made more phone calls to Republican senators. Later that evening, after Trump had called for the insurgents to go home, Rudy Giuliani made even more calls to Republican senators.

Indeed, the J6 committee’s Adam Kinzinger named them. They were: Josh Hawley, Ted Cruz, Marsha Blackburn, Bill Hagerty, Tommy Tuberville and Lindsey Graham. Of that number, only three voted to overturn the results of the election: Cruz, Tuberville and Hawley.

The cover-up

Giuliani also called US Rep. Jim Jordan.

Jordan, as I wrote last week, was nominated to serve on the initial select committee to investigate J6. Speaker Nancy Pelosi vetoed his nomination, though. Good thing she did. The current committee would have been compromised by the presence of a congressman who was a serial witness to the serial crimes under investigation.

Jordan was nominated by Kevin McCarthy. As the J6 committee reminded us last night, the House minority leader talked to Trump after the attack. He said Trump said he had “some responsibility” for J6. McCarthy said he told Trump that the House Democrats were likely to pass an impeachment resolution and that he should resign.

Trump didn’t resign, of course.

Perhaps the fix was in.

Implication by omission

Liz Cheney, the vice chair of the J6 committee, reminded us that the committee’s work goes on. Hearings will resume in September, she said. Then the Wyoming congresswoman used some curious math:

Today, we know far more about the president’s plans and actions to overturn the election than almost all members of Congress did when President Trump was impeached on January 13, 2021, or when he was tried by the Senate in February of that year.

Fifty-seven of 100 senators voted to convict President Trump at that time, and more than 20 others said they were voting against conviction, because the president's term had already expired.

Cheney said “almost all,” I think, because a dozen GOP members had been deeply involved in or material witnesses to Trump’s conspiracy.

She said “57 of 100,” I think, because it takes 67 senators to remove and convict a president. She said “more than 20 others,” because she’s apparently giving these GOP senators the benefit of the doubt.

But that still leaves around 20 unaccounted for. Why?

Perhaps because some, or all, of these 20 or so Republican senators had been in contact with the former president as the insurrection was unfolding and therefore potential co-conspirators in the crime.

Perhaps because some, or all, of these 20 or so Republican senators voted against conviction, thus taking steps to cover up the crime.

In any case, it was implication by omission.

The appearance of a conspiracy

We know at least six of them were evidently in both camps. On the evening of J6, Rudy Giuliani called Blackburn, Hawley, Cruz, Hagarty, Tuberville and Graham hoping they would object to the vote count. (Three did.) This same group voted to acquit Trump of treason.

If that’s not a rigged outcome, it sure looks like one.

Liz Cheney seemed to be inviting us to put the former president’s second impeachment trial in light of what we know now.

She seemed to be asking us to consider what it means when at least a dozen sitting members of the House were material witnesses as well as grand jury members deciding on an indictment (impeachment).

She seemed to be asking us to see that at least six of those Senators were materially involved in a crime of which they sat in judgment.

If that’s not a conspiracy, it sure as hell looks like one.

---

https://sethabramson.substack.com/p/new-two-men-very-close-to-ginni-thomasone

In early September of 2020, during the same several-week period that Ginni Thomas friend and Donald Trump lawyer Cleta Mitchell was successfully recruiting Ginni Thomas friend and former Clarence Thomas law clerk John Eastman to also become a Trump lawyer, Eastman was the head of the far-right Claremont Institute Center …...

no lnx

July 17

Proof, Investigative Commentary:Two Men Very Close to Ginni Thomas—One of Them One Step Removed From Trump’s Coup Plot—Come seth abramson graphicUnder New Scrutiny, Seth Abramson, left, July 16-17, 2022. New evidence strongly suggests that it’s more imperative than ever that the House January 6 Committee get sworn testimony from the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas—and do so quickly.

Introduction: In early September of 2020, during the same several-week period that Ginni Thomas friend and Donald Trump lawyer Cleta Mitchell was successfully recruiting Ginni Thomas friend and former Clarence Thomas law clerk John Eastman to also become a Trump lawyer, Eastman was the head of the far-right Claremont Institute Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence.

Around this time—September 9—a member of Trump’s National Security Council, Michael Anton, authored a truly stunning article entitled “The Coming Coup?” The document is profoundly unsettling in retrospect, given Anton’s high position within Trumpworld’s intelligence apparatus.

In “The Coming Coup?”, Anton imagined the following scenario:

Violence around the time of the 2020 election propagated by left-wing groups; requiring the invocation of the Insurrection Act by then-President Trump....

Note that this very same sequence of events could equally be triggered if Trump and his political team were to stage a televised act of violence and chaos and then blame it on left-wing agitators in a premeditated way—which, in the event, is exactly what Trump used the Rudy Giuliani-Steve Bannon-John Eastman “war room” at the Willard Hotel in Washington to do during Insurrection Week. [flynn called for matial law, seize machines, rerun election under mil?]

Despite no evidence whatsoever that either Black Lives Matter activists or participants in the loose antifa movement had been present at the United States Capitol on that dark day, Trumpist partisans insisted that they had been—and immediately after the Capitol was cleared began pushing Trump to invoke the Insurrection Act on these (fraudulent) grounds.

[B]y September of 2020 it was Trump’s longtime friend, attorney, confidant, and fixer Michael Cohen who had told Congress and all America under oath that he knew for a fact that Donald Trump was not going to concede the 2020 presidential election no matter what happened in it.

Just days ago, a Mother Jones investigative report confirmed Cohen’s revelation with secretly recorded pre-election audio of Bannon—of Trump’s Insurrection Week Willard Hotel war room, which he shared with the Claremont Institute’s Eastman—confirming that in fact it was Trump who’d all along planned to execute the plot Anton wrote of for Eastman’s Claremont Institute back in September, just after Eastman came aboard Trump’s legal team at Ginni Thomas friend Cleta Mitchell’s invitation.

So Michael Cohen was right. And if you’re of the camp that believes—on significant evidence—that every accusation by Trumpworld is fact a confession, you can see in the coup plot outlined above by Trump adviser Anton precisely the sequence of events that would quite nearly be carried out by Bannon, Giulian, Eastman, Sidney Powell, Michael Lindell, Patrick Byrne, and Michael Flynn.

Within 90 days of Anton’s essay, Eastman would be working on making the seditious vision of Trump’s intel guru (which the Claremont Institute had eagerly published) a reality—though for Donald Trump, of course, rather than Joe Biden. Indeed, once Ginni Thomas friend Eastman joined Trump presidential adviser Ginni Thomas and the aforementioned Ginni Thomas friend and presidential adviser Cleta Mitchell as a Trump adviser, he appears to mostly have focused on executing Anton’s hypothetical.

Seth Abramson, shown above and at right, is founder of Proof and is a former criminal defense attorney and criminal investigator who teaches digital journalism, seth abramson resized4 proof of collusionlegal advocacy, and cultural theory at the University of New Hampshire. A regular political and legal analyst on CNN and the BBC during the Trump presidency, he is a best-selling author who has published eight books and edited five anthologies.

---

https://www.justsecurity.org/74138/incitement-timeline-year-of-trumps-actions-leading-to-the-attack-on-the-capitol/

...January 20, 2020: President Trump enthusiastically expresses support for heavily armed 2nd Amendment protesters in Richmond, Virginia.

President Trump tweets: “The Democrat Party in the Great Commonwealth of Virginia are working hard to take away your 2nd Amendment rights.”

April 17, 2020: Following armed anti-pandemic lockdown protests at several state capitals, Trump tweets: “LIBERATE MINNESOTA!” “LIBERATE MICHIGAN!” and “LIBERATE VIRGINIA, and save your great 2nd Amendment. It is under siege!”

The tweets come in response to armed protests in several states, including Michigan, where protesters chanted “lock her up,” referring to Governor Gretchen Whitmer. The tweets prompt a leading legal expert on militias Mary McCord to write that Trump has “incited insurrection” against state governments.

April 30, 2020: Armed protestors storm the Michigan state capitol building. Two of the protestors are eventually charged in the attempted kidnapping of Governor Gretchen Whitmer (see entry for Oct. 7, 2020).

The New York Times reports that one of the protestors carried a sign that read, “Tyrants Get the Rope,” and another carried an American flag that had a doll made to look like Ms. Whitmer hanging from it.

May 1, 2020: Trump tweets in favor of the Michigan protestors.

The president tweets: “The Governor of Michigan should give a little, and put out the fire. These are very good people, but they are angry. They want their lives back again, safely! See them, talk to them, make a deal.”

May 28, 2020: Trump retweets, with praise, a video of a supporter saying, “The only good Democrat is a dead Democrat.”...

https://www.justsecurity.org/77681/mark-meadows-timeline-the-chief-of-staff-and-schemes-to-overturn-2020-election/

Nine highlights from the Timeline below:

1. :{:{Meadows and Giuliani created a “parallel track” to raise election fraud claims}:

2. Trump campaign staff followed up on “Meadows’ theory” that tens of thousands of “illegal aliens” voted in Arizona

3. Meadows helped introduce President Trump to DOJ official Jeffrey Clark, who was plotting to oust the acting attorney general and use the Justice Department to overturn election results in Georgia

4. Meadows expressed upset, along with Trump, in response to Attorney General Barr’s having told the Associated Press there was no election fraud that could have affected the outcome in the election

5. Meadows made a surprise visit to Georgia where he met with the Secretary of State’s lead elections investigator. Trump called her the next day on Meadow’s suggestion and in the call urged her to find fraud in Fulton County

6. Meadows arranged and participated in the call in which Trump asked Georgia Secretary of State Raffensperger to “find 11,780 votes”; and during the call Meadows asked the Georgia officials to share voting data even after they told him they could not because it was protected by law

7. In several communications with the Justice Department—in violation of White House and DOJ contacts policies—Meadows pressured the Department to investigate baseless allegations of election fraud

8. Then-Acting Secretary of Defense’s chief of staff Kash Patel says he spoke to Meadows “nonstop” on Jan. 6

9. In his final days in office, Trump hoped to issue a preemptive pardon for Meadows, Giuliani and possibly himself....}:

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edit bd

...

Last night’s hearing, however, suggested one more layer.

A cover-up of the congressional coup.

By the Congress.

Hinting hard

Co-conspirators?

Last week, the panel’s Stephanie Murphy saidTrump met in late December with US Reps. Matt Gaetz, Andy Biggs, Brian Babin, Jody Hice, Louie Gohmert, Andy Harris, Mo Brooks, Paul Gosar, Scott Perry and Jim Jordan. Margaret Taylor Greenewas there. So were Mike Pence, Mark Meadows and Rudy Giuliani. (Seven of these members asked for pardons. Ditto Meadows, Giuliani and Greene.)

Terrifying GOP senators

After “pouring gasoline on the fire,” as witness Sarah Matthews said, the former president made more phone calls to Republican senators. Later that evening, after Trump had called for the insurgents to go home, Rudy Giuliani made even more calls to Republican senators.

Indeed, the J6 committee’s Adam Kinzinger named them. They were: Josh Hawley, Ted Cruz, Marsha Blackburn, Bill Hagerty, Tommy Tuberville and Lindsey Graham. Of that number,only three voted to overturn the results of the election: Cruz, Tuberville and Hawley.

The cover-up

Giuliani also called US Rep. Jim Jordan.

Trump didn’t resign, of course.

Perhaps the fix was in.

Implication by omission

Liz Cheney, the vice chair of the J6 committee, reminded us that the committee’s work goes on. Hearings will resume in September, she said. Then the Wyoming congresswoman used some curious math:

Today, we know far more about the president’s plans and actions to overturn the election than almost all members of Congress did when President Trump was impeached on January 13, 2021, or when he was tried by the Senate in February of that year.

Fifty-seven of 100 senators voted to convict President Trump at that time, and more than 20 others said they were voting against conviction, because the president's term had already expired.

Cheney said “almost all,” I think, because a dozen GOP members had been deeply involved in or material witnesses to Trump’s conspiracy.

But that still leaves around 20 unaccounted for. Why?

Perhaps because some, or all, of these 20 or so Republican senators voted against conviction, thus taking steps to cover up the crime.

In any case, it was implication by omission.

The appearance of a conspiracy

If that’s not a rigged outcome, it sure looks like one.

Liz Cheney seemed to be inviting us to put the former president’s second impeachment trial in light of what we know now.

She seemed to be asking us to consider what it means when at least a dozen sitting members of the House were material witnesses as well as grand jury members deciding on an indictment (impeachment).

She seemed to be asking us to see that at least six of those Senators were materially involved in a crime of which they sat in judgment.

If that’s not a conspiracy, it sure as hell looks like one.

---

https://news.yahoo.com/11-house-republicans-attended-white-194109173.html

White House held a December 21, 2020, meeting to discuss a fringe theory to overturn the election.
The January 6, 2021, committee shared the names of 11 House Republicans who went to that meeting.
They included Reps. Matt Gaetz and Jim Jordan, as well as Rep.-elect Marjorie Taylor Greene.

The House select committee investigating January 6, 2021, offered new details on Tuesday about a meeting at the White House that involved several Republican members of Congress ahead of the meeting of the joint session of Congress to certify the 2020 presidential election.

Democratic Rep. Stephanie Murphy of Florida, a member of the committee, said the December 21 meeting was part of an effort to "disseminate his false claims and to encourage members of the public to fight the outcome on January 6."

Vice President Mike Pence, Rudy Giuliani, and Mark Meadows, the White House chief of staff at the time, attended the meeting, along with President Donald Trump, Murphy said.

at the meeting, Murphy said the members discussed election theories pushed by Trump's personal lawyer John Eastman, who said he believed that Pence was able to single-handedly reject slates of electors in his role presiding over the joint session.

In reality, Pence's role was simply to count the votes. On Tuesday, the committee aired footage of Pat Cipollone, Trump's White House counsel. He was asked to address a comment attributed to him by another Trump advisor, Jason Miller, who quoted him as saying that Eastman's theory was "nutty." Cipollone declined to contradict that.

Cipollone said he tried to attend the meeting himself but was apparently turned away.

Here are the 11 House Republicans who were at the meeting, according to the White House visitor logs obtained by the January 6 panel:

Rep. Mo Brooks of Alabama
Rep. Brian Babin of Texas
Rep. Andy Biggs of Arizona
Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida
Rep. Louie Gohmert of Texas
Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona
Rep. Andy Harris of Maryland
Rep. Jody Hice of Georgia
Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio
Rep. Scott Perry of Pennsylvania
Rep.-elect Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia

The committee previously shared a number of Republicans who sought pardons from Trump in the final days of his administration. Six of the attendees of the December 21, 2020, meeting — Biggs, Brooks, Gaetz, Gohmert, Greene, and Perry — sought pardons.

Read the original article on Business Insider

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claremont inst WAR GAMES

https://www.alternet.org/2021/11/john-eastman-2020/

The Trump advisor who wrote the infamous pseudo-legal justification for overturning the 2020 election also helped to create a blueprint for what Donald Trump could do to hang onto power by force.

John Eastman joined a couple dozen right-wing operatives in simulating the aftermath of a closely contested election. The report was published in mid-October 2020 and co-sponsored by the Claremont Institute, the think tank where Eastman works.

The authors of the report are clear their simulation had a very serious purpose: to prepare real public officials for real violence in the event of a disputed election. The authors say they fully expected the necessary preparations to crush dissent would be perceived as the run-up to a military coup. But in their view, that couldn't be helped. It was important to come up with legal justifications for overwhelming political violence before the election, they said.

The report is a blueprint for how Donald Trump could fuse federal power, local police and criminal gangs like the Proud Boys to hang onto power. It seems to foreshadow Eastman's plan for a procedural coup on January 6, except projected onto Biden supporters.

The Claremont simulation started from the assumption that left wing violence was a "near-certainty" and that Trump's Defense Department, FBI, and Department of Homeland Security must be prepared to crush Biden supporters in the event of a contested election.

The simulation starts from the following half-baked premise: All the networks call the contest for Biden on Election Night, because he appears to have won Texas, bringing his electoral vote total to 270.

Somehow, all the networks fail to notice that Russia had taken the entire electoral apparatus of Texas offline before all the votes came in. (This wouldn't get past Steve Kornacki, let me tell you.) Texas goes back in the "too close to call" column. Biden is still two electoral votes ahead, but the nation explodes with rioting and arson by "antifa" and Black Lives Matter. Fourteen police officers are shot on election night.

Thus begins Choose Your Own Adventure: Death Squads. There's an elaborate procedural and legal backstory about how an uncertain Election Night metastasizes into a constitutional crisis to be worked out probably by the Supreme Court, but I won't bore you with it because it's obviously a figleaf. This is a manual for state violence.

With the nation in flames, the players have Trump's Department of Defense deploy military personnel carriers to multiple states, which local mayors rudely call "tanks." These pesky mayors aren't cooperating with the Trump administration's desire to clamp down on dissent.

So, their police departments go completely rogue and join forces with the Trump administration. The NYPD seems to have overthrown Bill De Blasio. The Chicago Police Union refuses to protect Mayor Lori Lightfoot. Federal law enforcement with no identifying insignias encircle the White House to defend it with heat rays.The Proud Boys, Three Percenters and Oath Keepers form posses to "assist."

Tellingly, Eastman and his fellow players assume that pro-Biden forces will try to gather at the Capitol on January 6. So they thwart their political adversaries by tracking their phones, setting up police checkpoints and using Trump's Homeland Security fusion centers to identify and detain their leaders. The players protect the Capitol with an army of federal agents, snipers and of course more heat rays. Trump's FBI hunts down more antifa leaders in the DC suburbs.

War games often reveal more about the players than they do about the future, and this exercise is no exception. The report shows that John Eastman and his confederates expected a disputed election would set off a wave of civil unrest that would culminate in the US Capitol on January 6, supported by insurrections at key state houses that same day. The report projected this strategy onto Biden supporters, but that's exactly what Trump confederates did on January 6.

A showdown on January 6 might feel inevitable in retrospect, given the horrific events of that day. But it wasn't an obvious choice. January 6 was the date of the certification of the presidential election, which has historically been a pro-forma affair. Results have already been decided.

The states have certified their election results, the Electoral College already has voted and all that's left to be done is the little ceremony during which the Congress counts the electoral votes. It doesn't make sense to have your last stand to win a contested election after the results are already set in stone, unless you think you can change them.

John Eastman did in fact come up with a crackpot legal excuse for how Mike Pence could throw the election to Trump. His argument was to the law as creationism is to biology, but it was good enough for Trump. We know Trump pressured Pence to act on Eastman's advice. Eastman shared a dais with Trump as well as Rudy Giuliani at the rally immediately before the siege. The crowd was chanting "Hang Mike Pence," because Pence had refused to comply with Eastman's scheme.

Eastman later claimed he wasn't serious about the memo, but the results of this simulation suggests he and fellow right-wingers had sized up the certification of the presidential election as their moment to stage a procedural coup with physical reinforcements waiting.

---

an 7 22

Fascism expert Ruth Ben-Ghiat provided fascinating insight — and a terrifying prediction about future Republican Party violence — when she was interviewed by CNN's Jim Acosta on Saturday.

On Tuesday, Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson testified that on Jan. 6, Trump was "irate" when the Secret Service would not drive him to the Capitol and lunged for the steering wheel of his presidential limousine.

Acosta began that interview by noting that weeks before Hutchinson's testimony, Ben-Ghiat had informed his audience that Trump had to go to the Capitol for the phase of a coup where the new order would be announced. Acosta described her analysis as "almost clairvoyant."

"And we have since learned that Trump did try to go to the Capitol on Jan. 6, but his Secret Service stopped him," Acosta said. "Ruth, what is your reaction to everything we learned this week, including this new CNN reporting that seems to back up what Cassidy Hutchison was saying?"

"I'm really disturbed, not surprised, about the role of violence," the New York University professor replied.

"It was very telling to me that Trump said chief of staff Mark Meadows, who seems to have been like the control center of this operation, she said that when the violence broke out, he didn't seem concerned at all, and he didn't seem perturbed, and that's because violence was part of the plan. It has to be in a coup," she explained.

"That's also why Trump wanted the, you know, weapons detectors removed, and so the other thing that stands out is that not only did he want to be driven there to the Capitol and be at the head of this, you know, violent thug march into the Capitol, but Ms. Hutchinson testified that there were conversations about him entering the chamber," she continued. "And what that says to me is first, you know, you'veneutralized the presidential chain of succession. They were going to do something to Pence, they were hunting Pelosi, Nancy Pelosi, speaker, and so he was going to also have fixed the problem with the electoral counts because Pence wasn't there, and then he was going to declare himself at the head of this violent mob in the chamber as a legitimate president, and that's where that phase of the coup would have ended."

"It's extraordinary what we're learning from these hearings," she said.

Acosta asked Ben-Ghiat to compare Trump to other leaders she has studied.

She said Trump, "and his party are behaving in a desperate way, and when autocrats think they're going down, they will do anything -- and we've seen Jan. 6 -- to stay in power. What's really extraordinary is how Trump, who came from outside politics, put the GOP in such a state of authoritarian subjection and discipline that the whole party is completely compromised. We're learning from these hearings just how many people were involved," she said.

"And unfortunately, I think we can expect more extremist behavior, aggressive behavior from the party because they are acting out of fear. They're guilty, and their coup failed, and they've been exposed to the world by these hearings, and so they are -- they're in emergency mode," Ben-Bhiat warned.

Watch:

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https://www.citywatchla.com/index.php/cw/guest-words/24209-the-money-trail-ginni-thomas-emails-to-overturn-biden-s-election-leads-to-charles-koch

2020 ELECTION CONSPIRACY - The Washington Post’s Bob Woodward and Bob Costa of CBS News have unleashed a fury of renewed interest in the work of the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol.

Last Thursday, Woodward and Costa set off a political firestorm when they released the contents of emails that Ginni Thomas, wife of the sitting Supreme Court Justice, Clarence Thomas, had sent to President Donald Trump’s Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows, in 2020, urging him to overturn the Biden election win and attempting to steer his efforts in that regard.

A total of 29 emails were obtained by Woodward and Costa, with the bulk of the emails occurring in just the month of November 2020, raising questions as to how many more emails are still out there from Thomas to the White House from December 1, 2020 through January 20, 2021 when Biden was sworn in.

Much of the current news debate around the emails is focusing on whether Clarence Thomas should recuse himself from cases involving groups with which his wife is involved and whether the Select Committee should subpoena Ginni Thomas to testify. While those are certainly important issues, what has thus far been ignored is the smoking gun trail that leads directly to the doorstep of billionaire and right-wing Republican political mastermind, Charles Koch, the Chairman, CEO (and majority owner with the heirs of his deceased brother David) of the fossil fuels conglomerate Koch Industries.

Wall Street On Parade has previously documented that at least three of the front groups that fomented the Big Lie that the 2020 presidential election had been stolen from Trump and that actively solicited thousands of people to turn out for the January 6 event at the Capitol, were funded by Koch Industries or its front groups.

The smoking gun in the Ginni Thomas email thread occurs in an email dated November 10, 2020 when she tells Meadows to “Listen to Rush. Mark Steyn, Bongino, Cleta.” Thomas is clearly referring to conservative commentators Rush Limbaugh, Mark Steyn and Dan Bongino, and lawyer, Cleta Mitchell.

Cleta Mitchell is best known in the Trump election saga as the lawyer who was on the January 2, 2021 call with Donald Trump when he phoned the Secretary of State of Georgia, Brad Raffensperger, and told him this: “I only need 11,000 votes. Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break.” That call took place two months after the presidential election. (Mitchell stepped down from her long-term employment at law firm Foley & Lardner after her presence on that call made the news cycle.)

But Cleta Mitchell’s relationship with Ginni Thomas dates back at least a decade earlier – and not in a good way.

Cleta Mitchell had filed an amicus briefin the Citizens Unitedcase before the Supreme Court that was decided on January 21, 2010. That case would be the tipping point to allow unlimited sums from corporations – like Koch Industries — in U.S. elections.

Just eight days after Justice Thomas voted in favor of that decision to open the floodgates to corporate money in campaigns, Cleta Mitchell made a move that looked very much like a quid pro quo to Ginni Thomas. Mitchell, then still a partner at Foley & Lardner, filed an application with the Internal Revenue Service to set up a nonprofit called Liberty Central, Inc.on behalf of Ginni Thomas. According to IRS tax filings, Liberty Central received a combined $1.478 million from dark money donors in 2009 and 2010.

On the IRS tax filings for Liberty Central for 2009 and 2010, Ginni (Virginia) Thomas is listed as President and CEO. The 2010 tax filing shows that Ginni Thomas received $120,511 in compensation from Liberty Central that year. She eventually stepped down from an official post at the nonprofit, stating she would serve as a consultant.

Liberty Central had the fingerprints of Charles Koch all over it. Acting as General Counsel in 2010 for Liberty Central was a former lawyer for the Charles G. Koch Foundation, Sarah Field. A former Koch lobbyist, Matt Schlapp, served on the Board of Liberty Central at inception.

Mitchell’s law firm, Foley & Lardner, employed three attorneys working as lobbyists for a Koch Industries affiliate, Koch Companies Public Sector, LLC in Madison, Wisconsin in 2011. The Koch-related lobbyists were Ray Carey, Jason Childress and Kathleen Walby.

Mitchell, herself, was a former lobbyist at the federal level in years 2005 through 2008 for the Alliance for Charitable Reform, a project of The Philanthropy Roundtable, another tax-exempt organization. Donors Trust and Donors Capital Fund, two dark money groups which also have Charles Koch’s fingerprints all over them, were spun off from the Philanthropy Roundtable in 1999. (See our report: Koch Footprints Lead to Secret Slush Fund to Keep Fear Alive.)

Mitchell is listed on the 2018 federal tax filing for SteveBannon’s charity, Citizens of the American Republic, as an officer of the organization, holding the position of Secretary. Bannon and others were charged in August of 2021 by the Department of Justice with bilking donors out of hundreds of thousands of dollars through that charity.

Senator Ron Johnson, a Republican from Wisconsin, was one of those pushing the narrative on television that the election had been stolen from Donald Trump. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, lawyers and staff of Foley & Lardner were the third largest donor to Johnson’s campaign committees since 2015. Employees and officials of Koch Industries ranked fifth.

There were only eight Republican Senators who refused to certify the votes for the challenged states of Arizona and/or Pennsylvania. Those Republican Senators were: Ted Cruz of Texas; Josh Hawley of Missouri; Rick Scott of Florida;Tommy Tuberville of Alabama[2 calls jan 6? trump and rudy?]; Roger Marshall of Kansas; Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi; John Kennedy of Louisiana; and Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming. Every Republican Senator who refused to certify the election results on January 6 received funding from Koch Industries PAC.

Trump’s Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows, whom Ginni Thomas enlisted in the White House to help overturn Biden’s election win, was previously a member of the House of Representatives from North Carolina from 2013 to 2020. He also received campaign funding from the Koch Industries PAC throughout his time in Congress.

Charles Koch is usually very careful in keeping an arm’s length relationship between himself and his political operations. But on at least one occasion Koch conducted a dinner meeting directly with sitting Justice Clarence Thomas at a private club in California.

In January 2008, Justice Thomas attended an all-expenses-paid, four-day trip to the Koch brothers’ semi-annual political gathering in the Palm Springs area of California. (According to his 2008 disclosure form and the Supreme Court’s public information office, Thomas’ expenses for that trip were paid by the Federalist Society, a conservative nonprofit that Koch foundations have generously supported.)

Justice Thomas’ trip to the Koch event occurred in the same year that the Citizens United case was accepted by the Supreme Court. The Court accepts less than two percent of all cases appealed to it.

Wall Street On Parade was previously able to confirm with Scott Markley, Public Information Specialist at the Supreme Court, that during that January 2008 visit to the Koch political gathering, Justice Thomas was hosted by Charles Koch and his wife, Elizabeth, at the private Vintage Club where Charles Koch is a member.

The Citizens United decision did not pass the smell test when it was approved in a 5-4 vote by the Supreme Court. Four of the nine justices wrote a scathing dissent that raised the issue of unprincipled behavior, writing that the majority had ruled on issues that were not even legally before the court.

The money that the Koch political machine pumped into putting Trump in the Oval Office quickly paid big dividends in his first term (and made it clear as to why Charles Koch would have wanted to see a second Trump term).

Koch Industries’ law firm, Jones Day, sent 12 of its law partners to staff up key positions in the Trump administration on the very day Trump was inaugurated. Jones Day has since sacked the press release it issued at the time but you can read the reporting on it at the American Bar Association Journal.

Once Trump was settled in the Oval Office, a Koch front group, then known as Freedom Partners, mapped out the agenda it expected Trump to march to. In a document titled “Roadmap to Repeal: Removing Regulatory Barriers to Opportunity,” the group listed the laws and regulations it expected to be repealed in the first 100 days of Trump’s administration. The Trump administration dutifully marched to the beat. Repeal the Paris Climate Accord – done. Tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy – done. Gutting federal regulations and the Environmental Protection Agency – done.

By the spring of 2018, 12 people who previously worked at Freedom Partners were working in the Trump administration. Freedom Partners has since disbanded but when we last took a look at the nonprofit in July 2018, we found that all but one of Freedom Partners’ 9-member Board of Directors was a current or former Koch company employee. The Board Chair of Freedom Partners at that time was the same Mark Holden that was the General Counsel of Koch Industries.

It’s time for the House Select Committee to subpoena not just Ginni Thomas and Cleta Mitchell. It’s time to hear from Charles Koch directly on how so much money bearing his fingerprints ended up fomenting the attack on the Capitol on January 6.

There will never be a better time than now for the American people to finally get at the truth.

(Pam Martens & Russ Martens are authors at CounterPunch.org. This originally appeared on Wall Street on Parade.)

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ref 1/20/21

Money Trail to the Siege at the Capitol Leads to Charles Koch and Koch Industries

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an 6 25/22

Trump told Congressional cronies how to get pardons for aiding his bogus election scheme, GOP Rep. says

Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene are panic-tweeting after revelations they sought pardons

Conservative insider denounces Republicans who wanted Trump to provide pardons for their involvement in his election scheme

Mo Brooks texts email to CBS containing instructions from Donald Trump on how to request pardons

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perry denied, then proved? 3 more denied?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/23/5-takeaways-jan-6-hearing-trumps-doj-plot/

wapo

June 23, 2022

In the Jan. 6 committee hearing on June 23, witnesses described how President Donald Trump pressured the Justice Department to investigate election fraud. (Video: JM Rieger/The Washington Post, Photo: Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post)

The Jan. 6 committee on Thursday held its fifth major hearing, this one focused on President Donald Trump’s pressure campaign on the Justice Department to help him overturn the election.

The plot was spearheaded within the department by an official named Jeffrey Clark, whose home federal agents searched Wednesday in a significant development that reflects the increasing legal jeopardy faced by Trump’s allies and perhaps Trump himself. Trump at one point considered installing Clark as acting attorney general to further the plot — which prompted mass resignation threats....

The Jan. 6 committee on Thursday held its fifth major hearing, this one focused on President Donald Trump’s pressure campaign on the Justice Department to help him overturn the election.

Timeline: Trump's pressure on the Justice Department to overturn the election

Below, some takeaways from the hearing.

The pardon picture, filled out

In a video presented on June 23, Trump White House officials said that at least five House Republicans asked President Donald Trump for pardons. (Video: The Washington Post, Photo: Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)

The committee has repeatedly previewed evidence that certain key players in Trump’s plot soughtpardons. Last week, one of them was revealed to be Trump lawyer John Eastman, who asked to be put on “the pardon list.” The implication from that email was that there was indeed a list that seemingly might have other names.

The committee built out its own list Thursday, adding several House Republicans to it. Here are the names and the evidence:

Reps. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.) and Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) — In a Jan. 11 email from Brooks, he said he and Gaetz were suggesting pardons for everyone who objected to the election results in Arizona and Pennsylvania. White House lawyer Eric Herschmann also said he believed that Gaetz had requested a pardon. White House aide John McEntee said Gaetz told him he asked for one from White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. Cassidy Hutchinson, an aide to Meadows, also testified to the effort by Brooks and Gaetz, saying that Gaetz had been seeking a pardon “since early December” and that he reached out to her personally.

Days after the Capitol attack and the final attempt to overturn the election, Members of Congress requested pardons.

Five days after the attack on the Capitol, Representative Mo Brooks requested pardons for himself, Representative Gaetz, and others. pic.twitter.com/f0xLm5SKtT

— January 6th Committee (@January6thCmte) June 23, 2022

Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) — Hutchinson testified that he requested a pardon.

Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Tex.) — Hutchinson testified that he requested a pardon.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) — Hutchinson said that she had heard that Greene had asked the White House counsel’s office for a pardon from deputy counsel Pat Philbin but that Greene hadn’t asked her personally.

Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) — Hutchinson testified that he requested a pardon.

Perry has flatly denied seeking a pardon, calling it “a shameless, soulless lie,” but Hutchinson said he talked to her directly about it.

Hutchinson also said that Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), whom House Republicans tried to put on the committee before Democrats objected, talked with the White House about congressional pardons but that she was unaware of him asking for one.

What John Eastman and ‘the pardon list’ means

Asking for a pardon doesn’t equal admitting guilt,[but in applying you must tell what you did? negates exec priv] and Eastman in particular argued that his request was meant as a precaution. But given how far-fetched this plot was and how often those involved were told their plot was illegal, that fact that people were trying to cover their backsides on the way out is important.

And crucially, some of these requests came even before the plot failed on Jan. 6.

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1/6 hearing 6/21 tuescleta said she commissioned Eastman coup memo a day or 2 after (or before) election loss?

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an 6 22

the 50th anniversary of Watergate comes at a time when the bipartisan select committee formed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is holding a series of public hearings on the January 6, 2021 insurrection. It was 50 years ago, on June 17, 1972, that the Democratic National Committee’s headquarters became the target of a break-in, and it was 48 years ago, in August 1974, that President Richard Nixon resigned in disgrace.

With the January 6 hearings underway during the Watergate anniversary, some Donald Trump/Nixon comparisons are inevitable. Yet the damning evidence being presented during the January 6 hearings underscores the fact thatTrump and his MAGA loyalists were willing to cross dangerous lines that even Nixon wouldn’t have crossed. One such line was using fake “electors” in a brazen effort to steal the 2020 election from now-President Joe Biden.

Journalist Rosalind S. Helderman, in a report for the Washington Post published on June 20, explains, “The convening of the Electoral College on December 14, 2020, was supposed to mark the end of the wild, extended presidential election that year. But when the day arrived, a strange thing happened. In seven swing states won by Joe Biden, when the Democrat’s electors assembled to formally elect him president, Trump supporters showed up, too, ready to declare that their man had actually won.”

Those fake “electors” tried to pull off a coup in states ranging from Michigan to Nevada.

“At the time, the gatherings seemed a slapdash, desperate attempt to mimic President Donald Trump’s refusal to concede,” Helderman explains. “But internal campaign e-mails and memos reveal that the convening of the fake electors appeared to be a much more concerted strategy, intended to give Vice President Mike Pence a reason to declare the outcome of the election was somehow in doubt on January 6, 2021, when he was to preside over the congressional counting of the Electoral College votes.”

In its Thursday, June 17 hearing, Helderman notes, the January 6 select committee “explored” the “pressure campaign placed on” (then-Vice President Mike) Pence to accept the Trump electors as somehow legitimate.”

The select committee will be presenting more evidence on the fake “electors” scheme, according to Rep. Adam Schiff of California. During a June 19 appearance on CNN, Schiff announced, “We’ll show evidence of the president’s involvement in this scheme. We’ll also, again, show evidence about what his own lawyers came to think about this scheme. And we’ll show courageous state officials who stood up and said they wouldn’t go along with this plan to either call legislatures back into session or decertify the results for Joe Biden.”

The fake “electors” scheme was unprecedented in U.S. history. Never before had a U.S. president lost an election by 7 million votes only for his supporters to try to snatch the electoral votes from the candidate who legitimately won them.

“The notion that state legislatures could choose electors in defiance of voters would be a radical one in modern American history,” Helderman observes. “But the documents show Trump strategists quickly began to pursue the theory, especially as lawyers for the campaign and allied groups racked up losses in court cases that they had urged judges to hear expeditiously, before the electors could meet. Their idea was that state legislatures could step in if the election had been marred by massive fraud or illegality. The Trump campaign pushed the fraud narrative even though the president and other top officials were told over and over, even by allies, that there was no evidence to support it, committee evidence and testimony has shown.”

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6 22

The first thing to know about today’s hearing by the J6 committee is John Eastman, the coup-memo mastermind, is in deep deep doo doo.

The former professor of law at Chapman University and fellow at the Claremont Institute apparently thought it was a good idea to explain in writing that the J6 insurrection might not have happened if not for a mulish vice president refusing to go along with a bloodless coup.

Eastman moreover had no qualms about saying in front of witnesses that it’s OK for a Republican vice president to pick and choose who’s going to be president but nuh-uh for VPs from the other side. He also said – to the president – that his attempted coup would perhaps maybe I dunno yeah definitely violate the Electoral Count Act of 1887.

Former White House counsel Eric Herschmann said he told Eastman this: “I'm going to give you the best free legal advice you're ever getting in your life: Get a great f-ing criminal defense lawyer. You're going to need it.” (Evidently counsel advised mum’s the word. In deposition, Eastman invoked his Fifth Amendment rights 100 times.)

Eastman’s hare-brained scheme came down to this: Mike Pence, in his ceremonial role as president of the Senate, in the counting of the electoral votes, could do one of two things on his own, Eastman said.

He could reject the votes, thus declaring Donald Trump the winner.

Or he could send the votes back to the five to seven states that had determined the 2020 election’s outcome. (From there, it’s hard to tell what would have happened. Either the states would resend alternate slates of electors loyal to Trump, a dubious option. Or the election would have been thrown to the House, where state legislatures controlled by one party would get one vote to settle matters.)

Either way, Pence said no.

He said no from the start, according to Greg Jacob, former counsel for the office of the vice president. Jacob was today’s star witness. Thanks to his testimony, we know that those who did not believe that Mike Pence could decide the election on his own, included, in addition to the entire White House counsel’s office, the following people:

Mark Meadows.

Rudy Giuliani.

Donald Trump.

And John Eastman himself.

Indeed, Eastman conceded numerous time and in various ways that his conspiracy would not survive legal scrutiny or the Supreme Court, Jacob said. Eastman vacillated between requesting that Pence reject the votes outright, which he deemed too aggressive an option, or suspend the vote count, which he deemed more politically palatable.

Having gotten nowhere with White House attorneys, state elections officials and his own vice president, Trump mounted a pressure campaign on Pence knowing that neither statutory law nor the Constitution gave him the authority to do what Trump demanded.

Trump did it anyway.

The J6 committee made must-see good TV by illustrating how, starting in December, the former president began pressing Pence via television remarks, Twitter and in private meetings. On the morning of January 6, 2021, Trump called to ask Pence one last time. According to witnesses, Trump called him a coward, a wimp and the p-word.

Then Trump took the stage at the Ellipse. According to lead presenter California Congressman Pete Aguilar, the first draft of his speech made no mention of Pence. Trump revised it, however. Then on stage, he ad libbed. Video footage shows that with each mention, the crowd got more jacked up before being sent down Pennsylvania Avenue.

Most dramatic, I think, was the demonstration of cause and effect regarding Trump’s tweet at 2:24 p.m. By that time, Pence had begun counting the votes. White-power terrorist group the Proud Boys had already breached security and were pouring into the building. White House staffers told J6 investigators there was general agreement that Trump ought to send out a tweet in order to calm things down.

He was told an insurgency was brewing. He wrote:

“Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution, giving states a chance to certify a corrected set of facts, not the fraudulent or incorrect ones which they were previously asked to certify. USA demands the truth!”

That, according to a witness, “was like pouring gasoline on the fire.”

Congressman Aguilar said an informant told the FBI that the Proud Boys were prepared to capture and kill House Speaker Nancy Pelosi if they found her. Same for Mike Pence. A makeshift gallows was raised on the Capitol grounds while the mob chanted “Hang Mike Pence!”

Like said, deep deep doo doo.

And John Eastman isn’t alone.

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/06/ginni-thomas-2020-more-extensive/

The efforts of far right-wing lobbyist and pro-MAGA activist Virginia “Ginni” Thomasto overturn the 2020 presidential election, disenfranchising millions of voters in the process, were even more extensive than have previously been reported.

In addition to her month’s long text messaging with then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, urging him to find a way to falsify the 2020 results and have Donald Trump declared the winner, Thomas reached out to members of the Arizona House, urging them to choose different presidential electors who would represent Trump.

Earlier reporting indicated Thomas had tried to pressure two Arizona Republican lawmakers.

But it wasn’t just two who Thomas tried to have overturn the election results. In total it was 29.

Ginni Thomas, the spouse of a U.S. Supreme Court justice, “sent the messages using FreeRoots, an online platform intended to make it easy to send pre-written emails to multiple elected officials,” according to The Washington Post.

“New documents show that Thomas indeed used the platform to reach many lawmakers simultaneously. On Nov. 9, she sent identical emails to 20 members of the Arizona House and seven Arizona state senators. That represents more than half of the Republican members of the state legislature at the time.”

Thomas “urged lawmakers to ‘stand strong in the face of political and media pressure’ and claimed that the responsibility to choose electors was ‘yours and yours alone,'” which is false. “They had ‘power to fight back against fraud’ and ‘ensure that a clean slate of Electors is chosen,’ the email said.”

Thomas’ actions did not stop on November 9.

“Before you choose your state’s Electors …consider what will happen to the nation we all love if you don’t stand up and lead,” she wrote to 22 additional lawmakers on December 13. Her email “linked to a video of a man urging swing-state lawmakers to ‘put things right’ and ‘not give in to cowardice.'”

U.S. Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) last month blasted both Ginni Thomas and her Supreme Court Justice husband, Clarence Thomas, saying the “conflict of interest just screams at you.”

“Here you have the wife of a Supreme Court justice,” Schiff said, the Post notes, trying to “get Arizona to improperly cast aside the votes of millions. And also, to add to it, her husband on the Supreme Court, writing a dissent in a case arguing against providing records to Congress that might have revealed some of these same e-mails.”

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An incriminating new email obtained by both CNN and The Washington Post is shedding light on an election plot in Georgia that was reportedly orchestrated by former President Donald Trump's campaign.

According to CNN, the Trump campaign is said to have advised fake electors to infiltrate the Georgia State Capitol and cast fake electoral votes for the former president. The email correspondence, which was dated December 13, 2020, included detailed instruction for electors to get themselves in position to cast Georgia's electoral college votes although President Joe Biden had already been announced as the election winner of the state.

In the email, Robert Sinners —a Georgia-based elections operations director for the Trump campaign— advised that the group of fake electors to use "complete secrecy and discretion." The email also included instructions for the fake electors to sign certificates confirming they had the authority to cast the votes on behalf of the state.

"I must ask for your complete discretion in this process," wrote Sinners. "Your duties are imperative to ensure the end result — a win in Georgia for President Trump — but will be hampered unless we have complete secrecy and discretion."

Per The Washington Post, the fake electors were also instructed to tell Capitol security that they actually had appointments with a state senator in order to be allowed entry into the building. Sinners also emphasized the importance of the group not drawing attention to themselves or having any contact with the media.

"Please, at no point should you mention anything to do with Presidential Electors or speak to the media," Sinners wrote in bold text, per The Post.

In wake of the email being made public, Sinners released a statement to The Washington Post. According to the Trump campaign staffer, he simply followed the orders of Georgia Republican Party chairman David Shafer and other senior campaign staffers.

"Following the Former President's refusal to accept the results of the election and allow a peaceful transition of power, my views on this matter have changed significantly from where they were on December 13th," said Sinners, who now works for Georgia's Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R).

Shafer's lawyer also confirmed his client's cooperation with the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

"None of these communications, nor his testimony, suggest that Mr. Shafer requested or wished for confidentiality surrounding the provisional electors," Shafer's lawyer said, according to the news outlet.

Despite the efforts to overturn the election results in Georgia, all 16 of the state's electoral votes went to Biden.

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presumably 1/6 hearings will tell us much more about trump involvement

https://www.alternet.org/2022/06/trump-2657468781/

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/06/mark-meadows/

i forgot ziegler:

an 6 22 raw story

Navarro, President Trump’s former trade advisor was indicted for contempt of Congress on Friday due to his refusal to cooperate with the January 6th Committee, which has signaled interest in his communications with the president.

Less attention has been paid to Garrett Ziegler, a Navarro aide and zealous Trump loyalist who both supported his boss’ efforts and coordinated with a network of outside operatives who were promoting an onslaught of false claims about election fraud and legally dubious schemes to preserve Trump’s hold on power.

Ziegler received an email from the senior investigative counsel for the committee, which is scheduled to begin public hearings on June 9, requesting a meeting to discuss information he might have that is relevant to the congressional investigation.

Among his extensive efforts from his office at the White House, Ziegler facilitated a now-infamous late-night meeting on Dec. 18, 2020 in which attorney Sidney Powell, retired Lt. General Michael Flynn and former Overstock.com CEO Patrick Byrne tried to persuade President Trump to order the National Guard to seize voting machines and re-running elections in six battleground states he lost to Joe Biden.

Ziegler used his White House Worker and Visitor Entry System, or WAVES pass to let Powell, Flynn and Byrne into the White House, allowing them to hold an impromptu meeting with Trump in the Oval Office, as he later recounted in aninterview with fellow election denier David Clements. Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and White House Counsel Pat Cipollone were caught by surprise by the meeting, which reportedly descended into a shouting match. Ziegler’s efforts bypassed protocol for White House meetings, and he said when it was discovered that he had let the plotters into the White House, his visitor’s privileges were revoked.

In Navarro’s book In Trump Time, he wrote that “to support the challenge effort, he allowed “several members of my staff to help out in the battleground states on their own time.” Navarro’s book describes “the young and always earnest” Ziegler venturing to an Indian reservation in Nevada to investigate alleged vote-buying shortly after the election. The work eventually culminated in the three-part Navarro Report, which asserted without evidence that the election had been stolen from Trump.

Around the time of the election, a man named Mark Cook took a photograph of cardboard boxes stacked on metal shelves that were labeled “Dominion Voting” and “Made in China.”

“My good friend Mark Cook took this picture,” Ziegler, who is now 26, wrote on his Telegram channel in June 2021. “We infiltrated the election equipment storage facility in Sacramento County, CA, and documented all of the violations of law.”

Cook’s photograph would later be used on the final page of a PowerPoint presentation entitled “Election Fraud, Foreign Interference & Options for 6 JAN” put together by Phil Waldron, a retired Army colonel with a background in psychological warfare that was shown to members of Congress on Jan. 4 and 5, 2021. The presentation recommended that Vice President Mike Pence set aside the electoral votes from the six battleground states carried by Biden, and also called on President Trump to order the National Guard to seize voting machines and re-count the ballots.

For his part, Cook remains active in the election denial movement. Last month, he and Clements, a former New Mexico State University professor, addressed a Republican-controlled board of commissioners in Surry County, NC. Introduced by Clements as “our hardware and IT cybersecurity expert,” Cook told commissioners: “If our Pentagon can’t secure a network, Department of Defense can’t secure a network, our Department of Homeland Security can’t secure a network, are we really so foolish as to think the only system that is completely impervious to any cyber-hack is our voting system?”

Cook’s 25-minute presentation omitted a simple fact — voting tabulation machines are not networked, and preliminary counts are transferred on a mobile drive to a computer to be uploaded from local election offices for election-night reporting.

Both Ziegler and Cook were trusted associates in the network of operatives and conspiracy theorists that worked under the competing legal teams headed by Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani and by Powell, alongside Flynn and Byrne.

In a private Telegram text to another election denier that has been reviewed by Raw Story, Waldron said, “Mark and Garrett have worked with us since 14 Nov 20.” He added that Ziegler and Cook “both passed rigorous background checks” after suspicions arose that CIA and British intelligence assets were attempting to infiltrate the network plotting to overturn the election.

“I have no idea what Waldron was alluding to,” Ziegler told Raw Story in an email. “None. I had an active [top secret/sensitive compartmented information] clearance at the time. I think he was just spinning a tale for others.”

Waldron declined to comment for this story.

Michael Trimarco, a Giuliani associate who rented a bloc of rooms at the Westin Arlington Gateway hotel in November 2020,also alluded to a dual role on Ziegler’s part in an interview with the far-right podcaster Ann Vandersteel earlier this year.

“I know some of the people that were his direct reports, because he wasn’t officially reporting directly to Peter,” Trimarco told Vandersteel. “So, I know some of these other people. And politically that didn’t make people around in Peter’s world very happy with Garrett in the inter-office kinda…. But from what I saw, he was well connected with Peter… and I know he furnished a lot of information for the report.”

While enmeshed with the outside election denial network, Ziegler also provided the external teams with a direct conduit to the White House and President Trump, to the extent that Trimarco said information about election irregularities would often reach Trump before even Giuliani knew about it.

“Ironically, a lot of the stuff that got back to Rudy didn’t end up coming through me,” Trimarco said. “Because once that connection was made, Garrett would give it to Peter, and Peter would give it to the president. And then it would circle back to Rudy.”

In his interview with Clements, Ziegler dated work on the three-part Navarro Report to Nov. 15 — one day after Waldron said he had started working with Ziegler. Ziegler said he and four other aides assisted Navarro with the reports.

“We prepared — Peter gave direction,” Ziegler told Clements. “He’s a fantastic, logical thinker, which is very hard — easier said than done. He laid it out, what his vision was. And our job was to get the first draft.”

Much of the information in the reports was funneled up from the outside team, Trimarco said.

“Peter put out a three-volume report together, and a lot of the information — not all of it — came from this group of analysts that work working out of the Westin that did not go toTomotley,” Trimarco said, referencing attorney Lin Wood’s estate in South Carolina, where Powell and Flynn established a working headquarters away from DC.

One day after Powell, Flynn and Byrne’s Dec. 18 visit to the White House to promote their plan to have the National Guard seize voting machines and re-run the election, Trump tweeted out a link to the Navarro Report, with an invitation to his supporters to attend a “wild rally” in DC on Jan. 6, 2021.

Similar to his former boss, since leaving the White House Ziegler has continued to deride a coterie of officials he considers weak and insufficiently loyal to the president. In interviews and Telegram messages, Ziegler has particularly singled out Meadows for savage criticism.

In Telegram message in late January 2021, Ziegler wrote that he feared Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg would take control of the country and impose a dystopian “technocracy.”

“And I can assure you, from my standpoint in the WH, I did everything I could to prevent this,” Ziegler said. “I broke rules, protocol, etc. If I had a decade more of life under my belt, I would have had the formal power to get rid of Meadows, Cipollone, etc.”

Ziegler’s Telegram messages suggest he viewed Meadows as an obstacle to efforts to overturn the election. In one message, in February 2021, Ziegler faulted Meadows for citing an audit in Georgia as evidence of due diligence, writing that the chief of staff was “so fckn dumb (or compromised)” that he didn’t question whether an auditing company could be corrupted by “mob-like cartels.”

Like Navarro, who was indicted for contempt of Congress on Friday, Meadows is fighting a subpoena from the January 6th Committee. Last December, the House voted to hold Meadows in contempt, referring his case to the Justice Department for prosecution.

Meadows played a critical role in shepherding an array of schemes entertained by Trump in his quest to hold onto power. That included hosting meetings with the president and members of the House Freedom Caucus to discuss a plan — much like Navarro’s “Green Bay Sweep” — to pressure Vice President Mike Pence to remand the electoral votes back to the battleground states and delay certifying the election for Biden, according to testimony to the January 6th Committee by White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson. Meadows also hosted a meeting in which Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.), who is now the chair of the Freedom Caucus, expressed support for the idea of sending Trump supporters to the Capitol on Jan. 6, while others in the meeting remained silent, the New York Times has reported. Hutchinson also reportedly testified to the committee that she saw Meadows burn documents in his office fireplace after a meeting with Perry.

Ziegler has positioned himself to the right of the ultraconservative Freedom Caucus, of which Meadows was a chair before he left Congress to serve as Trump’s chief of staff.

“He’s a Freedom Caucus guy,” Ziegler complained to Clements during his July 2021 interviewed. “And what this means is — I call them ‘permanent hearing holders.’ So, Benghazi, Killary…. Nobody ever gets indicted with these jokers. Mark Meadows comes from that ilk…. So, how does this relate to the president’s chief of staff? He just wasn’t effective. He would get steamrolled by people.”

Much of Ziegler’s rhetoric on Telegram is laced with racist vitriol that uses African nations as a stand-in for national decline, while Christian chauvinism as force for national rebirth.

“If we elect people like Mark Meadows — good, jolly, your brother next door — we’re gonna end up like Zimbabwe,” Ziegler said. “If I could do one thing — which is stop electing nice guys. We need Christian zealots, frankly.”

Ziegler expressed a similar sentiment in a March 2021 Telegram message, in which he wrote, “We could have a Third Great Awakening in the country, both religious and political. And the coup we just went through could be the flint that ignites it. Hopefully its ends will be a repentance to the Christ and a Republic that gets rid of this corrupt and satanic Oligarchy.”

Beyond the Dec. 18, 2020 meeting he arranged at the White House, Ziegler said he tried to help Powell get to the president on different occasion.

“I walked Sidney over to the residence one to try to get the president a binder full of evidence,” Ziegler said on a podcast in February 2021. “And we got blocked again there, too.”

Ziegler recalled that he would tell anyone who would listen to him in the White House: “Let’s just go look at the ballots. We don’t have to do it. Have the National Guard in Georgia do it.”

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Why this former Trump official comes out looking absolutely terrible in the Mark Meadows texts

Chris Cillizza

Analysis by Chris Cillizza, CNN Editor-at-large

Updated 5:13 PM ET, Mon April 25, 2022

(CNN)Plenty of people -- members of Congress, former top White House aides -- come out looking bad in the more than 2,000 texts sent and received by Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows between Election Day 2020 and January 20, 2021, obtained by CNN.

No one -- and I mean NO ONE -- looks worse than Rick Perry, however.

You remember Perry -- the former Texas governor who served as the secretary of energy in former President Donald Trump's White House.

What you may not remember is that CNN reported this about Perry back in December 2021:

"Members of the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 attack on the US Capitol believe that former Texas Governor and Trump Energy Secretary Rick Perry was the author of a text message sent to then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows the day after the 2020 election pushing an 'AGRESSIVE (sic) STRATEGY' for three state legislatures to ignore the will of their voters and deliver their states' electors to Donald Trump, three sources familiar with the House Committee investigation tell CNN."

At the time, Perry's team flatly denied that he was the sender of those texts to Meadows. Here's the specific denial: "A spokesman for Perry told CNN that the former Energy Secretary denies being the author of the text." No explanation was offered for why the number used in the text was associated with Perry.

Which brings me to the texts that CNN reported on Monday. And these lines from CNN's story (bolding is mine):

"Previously disclosed text messages showed that former Trump administration Energy Secretary Rick Perry and Trump's son, Donald Trump Jr., each texted Meadows on November 4 and 5 with ideas for overturning the election.

"On November 7, hours before the election was called, Perry texted Meadows again: 'We have the data driven program that can clearly show where the fraud was committed. This is the silver bullet.'

"While Perry has previously denied CNN reporting about his text messages to Meadows, CNN has confirmed it's his cell phone and he signed this text, 'Rick Perry,' including his number."

So, in order to now believe Rick Perry's initial denials, you have to believe:

Someone got Perry's phone without him knowing about it.

That same person texted Meadows repeatedly about ways to possibly overturn the election.

That person, ingeniously, signed the texts "Rick Perry."

So, either you believe that or you believe that the texts from Rick Perry's phone and signed "Rick Perry" were, in fact, from Rick Perry.

If you believe that, then it's pretty clear that either Perry or Perry's staff weren't being truthful to CNN in the initial report on the texts that came from him. (Perry hasn't commented since the release of the new Meadows texts.)

Like I said, lots of people look bad in these texts. No one looks worse than Perry.

===

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/newly-revealed-mark-meadows-texts-appear-to-contradict-denials-by-marjorie-taylor-greene-rick-perry/ar-AAWAlLd

no lnx

4/25/22

Salon

Newly revealed Mark Meadows texts appear to contradict denials by Marjorie Taylor Greene, Rick Perry

Jon Skolnik

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., urged former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows to have former President Donald Trump declare martial law after his 2020 election loss in order to keep the former president in office.

Her plea, first reported by CNN, came January 17, weeks after the Capitol riot, when Greene texted Meadows that she and a number of Republicans felt that declaring a police state was "the only way to save our Republic."

"In our private chat with only Members, several are saying the only way to save our Republic is for Trump to call for Marshall [sic] law," she wrote to him. "I don't know on those things. I just wanted you to tell him. They stole this election. We all know. They will destroy our country next. Please tell him to declassify as much as possible so we can go after Biden and anyone else!"

Meadows reportedly did not respond to the message.

The shocking revelation comes just days after Greene was forced to testify in trial about her actions and rhetoric leading up to the Capitol riot. In one exchange during the proceeding last week, Greene was asked whether she called on Meadows to have Trump declare martial law.

"I don't recall," she responded. "I don't remember."

RELATED: Marjorie Taylor Greene denies calling for Pelosi's execution during trial, then backtracks

That response was, more or less, carried through the entire proceeding, with Greene claiming that she doesn't remember saying things for which there is documented proof.

In another exchange during the trial, Greene suggested that the January 6 insurrection was orchestrated by Black Lives Matter and Antifa. But according to Monday's newly unearthed texts, Greene privately pleaded with Meadows to have Trump ask the rioters to stand down, indicating that she knew the riot was led by Trump supporters.

"Mark I was just told there is an active shooter on the first floor of the Capitol Please tell the President to calm people This isn't the way to solve anything," Greene wrote at the time.

Greene's texts to Meadows reportedly came just weeks after a "heated" December meeting in the Oval Office, wherein numerous Trump aides clashed with some of the former president's most ardent election deniers, including ex-Trump lawyer Sydney Powell and Michael Flynn, Trump's national security advisor.

During the meeting, CNN reported, Flynn also suggested that Trump invoke martial law in order to overturn the 2020 election. But numerous Trump aides reportedly pushed back on the idea, deeming it too extreme.

RELATED: Marjorie Taylor Greene is blasting through campaign funds

Hours before the election was called, former Trump Cabinet member and Texas Republican governor Rick Perry texted Meadows:"We have the data driven program that can clearly show where the fraud was committed. This is the silver bullet."Perry has previously denied such participation, but according to CNN, Meadows' trove included "one text message signed by Rick Perry, sent from Rick Perry's cell phone, with Rick Perry's phone number, saying 'This sort of thing is my bag.'"

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/04/ginni-thomas-texts-mark-meadows/

an 4 22

ginni Thomas, who is married to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, has been drawing a great deal of scrutiny over reports that after the 2020 presidential election, she urged then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows to push for the election results to be overturned. And according to reporting in CNN, one of the people Ginni Thomas mentioned in her texts to Meadows was her friend Connie Hair — a Republican insider who was serving as chief of staff for Rep. Louis Gohmert of Texas.

“In her now-infamous texts to Trump Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, referred to Hair and claims about election fraud while urging Meadows to fight the election result,” journalists Katelyn Polantz and Andrew Kaczynski report on CNN’s website. “Around that same time, Hair’s boss, Gohmert, filed or supported two lawsuits challenging the election that eventually landed before the Supreme Court.”

The CNN reporters add, “Ginni Thomas’ years-long relationship with Hair, including social outings that Clarence Thomas attended, as well as her texting with Meadows, add another dimension to an ongoing debate over whether her husband should recuse himself from cases related to the 2020 election and the January 6 insurrection, especially when his wife is closely aligned to people who advocated overturning the election.”

After the 2020 presidential election, Hair wasn’t shy about promoting the Big Lie. Hair, in a November 21, 2020 post on Facebook, wrote, “Massive amounts of voter fraud in the big cities throughout the contested states. And the evidence has only just begun to hit the courts.”

Polantz and Kaczynski note that Hair has a long history of associating with the Thomases.

“The Thomases have kept in contact with Hair for years, according to several photos and messages shared on Facebook by Hair and others and obtained by CNN,” Polantz and Kaczynski explain. “In 2016, Hair posted about attending a Colbie Caillat concert, sending her thanks for a ‘fun’ evening to Ginni Thomas…. Hair has worked in Gohmert’s office since 2010, according to congressional staffing records. In 2017, she took a new round of pictures with Clarence and Ginni Thomas, this time inside the justice’s chambers. That day, January 20, 2017, Clarence Thomas had sworn in (Mike) Pence as vice president.”

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/04/proof-congressional-republicans-subvert-election/

a recording made by a disgruntled election conspiracist is the strongest evidence yet that operatives in Donald Trump’s orbit summoned supporters to Washington on January 6 for the express purpose of coercing lawmakers into overturning the 2020 election.

News broke late Tuesday afternoon, whereupon this bombshell of a story was promptly buried under an avalanche of other news.

The main characters aren’t household names, but this story is every bit as important as the earlier revelation that Donald Trump, Jr, was pushing a detailed plan for a coup to his father’s chief of staff before the election had even been decided. And it’s even more important than the late-breaking news that Sen. Mike Lee talked up Trump lawyer John Eastman’s plan for a procedural coup in late November.

The star of the secret recording is Jason Sullivan, one-time aide to dirty trickster and longtime Trump confidante Roger Stone.

Sullivan told the Times he was invited to speak by a group of anti-vaccine activists, who were planning a permitted event in the capital on J6. (By amazing coincidence, Stone was scheduled to speak at an anti-vax event on the afternoon of J6, an engagement he missed, for reasons that are surely of great interest to the J6 committee.)

The call was made a week before the insurrection.

Sullivan repeatedly urged the other callers to intimidate the lawmakers who were meeting to certify the election. He told them they needed to make them feel like the people were “breathing down their neck.”

“If we make the people inside that building sweat and they understand that they may not be able to walk in the streets any longer if they do the wrong thing, then maybe they’ll do the right thing,” Sullivan said.

“We have to put that pressure there.”

This recording was made by a woman named Staci Burk, a former school board official turned election conspiracist. Burk filed an anonymous affidavit supporting one of Trump lawyer Sidney Powell’s many election conspiracy theories. Whereupon heavily armed paramilitary operatives calling themselves the 1st Amendment Praetorian (1AP) moved into her home for several weeks, ostensibly to guard her. Burk told the Times a 1AP member joined the call, and she made the recording because the armed men were making her feel unsafe. Members of 1AP were in the capital during the insurrection and members of the group have been subpoenaed by the J6 committee.

This recording partially corroborates previous claims by Ali Alexander, another one of Roger Stone’s associates. He said he schemed with members of the Congress to gather a crowd to pressure lawmakers into overturning the election during the certification ceremony.

In a video made before the insurrection, Ali Alexander claimed that he and US Reps. Mo Brooks, Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar “schemed up putting maximum pressure on Congress while they were voting.”

The video circulated on social media but was later deleted. The plan was to “change the hearts and the minds of Republicans who were in that body, hearing our loud roar from outside,” Ali Alexander said.

The Sullivan call proves there was an inside-outside game on J6.

The inside game was the procedural coup devised by John Eastman that was unfolding inside the Capitol on J6 as GOP legislators raised spurious claims of election fraud to overturn a free and fair election.

The outside game was the mob deliberately assembled in order to pressure legislators to go along with Trump’s illegal scheme.

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raw story tom b an 4 16 22

According to former Republican National Committee spokesperson Tim Miller, nothing better demonstrates that even the “good Republicans” like Sen. Mike Lee (UT) engaged inhare-brained schemes to help Donald Trump steal the 2020 presidential election, than Lee’s text messages leading up to the Jan 6th insurrection.

As Miller notes in his Bulwark column, there has existed a narrative that there were “good” Republicans who were not involved in plotting to keep Trump in the Oval Office no matter what voters decided, and then there were the fanatics who saw no problem with running roughshod over the Constitution.

With CNN reporting that Lee and fellow Republican Rep. Chip Roy (TX) were frantically texting former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows asking for help in disrupting the certification of the vote, Miller suggested that the “insane” wing of the party is deeper than people think.

With Lee and Roy’s texts demonstrating a swing from full-throated support for overturning to becoming appalled by the conspiracy theories and legal reasoning being put forth by former Trump attorney Sidney Powell, Miller wrote that the whole affair was a “clown show.”

“Among the self-appointed responsible Republicans, the story of Trump’s attempted election theft goes something like this: The former president had a few CRAZYpeople around him providing bad advice. Rudy and Lin Wood and Sidney “Release the Kraken” Powell and their ilk were egging on a strategy that was never going to work and that nobody was actually on board with,” Miller began. “Meanwhile, the rest of the players were maybe not profiles in courage, but they were trying to do the right thing. Just, you know, behind the scenes. Some were encouraging Trump to be more presidential—to finally do that growing into the office they had promised he would do four years ago now that he had lost.”

“The real story is that the circus was in town and even the supposed ‘good Republicans”’were happy to put on their clown make-up,” he added.

Listing off a series of the texts Lee sent to Meadows, Miller wrote that they are evidence that, “The true story is that ‘good Republican’ Mike Lee and White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows were forcing the crazy into the Oval Office at the most combustible time imaginable.”

Noting that Sens. Josh Hawley (R-MO) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) were openly trying to derail the certification of the 2020 vote, the former RNC official said Lee was just as bad — but doing it covertly

“In the end, Lee might not have voted to overturn the election but he was every bit a part of the coup as Cruz and Hawley and the rest. As it turns out this wasn’t the case of ‘responsible’ people trying to nudge things in the right direction in private,” he wrote before concluding, “It was a case where one posse of clowns was so insane that they were giving away the game. While the ‘responsible’ clowns like Mike Lee did everything in their power to figure out how they could keep the madman in power, without getting Rudy’s hair dye on their face.”

You can read the whole piece here.

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/04/don-trump-jr-mark-meadows/

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/04/don-trump-jr-election/

no lnx twt

Two days before the 2020 election was called for Joe Biden the President’s son, Donald Trump, Jr. sent a text to the White House Chief of Staff that said “we have operational control” to ensure a second Trump term, according to a just-published CNN bombshell report.

"It’s very simple,” Trump Jr. added in the November 5 text. “We have multiple paths We control them all.”

The damning text to Mark Meadows did not end there.

"We have operational control Total leverage,” Trump Jr’s text continued. “Moral High Ground POTUS must start 2nd term now.”

Legal experts are weighing in.

U.S. Rep. Ted Lieu (D-CA), an attorney who obtained the rank of Colonel in the Air Force Judge Advocate General (JAG) Corps made sure to stress the President’s son’s remarks seem to reveal illegality:

Former federal prosecutor of 30 years, Glenn Kirschner, wrote: “The ‘Subject’ line of Don Jr.’s email might as well have been, ‘I’m a member of my father’s criminal conspiracy to overturn the election.’"

And he asks, “How long do we have to endure this open, treasonous criminality by Trump and company before someone gets indicted?”

Election law expert Rick Hasen, a law and political science professor at the University of California, Irvine School of Law says “Mark Meadows election subversion texts are the gift that keep on giving. It’s amazing he didn’t fight against turning them over.”

Former US Acting Solicitor General Neal Katyal served up a one-word response: “Premeditated.”

:{:{}:

Richard Painter, former chief White House ethics lawyer in the George W. Bush administration: “This was an attempted putsch. He belongs in the slammer!”

"The son of a US President plotted to stop the US government from carrying out the transfer of presidential power,” tweeted attorney Luppe B. Luppen.

Popular MSNBC legal analyst and former federal prosecutor:

Former Manhattan DA’s office prosecutor Tristan Snell:

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an 3 22

When Ronald Reagan was president during the 1980s, part of his big-tent view of conservatism was what he called “the 11th Commandment” — which was “never speak ill of any fellow Republican.” But Donald Trump, as president, had a totally different approach: insult, belittle, bully and threaten any Republican who dared to disagree with him about anything. And according to Daily Beast reporters Asawin Suebsaeng and Adam Rawnsley, one of Trump’s worst enablers during his four years in the White House was far-right GOP activist and conspiracy theorist Ginni Thomas — who is married to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

In contrast to Reagan’s view that there was room for a variety of Republicans in his 1980s coalition — from Goldwater Republicans to Rockefeller Republicans, from secular libertarians to theocratic Christian fundamentalists — Trump demanded unquestioning loyalty from fellow Republicans. Ginni Thomas, Suebsaeng and Rawnsley emphasize in an article published by the Beast on April 1, encouraged that type of behavior and offered lists of people she recommended hiring or firing.

The Beast reporters explain, “Years before she became one of then-President Donald Trump’s most prominent coup supporters, Ginni Thomas was already notorious in his West Wing for, among other things, ruining staffers’ afternoons by working Trump into fits of vengeful rage…. Ever since she became a welcome guest at Trump’s residences, Thomas — an influential and long-time conservative activist, and wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas — had perfected a proven formula of enthralling and manipulating the president’s emotions and mood.”

Suebsaeng and Rawnsley continue, “On multiple occasions throughout the Trump era, Thomas would show up in the White House, sometimes for a private meeting or a luncheon with the president. She often came armed with written memos of who she and her allies believed Trump should hire for plum jobs — and who she thought Trump should promptly purge — that she distributed to Trump and other high-ranking government officials. The fire lists were particularly problematic, as they were frequently based on pure conjecture, rumor, or score-settling, where even steadfastly MAGA aides were targeted for being part of the ‘Deep State’ or some other supposedly anti-Trump coalition, according to people who saw them during the Trump Administration."[TWT]

During his years in the White House, Trump fired a long list of right-wing Republicans who he decided weren’t MAGA enough — from former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to former Attorney General Jeff Sessions to former National Security Adviser John Bolton. And eventually, he even turned against former Vice President Mike Pence and former Attorney General William Barr when they refused to go along with his efforts to steal the 2020 presidential election. Ginni Thomas, according to the Washington Post and CBS News, aggressively promoted the Big Lie, urging former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows to pursue efforts to overturn the 2020 election results.

// PUTIN UKRAINE FAIL] One of the reasons Trump was a failure as president was the fact that he wanted to be surrounded by yes-men, and according to the Beast’s article, Ginni Thomas did everything she could to encourage him.

A former senior Trump Administration official, presumably interviewed on condition of anonymity, told the Beast, “We all knew that within minutes after Ginni left her meeting with the president, he would start yelling about firing people for being disloyal. When Ginni Thomas showed up, you knew your day was wrecked.”

Trump wasn’t shy about hiring extremists if he thought they would be loyalists, and Thomas had plenty of recommendations. According to Suebsaeng and Rawnsley, her recommendations included “Fox News personality Dan Bongino, and the Trump-adulating Sheriff David Clarke” as well as Frank Gaffney — the former Pentagon official and conspiracy theorist who “accused conservative anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist of being a secret agent for the Muslim Brotherhood.”

A former Trump White House official told the Beast, “These fucking lists were so insane and unworkable. A lot of them were dripping with paranoia and read like they were written by a disturbed person.”

The Beast also interviewed former White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham, who recalled, “Trump loved talking to Ginni so much because he loved hearing about who was a Never Trumper, or allegedly one. He loved people who would flatter him, (as Ginni would do). But also, his obsession with loyalty aside, he just loved to gossip — all the time. That’s something else he got out of his series of meetings at the White House with Ginni Thomas.”

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'Coup in search of a legal theory': Judge delivers damning rebuke — orders Eastman to hand over docs

https://www.alternet.org/2022/03/john-eastman-2657052274/

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stop steal and coup fueled by qanon wingnuttery?

https://www.alternet.org/2022/03/gop-qanon/

Over the last few years, QAnon has slowly infiltrated the Republican Party, replacing its traditional conservative values with far-right conspiratorial theories that have nothing to do with reality.

Now, NY Mag's Jacob Silverman is explaining how QAnon has practically overtaken the Republican Party. While the radicalized beliefs were previously verbalized among factions of the political party, Silverman notes how those beliefs are progressively becoming more mainstream.

"QAnon’s adherents tend to espouse some selection of bizarre beliefs from the conspiracist’s buffet that includes accusations of pedophile politicians eating children, secret political tribunals in Guantanamo Bay, a great bloodletting, and Donald Trump swooping in to free us from evil. One day. Or maybe the day after. The prophecy is flexible, which is why it has evolved and endured."

Explaining the timeline of the political party's downward spiral, Silverman noted how the actions of Ginni Thomas, wife of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, are an example of the radical shift in Republican values and belief systems.

"The latest exemplar of the GOP’s descent into anything-goes nuttery is Ginni Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and a well-connected conservative activist who recently admitted to attending the January 6 Stop the Steal rally in Washington, D.C.," he writes. "Ginni’s right-wing beliefs have long been known, but leaked texts between her and then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows revealed Thomas’ commitment to overturning the election, based on an apparently sincere belief that Joe Biden had stolen the presidency. She encouraged Meadows to help put a stop to Democratic perfidy. 'The majority knows Biden and the Left is attempting the greatest Heist of our History,' went one message to Meadows, encouraging him to stand strong."

Silverman is also highlighting Republican lawmakers' latest actions that signal the party's shift toward more extremist beliefs.

"The signs of the Republican slide towardfull epistemic crackup are all around us," Silverman writes. "One can see it everywhere lately, not only in the 'why do you want to hurt children?'-type questions hurled by Republican senators at Jackson, but also in the revanchist anti-LGBTQ laws being introduced in Texas and Florida and in fearful talk of teachers 'grooming' children on Fox News. The ginned-up moral panic, centered around the child exploitation themes that helped give life to QAnon, is now a regular part of Republican political rhetoric."

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/03/madison-cawthorn/

1/6 mult weapons

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/03/trump-2656976697/

The report used by former President Donald Trump to push his big lie about the 2020 presidential election was reportedly written by one of his own White House staffers, new details reveal. GUK

The Guardian has reportedly reviewed the original version of the reference document. While the public version of Trump's reference is said to have been authored by Katherine Friess, who served as a volunteer member of the former president's post-election legal team, new developments have revealed the report "was, in fact, produced by the senior Trump White House policy aide Joanna Miller."

Per The Guardian, the report on Dominion Voting Systems, which was titled, “OVERVIEW 12/2/20 – History, Executives, Vote Manipulation Ability and Design, Foreign Ties” claimed the election technology company "corruptly ensured there could be 'technology glitches which resulted in thousands of votes being added to Joe Biden’s total ballot count.'”

According to an inside source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, "the original version of the Dominion report named Miller — who worked for the senior Trump adviser Peter Navarro — as the author on the cover page, until her name was abruptly replaced with that of Friess before the document was to be released publicly."

The report was supposed to be used as a tool to support Trump's efforts to have election results overturned in battleground states President Joe Biden won. However, Trump administration officials also began using the report to support other tactics they were reportedly considering to overturn the outcome of the election so the former president could remain in power.

After the report was made public, Navarro, according to the inside source, began referencing the baseless claims in his own report which he compiled with help from Miller and, Garrett Ziegler, who also worked as a policy aide for the Trump White House.

“Two weeks before the election, we were doing those reports hoping that we would pepper the swing states with those,” Ziegler said of former White House advisor Navarro's report.

The latest development comes as the House Select Committee continues its investigation into the Jan. 6 insurrection and the circumstances surrounding it.

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/03/donald-trump-john-eastman-crimes/

roger knew

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trms jamie said judge asked 1/6 comm to weigh in on crimes b/c has to decide if eastman has atty -cli priv, but crime negates

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aha: odd/telling that trumpista GOP is turning on longtime allies held by americans in high esteem, military and corps, call them woke when not loyal to trump?

jbs called ike a commie --> end?

3 22

Fact checker shreds Trump Jr.'s claim about 6 million military hours being spent promoting the 'woke' agenda

Donald Trump, Jr. speaking at the 2019 Teen Student Action Summit, hosted by Turning Point USA at the Marriott Marquis in Washington, D.C., Gage Skidmore

Meaghan Ellis March 03, 2022

A fact-checker is pushing back against Don Trump Jr.'s latest claim suggesting the military's last 6 million hours have placed an emphasis on the so-called "woke" agenda.

The Washington Post's Glenn Kessler highlighted remarks made by former President Donald Trump's son when he appeared at theConservative Political Action Conference in Orlando, Fla. At one point during his speech, he criticized the U.S. military.

“Our generals, the great woke leaders of our military that spent 6 million man-hours training our troops about wokeness — not fighting, not killing bad guys," Trump Jr., said on February 27. "They wanted to learn about White rage, a term none of us had heard of prior to him [Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff] testifying, right?”

[Donald Trump Jr. Bashes Biden Over Ukraine Crisis In Fiery CPAC 2022 Remarks | Full Speech

youtu.be]

Kessler pushed back with the facts about the military's hours spent. He noted that Trump Jr.'s remarks would only make sense to conservatives who rely on information from far-right influential platforms like Fox News and Newsmax. He went on to explain why.

After tracking down the six million figure, Kessler acknowledged that it derives from a letter written by Milley that was addressed to Sen. James M. Inhofe (Okla.), who is a high-ranking Republican official serving on the Senate Armed Services Committee. At the time, Inhofe had requested to know how much time had been dedicated to three key items as under the U.S. Department of Justice requirements. Those items, according to Kessler, are "an extremism 'stand-down' related to the Jan. 6 attacks on the Capitol, a climate change plan and a new diversity, equity and inclusion training program."

Although Trump Jr. claimed the military had spent a substantial amount of its time on the woke agenda,Kessler pointed out that they actually placed an emphasis on mitigating extremism.

"The biggest chunk of time was devoted to the extremism stand-down — nearly 5.4 million hours," Kessler explained. "Since nearly 2.5 million members of the military participated, that means about two hours per person, which Milley noted is “comparable to other Joint Force periodic training requirements.” The climate change plan (1,059 hours) and diversity training (529,711 hours) brought the total up to 5.9 million hours. But you can see that more than 90 percent of the total related to the extremism course."

Kessler also highlighted Trump Jr.'s attempt to bend words.

"Notice the sneaky trick that Trump Jr. plays here," he wrote.

The vast majority of the “6 million man-hours” and the “White rage” comment concerned the attack on the Capitol by supporters of his father — an attack that the former president has defended and even seemed to celebrate. But his son does not make that clear. Instead, he claims that this is all about a “woke agenda” imposed by the Biden administration. To some extent that might be a matter of opinion, but it seems like a real stretch."

He concluded saying that although the 6 figure number is an actual estimate of real-time hours, "there is no evidence that this relatively minor course detracted from any military training — and Trump Jr. entirely mischaracterizes what the training was for."

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an 2 22

no lnx twt

John Eastman wrote another 'election subversion memo' — this time for Wisconsin: report

Alex Henderson February 08, 2022

Throughout much of U.S. history, the types of things that Republican attorney and Donald Trump ally John C. Eastman did following the 2020 presidential election would have been unthinkable. Eastman wrote an infamous memo in which he laid out a plan for overturning the election results and keeping now-President Joe Biden, who legitimately won the election, out of the White House.

Now, according to Rolling Stone’s Washington, D.C bureau chief, Andy Kroll, Eastman is arguing for decertifying the election results in Wisconsin. And one of the far-right MAGA Republicans who is very much in favor of that is Wisconsin State Rep. Timothy Ramthun.

In an article published by Rolling Stone on February 6, Kroll reports, “Nowhere is this crusade to subvert the 2020 election result more on display than in Wisconsin. Even though Republicans there do not control all the levers of power — the governor, Tony Evers, is a Democrat — they have launched a multi-front effort to cast doubt on the 2020 election, intimidate local officials, and, in Ramthun’s case, throw out the state’s presidential-election result.”

Kroll notes that Ramthun is not universally loved by Republicans in Wisconsin.

“In Wisconsin, as in other states, the energy in the conservative movement burns hottest among those voters who believe the Republican-controlled Legislature should empower people like Ramthun and throw out Biden’s 2020 victory,” Kroll explains. “Moderate Republicans have responded by ostracizing Ramthun or blasting their party’s descent into a post-fact cult of conspiracy theorists.”

But Ramthun, according to Kroll, has an ally in Eastman.

“Ramthun…. received an eight-page analysis from John Eastman, the same lawyer who wrote the infamous memos arguing for how (Vice President Mike) Pence could overturn the election result on January 6, 2021,” Kroll writes. “Eastman’s memo for Ramthun, dated December 30, 2021, argues that if there was ‘acknowledged illegality’ in an election, then the result of that election was rendered null and the State Legislature had the power to pick the electors ‘as it sees fit.’”

Kroll interviewed Evers for his article, and the Democratic Wisconsin governor lamented that MAGA Republicans in his state have been tireless in their assault on voting rights.

Evers told Kroll, “This is an all-hands-on-deck moment here. If I weren’t able to veto bills without the Republicans overriding my veto, we’d be Georgia right now. We’d be Texas. We’d be Arizona.”

Kroll warns that the MAGA campaign against voting rights in Wisconsin will only grow worse if Evers isn’t reelected in the 2022 midterms.

“The threat to democracy in Wisconsin isn’t coming from a lawless election commission, hacked voting machines, or illegal ballots coming out of nursing homes,” Kroll writes. “It comes from a political party that united around suspicions and lies, and sought to bend reality to its will. Wisconsin is more than a laboratory for new policies and bold ideas; it’s a trial for whether democracy can survive at all.”

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CREW sed cauc:

crew 1/22

corporate and industry PACs have also continued to support the Republican state attorneys generalwho attempted to invalidate the election results in four battleground states by falsely claiming that election procedures in Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin violated federal law. Twenty companies including Boeing, Walmart, and Home Depot have donated $60,200 through their federal PACs to 12 attorneys general involved in the lawsuit, which was led by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall collected the most in donations, bringing in $14,500. He is the head of the Rule of Law Defense Fund, a dark money organization that paid for robocalls promoting the “Save America” rally held on January 6 before the insurrection....

Corporate and industry PACs have also contributed to the Republican state attorneys general who attempted to invalidate the election results by joining a lawsuit, led by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, against four battleground states won by Biden. Twenty industry donors including Boeing, Walmart and Home Depot have donated $60,200 through their federal PACs to Paxton and eleven other attorneys general who joined that lawsuit, attempting to decertify the results. The four states received historic turnout from voters of color.

Steve Marshall, attorney general of Alabama, has raised the most from these donors, taking in $14,500.He is the head of the Rule of Law Defense Fund, a dark money organization that paid for robocalls detailing when and where individuals should meet for the “Save America” rally held before the insurrection took place at the Capitol. His efforts to undermine the results of the 2020 presidential election perpetuated the myth that it was stolen, while robocalls by RLDF urged rallygoers to “march to the Capitol” and “call on Congress to stop the steal.”

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxtonpulled in $6,000 from the Texas Farm Bureau and Valero Energy since leading the charge to invalidate millions of people’s votes. Attorney General Sean Reyes of Utah backed the lawsuit, further eroding confidence in this country’s democratic system. He pulled in $7,500 from two donors, including Home Depot.

Companies that cut checks to these election objectors had also made commitments about confronting systemic racism in this country. Only their efforts to curb racism apparently don’t include their political giving. Cigna, which shared its “resolute belief in diversity [and] inclusion” and described intolerance “as not only unacceptable, but as the antithesis of everything [they] stand for,” offered contributions to Florida Attorney General and former RLDF board member Ashley Moody. Walmart, which committed $100 million over five years to build a “center on racial equity” to address systemic racism, contributed to Marshall. Home Depot gave $1 million to the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law “in support of its vital work to secure civil rights and equal justice for all,” then turned around and donated to Reyes.

These billion dollar corporations have contradicted their public commitments to racial justice by bankrolling attorneys general sowing doubt about a fair election in states like Georgia, which have historically suppressed Black voters. By funding these officials, the same companies claiming to support racial justice are giving political power to an anti-democratic and racist agenda.

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devos 180

https://www.alternet.org/2022/01/betsy-devos/

no lnx

Betsy DeVos’ foundation is giving $640,000 to right wing group whose 'scholar' wrote Trump-Pence coup memos

David Badash and The New Civil Rights Movement January 12, 2022

The foundation belonging to anti-public school activist and former Trump Education Secretary Betsy DeVos and her husband, is handing a right wing group, The Claremont Institute, $640,000.

“The Dick and Betsy DeVos Foundation donated $240,000 to Claremont in 2020 and approved another $400,000 to be paid out in the future, tax records show,” Rolling Stone reports in an article titled, “Revealed: The Billionaires Funding the Coup’s Brain Trust.”

The Claremont Institute is home to John Eastman, who was best known (and currently serves) as the chairman of the anti-LGBTQ organization NOM, the National Organization For Marriage. Eastman agreed to “retire” as a law professor at the Chapman University School of Law exactly one week after he delivered a speech, on stage with Rudy Giuliani, at Donald Trump’s rally that preceded the violent and deadly January 6 insurrection.

But only later would Americans learn that John Eastman was the architect and author of several documents, now called the “coup memos,” detailing how Vice President Mike Pence could, effectively, steal the election for Donald Trump on the fateful day of the insurrection.

Eastman continues to serve as a Senior Fellow at The Claremont Institute, and in his role as the Founding Director of the Claremont Institute’s Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence.

The Bulwark, founded by prominent conservative never-Trumpers, last year wrote: “That Claremont has been unparalleled in its intellectual submission to Trumpism should give us pause.”

In 2019, Claremont welcomed as a Lincoln Fellow the conspiracist and “ king of fake news” Jack Michael Posobiec III. Posobiec, already well known as a promoter of the Pizzagate hoax and the Seth Rich conspiracy theory, was then working as a correspondent and host for the One America News Network (OANN), which became one of the major promoters of false claims about the 2020 election. Claremont remains proud of the affiliation with Posobiec, with an institute official recently calling him “one of the best public political voices in America”—just days before it was revealed that a right-wing website Posobiec frequently promoted was a Russian disinformation project.

And among the latest crop of Lincoln Fellows is Charlie Kirk, the founder of the right-wing youth-mobilizing group Turning Point USA. Kirk bragged about sending “80+ buses full of patriots to DC to fight” for Trump on January 6. After his slimy “Falkirk Center,” co-founded with Jerry Falwell Jr., imploded, Kirk was ousted from Liberty University. The Claremont Institute has welcomed him with open arms.

As Americans now know, Eastman also counseled President Donald Trump in other areas, but in a shocking revelation which The New York Times and other news outlets reported late last year, Eastman sat in the Oval Office with Trump attempting to pressure the outgoing vice president to act to overturn a free and fair election.

Later, on January 6, Eastman, The Washington Post reported, would blame Pence for the violent attempted coup which included Trump supporters hunting for Pence inside the Capitol, a gallows and noose just outside, chanting repeatedly, “hang Mike Pence.”

What was essentially an attempted assassination of a sitting vice president came barely hours after Eastman – who to this day remains a Claremont Institute “scholar” – at the Jan. 6 spouted “conspiracy theories about voter fraud.”

Here is John Eastman, chairman of a Federalist Society practice group, at the pre-insurrection rally spouting conspiracy theories about voter fraud. He concludes: \u201cAnybody that is not willing to stand up and [vote to overturn the election] does not deserve to be in the office!\u201dpic.twitter.com/auD2vXSjNE

— Mark Joseph Stern ***FAIR COLAs FOR SLATE*** (@Mark Joseph Stern ***FAIR COLAs FOR SLATE***) 1610553789

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1 22 cdv

...Consider the fascinating and, at times, undeniably entertaining characters of TrumpWorld. Donald Trump himself is a reality TV star and pro wrestling "heel" who somehow became president. He has surrounded himself with other characters straight from central casting, including corrupt consigliere Roger Stone and "America's mayor" Rudy Giuliani, now a grossly incompetent go-between and a legal adviser of dubious skill and wisdom.

It's easy to laugh, but we cannot overlook those smart and very dangerous foes of democracy such as Steve Bannon, Michael Flynn, Stephen Miller, John Eastman, Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and numerous others. There are also the lesser-known true believers and ideologues who lurk in the shadows of think tanks, interest groups, academia, business and finance, the news media, right-wing evangelical churches, paramilitaries and "tactical culture," military and veterans groups, and elsewhere in the private sector and the world of public policy and consulting.

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1 22 yahoo mail

North Carolina voters challenge Rep. Madison Cawthorn’s candidacy for re-election under Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment.

The challenge, filed before the North Carolina State Board of Elections, alleges that Cawthorn is constitutionally disqualified from public office under Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, based on reasonable suspicion that he helped facilitate the January 6th insurrection. This is the first such challenge to candidate eligibility filed since the Reconstruction era.

In the weeks leading up to January 6th, Cawthorn publicly urged his followers to threaten and intimidate Members of Congress into blocking certification of 2020 election results. As the date approached, Cawthorn or his staff were in close contact with organizers for the “Save America” demonstration, in which Trump incited his supporters to “walk down to the Capitol” and “fight like hell.” Cawthorn’s speeches, tweets, and other public statements establish reasonable suspicion that he helped plan the demonstration and/or march with advance knowledge of the violent attack. Furthermore, his speeches since then suggest that he continues to endorse political violence as a tool for intimidation.

Free Speech For People is proud to represent these voters upholding our Constitution and defending our democracy in the face of the ongoing threat Cawthorn and his allies pose to our republic. But we can’t succeed without your support....

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an 12 21 me

A former Trump White House advisor has revealed he collaborated with a right-wing agitator to execute a behind-the-scenes effort to halt the certification of President Joe Biden's election victory.

Speaking to The Daily Beast last week,Peter Navarro —ex-adviser to former President Donald Trump— touched on his role in the plans and how he and former Trump White House strategist Steve Bannon corroborated with Republican lawmakers like Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas).Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) to halt the certification of the election results.

“We spent a lot of time lining up over 100 congressmen, including some senators. It started out perfectly. At 1 p.m., Gosar and Cruz did exactly what was expected of them,” Navarro told The Daily Beast. “It was a perfect plan. And it all predicated on peace and calm on Capitol Hill. We didn’t even need any protestors, because we had over 100 congressmen committed to it.”

The commitment Navarro discussed came as lawmakers were affirming the presidential election certification highlighting Biden's victory over Trump. Although they failed to successfully overturn the election, their goal was to stall as much as possible in hopes of pressuring Vice President Mike Pence (R) to send election results back to the six states Trump and his allies fought to overturn.

As reputable news outlets refused to circulate Trump's claims of widespread voter fraud, The Daily Beast noted that Navarro and Bannon "hoped to force journalists to cover the allegations by creating a historic delay to the certification process."

“The Green Bay Sweep was very well thought out. It was designed to get us 24 hours of televised hearings,” he said. “But we thought that we could bypass the corporate media by getting this stuff televised.”

Navarro went on to highlight what his exact role was in the plot. He was responsible for providing what has been described as "raw materials" such as the report he created with subtitles like “The Immaculate Deception” and “The Art of the Steal.”

“My role was to provide the receipts for the 100 congressmen or so who would make their cases… who could rely in part on the body of evidence I'd collected,” he told The Daily Beast. “To lay the legal predicate for the actions to be taken.” (Ultimately, states have not found any evidence of electoral fraud above the norm, which is exceedingly small.)

In his memoir titled,In Trump Time, Navarro also shed light on Bannon's role in the plot.

“Steve Bannon’s role was to figure out how to use this information—what he called ‘receipts’—to overturn the election result. That’s how Steve had come up with the Green Bay Sweep idea,” he wrote.

Navarro added, “The political and legal beauty of the strategy was this: by law, both the House of Representatives and the Senate must spend up to two hours of debate per state on each requested challenge. For the six battleground states, that would add up to as much as twenty-four hours of nationally televised hearings across the two chambers of Congress.”

During a segment on his podcast, "War Room Pandemic," Bannon also alluded to elements of the plot.

"We are right on the cusp of victory,” Bannon said on the show. “It’s quite simple. Play’s been called. Mike Pence, run the play. Take the football. Take the handoff from the quarterback. You’ve got guards in front of you. You’ve got big, strong people in front of you. Just do your duty."

Although Navarro had a role in the plot, he admitted that it was likely best that someone canceled his scheduled appearance to speak at the "Save America" rally shortly before the insurrection on the U.S. Capitol.

“It was better for me to spend that morning working on the Green Bay Sweep. Just checking to see that everything was in line, that congressmen were on board,” he said during the interview. “It was a pretty mellow morning for me. I was convinced everything was set in place.”

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sued VP big lie = coup?

https://www.alternet.org/2021/12/louie-gohmert/

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house investigation into the Jan. 6 insurrection just took an unexpected turn: report

Meaghan Ellis

December 21, 2021

Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) has become a key focal point for the House Select Committee's investigation into the Jan. 6 insurrection on the U.S. Capitol, according to The Washington Post'...

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Personal goon squad': Why a newly reported memo by a Trump loyalist is 'cause of considerable alarm' for US democracy

Alex Henderson

November 15, 2021

ABC News' Jonathan Karl has reported that on October 19, 2020, Trump loyalist John McEntee — then serving as White House director of presidential personnel — issued a memo listing reasons to fire then-Defense ESPER...

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chris h with 12/10/21 nice job on linear/serial lock-picking

12 21

...We have received exceptionally interesting and important documents from a number of witnesses, including Mark Meadows. He has turned over many texts from his private cell phone from January 6th.

"We have litigated and won Trump’s executive privilege case in Federal District Court. The Federal Appellate Court has expedited the appeal, and we anticipate a ruling regarding many more Trump White House documents soon. [As indeed happened moments later.]

"The investigation is firing on all cylinders.

"Do not be misled: President Trump is trying to hide what happened on January 6th and to delay and obstruct. We will not let that happen. The truth will come out."

New details about Meadows' actions during the Capitol riots have also been reported by CNN. According to an inside source, Meadows provided the House Select Committee with records of his text messages and emails that suggest he was "exchanging with a wide range of individuals while the attack was underway,"

The inside source also noted that although Meadows is now refusing to communicate with investigators, the records he provided “offer a window into what people were texting to Meadows on January 6, what he was telling them about Trump in real time, and what the former President was doing for those hours while the Capitol was under attack and rioters were chanting ‘Hang Mike Pence."

Other sources have also explained how critical Meadows' text messages may be to the investigation.

Per CNN:

"In a letter sent to Meadows' attorney on Wednesday, the committee hinted at the content of the texts it has received from Trump's former chief of staff. The letter noted Meadows provided the committee with "text messages about the need for the former President to issue a public statement that could have stopped the January 6th attack on the Capitol."

The source familiar with the communications tells CNN the texts may not reflect well on the former president.

The investigation into the U.S. Capitol insurrection will likely be ongoing.

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12 21 an

two days before the January 6 insurrection several Republican U.S. Senators and Representatives were briefed on a 38-page coup PowerPoint memo. That document is being described as a roadmap for then-President Donald Trump to declare a national security emergency, invalidate all electronic votes, and move to have himself declared the winner of the 2020 presidential election.

It does not appear that any of the Republican lawmakers alerted the public to the in-process coup attempt. It is not known if they alerted the Dept. of Justice, FBI, or other law enforcement agency.

The Guardian GUK revealed late Friday night that the 38-page coup PowerPoint "was presented on 4 January to a number of Republican senators and members of Congress." Those GOP lawmakers have not been publicly named.

Then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows turned the coup memo over to the House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack, claiming it had been emailed to him but not implemented.

But the document itself calls for the lawmakers to be briefed.

"Senators and members of Congress should first be briefed about foreign interference, the PowerPoint said, at which point Trump could declare a national emergency, declare all electronic voting invalid, and ask Congress to agree on a constitutionally acceptable remedy," The Guardian, which saw a version of the memo, added.

The New York Times, also on Friday, added that the coup PowerPoint "included a claim that China and Venezuela had obtained control over the voting infrastructure in a majority of states," which is false.

Larry Sabato, the highly-respected Director of the University of Virginia's Center for Politics said on Twitter the 38-page document was "COMPLETE HORSESHIT."...

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/11/trump-attorney-eastman-went-directly-to-arizonas-house-speaker-with-his-insurrectionist-scheme-report/

John C. Eastman — a far-right attorney, Donald Trump ally, MAGA Republican and prominent figure in the Claremont Institute — has horrified constitutionalists because of his authoritarian plan to overturn the 2020 presidential election results. And one of the Republicans he reached out to directly, according to the Arizona Republic, was Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers.

Referencing reporting in the Arizona Republic, Talking Points Memo's Cristina Cabrera notes that on January 4, 2021, Eastman contacted Bowers directly "to pitch a legal theory on how Arizona's electors ought to be tossed away before Congress" certified "the electoral votes on January 6."

Arizona was one of the five states that went for Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election but flipped to now-President Joe Biden in 2020; the others were Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan and Wisconsin. Trump falsely claimed that he was the real winner in Arizona but was deprived of a victory because of widespread voter fraud, but official bipartisan recounts confirmed that Biden, in fact, won the state.

Regardless, Trump lawyer Eastman was more than happy to promote Trump's false claims of widespread voter fraud. And because of Eastman, Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell and other Trump lawyers, the United States came dangerously close to a constitutional crisis during the late 2020/early 2021 lame duck period. The violent insurrectionist assault on the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6 was unprecedented in U.S. history.

Cabrera notes, "Eastman has claimed he was only…. offering hypotheticals and had no intention of overturning the election. But January 4, the day he spoke to Bowers, was also the day he presented his election-stealing scheme to (Vice President Mike) Pence. Both reported examples show Eastman pressing Republicans to subvert the election, not simply offering disinterested legal advice."

The fact that Eastman has been so prominent in the **Claremont Institute is important. Founded in 1979, the right-wing think tank has been around for 42 years — and in the past, it favored a more traditional brand of conservation. Claremont's founder, the late Harry V. Jaffa, was a speechwriter for Sen. Barry Goldwater during his 1964 presidential campaign. But Claremont has taken an increasingly dark and authoritarian turn in recent years, fully embracing Trump's MAGA movement and pushing far-right conspiracy theories. In a notorious essay for the American Mind published on March 24 and headlined "Conservatism Is No Longer Enough," Glenn Ellmers (a Claremont senior fellow) argued that most people living in the U.S. are no longer Americans in the true sense. Ellmers' essay was right out of the Viktor Orbán/Vladimir Putin/Marine LePen school of hyper-nationalist far-right authoritarianism.

Eastman, like Ellmers, has championed the MAGA movement vigorously. And more traditional conservatives and libertarians such as those at The Bulwark have been appalled by his scheme, outlined in a two-page memo, for overturning the 2020 election results.

According to Cabrera, "Eastman's reported conversation with Bowers fell on the same day as the attorney's Oval Office meeting with Pence, during which Eastman laid out his now-infamous memo explaining how the vice president could hijack Congress' certification process to keep Trump in power. Eastman proposed that Pence throw out electors from the swing states Biden had won, including Arizona, and let the GOP-controlled state legislatures or U.S. House Republicans choose new electors…. The Arizona Republic's new report on Eastman apparently trying to personally lobby an individual state Republican leader reveals the extent to which the lawyer tried to make his cloak-and-dagger scheme, which was fully backed by Trump, a reality."

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raise $ for 1/6 boast

https://www.alternet.org/2021/11/kimberly-guilfoyle/

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scott perry frdm cock --> bossert to trump

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11 21 an

On January 2, Trump lawyer John Eastman called into Steve Bannon's *War Room*podcast to explain how to steal the election. Eastman told Bannon that Vice President Mike Pence could still overturn Biden's victory. The interview was part of an extremely public campaign by Trump and his closest allies to lobby Pence to steal the election during the certification ceremony.

One of Eastman's crackpot theories was that the vice president has the unilateral power to accept or reject electoral votes at his whim, or failing that, to somehow "send the election back" to Republican-controlled swing state legislatures that would disregard the will of their people and replace Biden's electors with Trump's.

Eastman was Trump's master of self-serving constitutional bafflegab. His job was to spin elaborate pseudo-legal theories to justify Trump's assault on democracy. It was Eastman who wrote the notorious memos outlining his fanciful legal arguments for why the vice president has the power to unilaterally reelect himself. Eastman also co-wrote a blueprint for how Trump could use the military, the police, and criminal gangs to hold onto power after a disputed election. Eastman even spoke at Trump's rally on the Ellipse, making wild allegations of election fraud before Trump set the mob on the Capitol.

To understand January 6, you have to think in terms of an inside game and an outside game. The inside game was to steal the election procedurally. The outside game was to gather a mob to terrorize officials into going along with it. Eastman was a conceptual architect of both the paper coup attempt and of the plan for the political repression that Trumpists expected to follow in the wake of the theft.

READ:A growing threat is emerging from the theocratic wing of the GOP — but many liberals are missing it

It all comes back to the Big Lie of massive Democratic voter fraud in the swing states. Trump used the fantasy of a stolen election to gather his supporters in Washington for a "wild protest" on January 6, whip them into a rage and set them on the Capitol. Eastman used the same lie to justify his schemes to overturn the election procedurally.

In his various memos and public appearances, Eastman presented several paths to overrule the will of the people, but his ultimate justification was always the same: Democratic "fraud" in the swing states invalidated their certified slates of Biden electors.

Therefore, he maintained, Mike Pence was entitled to unilaterally cast aside the electoral votes and count alternate slates of fake electors in their place or discard the votes from those states altogether, denying either candidate the necessary 270 votes and throwing the election to the state delegations in the House.

As Eastman wrote in his second memo, Trump would prevail, "if the Republicans in the State Delegations stand firm." At the time, the GOP caucus was deeply divided over whether to back Trump's paper coup, and Pence was signalling he was not willing to play his assigned role.

READ:'Whole case is a mess': Internet stunned as judge lets Rittenhouse choose final jurors in raffle system

Hence the need for extra muscle on the outside.

This fits with what another key conspirator has said about his reason for gathering a mob on January 6. "We […] schemed up putting maximum pressure on Congress while they were voting," said Stop the Steal organizer Ali Alexander, regarding his motives. He wanted to "change the hearts and the minds of Republicans who were in that body, hearing our loud roar from outside."

After an extended rant about the cowardice of Mike Pence, the last order Trump gave the mob before sending them down Pennsylvania Avenue was that they must give "boldness" to "weak Republicans."

Trump's command echoed Eastman's language in the longer of the two memos in which he described his own scheme as "BOLD, certainly."

Read:'Conspiracy nuts': DeSantis is in the hot seat after his aide gets caught pushing anti-Semitic theory

The label "coup" conjures up images of a military takeover, but a procedural coup under the threat of violence is still a coup.

Denialists try to mislead by pointing to the insurgents' relatively light weaponry and saying: "You don't think they meant to overthrow the US government with that, do you?" But the plan was never to physically seize control of the government. Insurgents just had to bully Pence and House Republicans into reversing the election for Trump.

Trump's advisors were well aware that reversing a free and fair election would provoke national outrage and widespread protests. Eastman's blueprint for leveraging the military, the police, and criminal gangs to hold onto power would work as well or better after a procedural coup as it would after an uncertain Election Night (the scenario nominally entertained in the report). A stolen election would putBiden supporters in the streets where the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers would be waiting for them, prepared to start or escalate violence wherever they could. This kind of unrest was exactly what Eastman warned local officials to be prepared to suppress.[see war game bs?]

We eagerly await what Bannon and Eastman will tell the January 6 committee, but what they've already said is utterly damning.

READ:Ocasio-Cortez gives an impassioned speech blasting Kevin McCarthy after Gosar's 'incitement of violence'

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House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack has just issued more subpoenas for very close Trump associates, among them longtime Trump advisor Jason Miller, and former Trump National Security Advisor, QAnon conspiracist Michael Flynn.

Also on the list are the author of the memo detailing how Vice President Mike Pence could allegedly overturn the election, anti-LGBTQ group chairman John Eastman. Decades-long Giuliani ally Bernard Kerik is also among those subpoenaed.

One name many do not know is Angela McCallum, who served as aNational Republican Senatorial Committee War Room Lead,and as a National Executive Assistant, for Donald J. Trump for President.

Lastly, Bill Stepien, Trump 2020 campaign manager.

Axios' Andrew Solender posts the letter to Stepien.

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omg yikes D&D PR stunt?

https://www.alternet.org/2021/11/trump-2655520362/

no lnx

'Barely concealed bloodlust': Claremont Institute laid out detailed plan for using cops to overturn Trump’s election loss

Travis Gettys and Raw Story November 08, 2021

The right-wing Claremont Institute published a report in mid-October 2020 that gamed out a scenario where Donald Trump would remain in office through an alliance between law enforcement and militant extremists.

The report was prepared by attorney John Eastman, who authored a memo laying out another strategy for keeping Trump in office, and former Trump deputy national security advisor K.T. McFarland, as well as Kevin Roberts, then-executive director of the Texas Public Policy Foundation, alt-right figure Jeff Giesea and right-wing blogger Charles Haywood, reported The Bulwark.

"Despite the authors' pretensions to scholarship and rigor — 'for a simulation to be valuable, the other side gets a vote and actions must be based in realism' — the final document is a frenzied and paranoid piece of work, revealing of the anxieties and aspirations of the authoritarian right," writes columnist Christian Vanderbrouk. "Practically, the report is an instruction manual for how Trump partisans at all levels of government — aided by citizen 'posses' of Proud Boys and Oath Keepers — could, quite literally, round up opposition activists, kill their leaders, and install Donald Trump for a second term in office."

Most of the predictions in the report, titled "79 Days to Inauguration," did not come to fruition, such as the authors' belief that some states' voting results would be fatally tainted by cyber attacks and suspicious fires, and left-wing mobs did not converge on Washington, D.C., to incite violence, and police did not execute antifa/Black Lives Matter leaders as part of a federal operation.

"A barely concealed bloodlust runs through the report," Vanderbrouk writes. "This isn't a serious wargame or a policy study so much as a bowdlerized retelling of The Turner Diaries."

The report was produced in response to the bipartisan Transition Integrity Project's (TIP) exercise on "Preventing a Disrupted Presidential Election and Transition," which considered the prospect of Trump refusing to concede an election loss and made recommendations for avoiding a crisis -- which seems to be the opposite intent of the Claremont Institute's exercise.

"To the extent that the Claremont-TPPF report offers recommendations, they are mostly focused on how to emerge victorious from the chaos, including preparation 'for destructive urban unrest [with] potential targets includ[ing] ballot counting facilities, government buildings, especially state capitols and city halls, as well as television and radio studios,'" Vanderbrouk writes. "The Claremont task force seems either resigned to—or perhaps energized by—the view that 'prudent steps are likely to be spun as preparations for a military takeover or coup and may result in negative consequences either way.'"

"Either way. It's as if they're steering into the violence instead of trying to avoid it," he adds. "The message is clear:do whatever it takes to crush your opponents and all will be forgiven in the second Trump term."

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https://www.the**bulwark**.com/notes-on-an-authoritarian-conspiracy-inside-the-claremont-institutes-79-days-to-inauguration-report/

the sun rises on January 6, 2021 while a nation is in crisis.

Michigan’s presidential electors are in dispute after a mysterious fire in Detroit destroyed thousands of mail-in ballots, ultimately throwing the election to Congress.

The nation’s capital is overwhelmed by riots organized by left-wing radicals.

A Republican member of Congress is attacked and critically injured in the violence, potentially depriving Donald Trump of the decisive vote.

However, the representative heroically insists on being taken to the House floor. “With IVs and blood transfusions being administered, the member casts the deciding vote, giving Trump 26 state delegations and the needed majority.”

This is the grisly climax of a report published in mid-October 2020 by the Claremont Institute and Texas Public Policy Foundation’s (TPPF)called “79 Days to Inauguration,” prepared by “Constitutional scholars, along with experts in election law, foreign affairs, law enforcement, and media . . . coordinated by a retired military officer experienced in running hundreds of wargames.”

Among these luminaries were figures such as John Eastman—lawyer for Donald Trump and author of a memo advising Vice President Mike Pence to unilaterally block certification of Joe Biden’s win in order to buy time for GOP-controlled state legislatures to send competing slates of electors—and K.T. McFarland, who served as deputy national security advisor under Michael Flynn in the Trump White House.

Other participants includeKevin Roberts, then-executive director of the Texas Public Policy Foundation (soon to be head of the Heritage Foundation), Jeff Giesea, “a [Peter] Thiel protégé and secret funder of alt-right causes,” and Charles Haywood, a fringe blogger who anxiously awaits an American “Caesar, authoritarian reconstructor of our institutions.”

The distinguished wargamers.

Yet despite the authors’ pretensions to scholarship and rigor—“for a simulation to be valuable, the other side gets a vote and actions must be based in realism”— the final document is a frenzied and paranoid piece of work, revealing of the anxieties and aspirations of the authoritarian right.

Practically, the report is an instruction manual for how Trump partisans at all levels of government—aided by citizen “posses” of Proud Boys and Oath Keepers—could, quite literally, round up opposition activists, kill their leaders, and install Donald Trump for a second term in office. the scenario begins late on Election Night. The networks have declared Joe Biden the winner, his campaign having upset Trump in the state of Texas. The call is withdrawn moments later, following reports of a cyberattack involving the state’s tabulation system. As it becomes clear there will be no definitive winner on Election Night, attention shifts to a few battleground states with large numbers of outstanding ballots.

Riots break out in more than a dozen major cities . . . 14 law enforcement officers are known to have been shot, with one confirmed death. There are unconfirmed reports of a car bombing of a police precinct building in Philadelphia.

The violence, as imagined by Claremont and TPPF, overwhelms police and fire officials.

Police recede to a defensive posture around their precincts, it is unsafe to maneuver police vehicles down the streets and responding to calls for service, even emergency calls, is suspended. Fire departments are unable to approach buildings on fire without police escorts, which are not happening.

The next day, the federal government announces Operation Spearfish, targeting

Leaders and agitators within the groups associated withBLM, Antifa, Boogaloo, and NFAC . . . with over one thousand arrest warrants issued using federal and state statutes from RICO to disorderly conduct… The decision to obtain arrest warrants even for the barest minimum of probable cause on the lowest of charges is meant to remove the players from the picture, at least temporarily. Social media sources and other intelligence sources were used to find any instances of incitement to violence, threats, or other criminal activity that met federal or local statutes and act on them.

Remember, this narrative is the result of a role-playing exercise in which the participants imagined themselves as key decision-makers in the federal government. The actions described, therefore, might be best understood as a combination of group therapy and suggestions for how they believe the federal government and law enforcement should behave in a moment of constitutional crisis.

Some of the report is revealing. Some of it is sad. Some of it is darkly funny. For instance, the authors’ recommendation for mass, politically motivated arrests “to remove the players from the picture” sits oddly next to the right’s outraged reaction to the prosecution of Trump supporters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6.

There’s more irony in how the task force imagines right-wing gangs would operate during such a period: with quiet discipline and in cooperation with law enforcement.

A lack of social media activity and overt action by the rioting by members of the Proud Boys draws the attention of law enforcement officials suspecting they may be operating covertly on the ground in several major urban rioting areas, but their exact involvement is unknown.Reports of militias moving into suburban areas is being monitored. Several groups affiliated with the Three Percenters and Oath Keepers have openly offered to assist law enforcement in putting down the violence via social media, touting significant current and retired law enforcement and military membership.

Which is . . . not how the Trumpist forces behaved during the actual crisis:

in reading the report, it becomes clear that task force participants see law enforcement as a critical adjunct to the more traditional political actors and that they believe law enforcement could act with greater impunity and force, independent from—and at times in defiance of—elected leaders.

There are rumors that several sheriffs in conservative counties throughout the country are hinting that they may deputize regular citizens into posses should the lawlessness come to their counties. Social media is ablaze with volunteers from Proud Boys, Three Percenters, and Oath Keepers and other Posse Comitatus groups to form posses.

This isn’t an innocent game of “what if?”

Earlier this year the Claremont Institute created a Sheriffs Fellowship program. Claremont claims that this program will offer “training of unparalleled depth and excellence in American political thought and institutions.” But then, this is the same group that produced a report hoping that “several sheriffs in conservative counties” would give groups like the Proud Boys actual legal authority.

Which is it?

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:{:{}:

law enforcement plays an openly insurrectionist role throughout the “79 Days” exercise, defying civilian leaders, refusing to offer them protection, and threatening them with arrest.}:

For example, the report imagines Chicago police (with vocal backing from their union) abandoning Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s residential block, permitting protesters to set up camp on her front lawn.

In imagined dialogue, the wargame quotes the city’s Fraternal Order of Police president as saying “We have officers risking their lives by not shooting people they should be shooting, or waiting too long because Lightfoot and her Soros-funded prosecutor Kim Foxx seem more interested in arresting cops than criminals.”

The union leader goes on to defend a police sickout (“Foxx and Lightfoot use this department and its officers as political scapegoats all the time, maybe they will enjoy not having us around”) and “excessive force” against rioters (“Take a look out the window there, you tell me, what the hell is excessive right now?”).

The authors use an imaginary appearance by former Milwaukee Sheriff David Clarke on Fox News to issue an open threat to elected leaders of the political opposition, which is imagined as going “viral”:

“The police are here to protect people and preserve the peace. They will do that. Politicians might get in the way for a while like they’re doing right now, but at some point, cops will remember their oath and will take back their communities for the good, law-abiding people in those communities. You won’t want to be on the other side of that once they have had enough of this nonsense.”

The National Fraternal Order of Police issues a partisan statement attacking Joe Biden’s “irresponsible” call for peaceful protests, “calling on President Trump to assist our men and women in blue in putting an end to the violence and anarchy and to restore law and order.”

At which point the “79 Days” report moves into truly authoritarian wishcasting:

Federal and local law enforcement officials “entered into meetings with Google, Facebook, and Twitter to discuss tracking phones and electronic communication devices that have been traveling together to various cities” to track various “agitator groups.”
Checkpoints are established“along major corridors entering Michigan, Texas, and Florida [to] stop and detain any suspicious caravans or large transport vehicles and to identify passengers for verification in the state fusion centers as members of Antifa and BLM are expected to descend on the capitol buildings in those states.”
The FBI’s elite counterterrorist Hostage Rescue Team is sent to “execute search warrants for weapons in and around Washington, DC… Seven Antifa members are killed by gunfire” during the simultaneous raids with “no injuries to the agents.”

A barely concealed bloodlust runs through the report. During a battle with rioters at a Portland police precinct building, a:

SWAT sniper conducting overwatch shot and killed one of the arsonists as he drew his arm back to throw his device (captured on police surveillance video and released immediately: warning graphic). The Molotov Cocktail exploded when he dropped the bottle and covered several rioters in flames, three injured severely and one dead at the scene.

At a confrontation near the White House, a non-lethal directed-energy weapon called the “Active Denial System” is used against protesters “to great effect with limited, precise application to specific threats. Social media erupts with claims of abuse through military weaponry.”

The body count grows with “officer-involved shootings” related to the RICO-authorized Operation Spearfish, resulting in “at least three suspects dead.” However, “none of the agencies is releasing information on the circumstances or identities of the officers or suspects involved, citing the ongoing investigation.”

These raids, which operate with all the impunity of a death squad, “are executed in middle to upper class neighborhoods where the Antifa and BLM activists/leadership tend to reside.”

The exercise ends with crude myth-making: the noble and sacrificial decision by a “Republican member from an at-large delegation” suffering from “life-threatening wounds” who, “understanding what is at stake, demands to be transported to the House for the state delegation vote and arrives in a heavily guarded convoy.”

This isn’t a serious wargame or a policy study so much as a bowdlerized retelling of The Turner Diaries.

:{:{}:

the “79 Days Report” was created as a rejoinder to the bipartisan Transition Integrity Project’s (TIP) exercise on “Preventing a Disrupted Presidential Election and Transition.”}:

Founded in June 2020, the TIP gathered more than a hundred experts (including Bill Kristol, editor-at-large of The Bulwark) to game out a number of scenarios, including the worrying prospect that a refusal by President Trump to concede defeat would lead to violence.

The TIP final report also included detailed “recommendations to avoid a crisis,” such as educating state and local officials about their constitutional responsibilities, combating misinformation, and ensuring that protests were not hijacked by violent actors or agent provocateurs.

“Peaceful protesters will need specialized training on de-escalation and non-violent techniques—and on how to document the non-violent nature of their protests, given the likelihood that agitators will attempt to blame any violence on them,” goes one TIP recommendation.

Another TIP proposal is for “military and law enforcement leaders to be particularly attuned to the possibility that partisan actors will seek to manipulate or misuse their coercive powers for inappropriate political ends.”

To the extent that the Claremont-TPPF report offers recommendations, they are mostly focused on how to emerge victorious from the chaos, including preparation “for destructive urban unrest [with] potential targets includ[ing] ballot counting facilities, government buildings, especially state capitols and city halls, as well as television and radio studios.”

The Claremont task force seems either resigned to—or perhaps energized by—the view that “prudent steps are likely to be spun as preparations for a military takeover or coup and may result in negative consequences either way.”

Either way. It’s as if they’re steering into the violence instead of trying to avoid it.

The message is clear: do whatever it takes to crush your opponents and all will be forgiven in the second Trump term.

Indeed, the wargamers expect readers to find their work heartening precisely because the bloodshed and strife will lead to the outcome they desire:

We hope that our work will reassure the American people that our system of government is resilient—having been crafted by the Founders to withstand crises and to emerge through the turmoil with a government of the people, by the people, for the people, that shall not perish from the earth, but endure to secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our children.

establishment conservatives like to pretend they can insulate themselves from the Big Lie that Trump won the 2020 election.

But the Big Lie doesn’t stand up all by itself. It requires the supporting architecture of smaller lies and evasions, like the claim that our republic was never really threatened because Donald Trump lacks sufficient competence.

The particular focus on Trump the man misses the movement for its leader.

Given the weight of the evidence against that larger movement, one wonders if the myopia is intentional.

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an 11 21 https://www.alternet.org/2021/11/judge-jeanine/

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Revealed: Fox's Judge Jeanine orchestrated payments for ‘command centers’ that could blow up Trump’s defense

Travis Gettys and Raw Story November 03, 2021

Fox News host Jeanine Pirro orchestrated campaign payments for 'command centers' at DC hotels that could blow up Donald Trump's executive privilege claims.

Former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani and the city's former police chief Bernie Kerik had been paying for hotel rooms and travel related to their efforts to overturn Trump's election loss, but the pair grew concerned by early December as the bills piled up, reported the Washington Post.

"How do I know I'm gonna get my money back?" Kerik thought at the time, as he recently told the newspaper.

Kerik knew that Giuliani hadn't been reimbursed for his expenses or paid for his services, but their friend Jeanine Pirro, a Fox News host beloved by the twice-impeached one-term president, called Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna McDaniel and asked her to help them out.

McDaniel spoke to Kerik by phone but refused to give him money, and instead recommended that he ask the Trump campaign to reimburse his expenses, according to the former police chief and a GOP official.

The campaign cut its first check to Kerik in mid-December with Trump's approval, according to a former senior campaign official, and eventually paid more than $225,000 for hotel rooms and suites at the Willard Hotel in Washington, D.C., that served as a "command center" for efforts to overturn the election results ahead of Jan. 6 riots.

Those payments, according to legal experts, could undermine Trump's claims of executive privilege over documents and testimony related to the U.S. Capitol riots sought by the House select committee investigating the insurrection.

"[This] further undermines a wildly broad assertion of executive privilege," said Richard Ben-Veniste, a former Watergate prosecutor. "Executive privilege is typically limited to the protection of communications involving a president's official duties — not to those relating to personal or political campaign matters."

Former Justice Department official John Yoo, who advised former vice president Mike Pence's staff that there was no legal basis to deny the certification of Joe Biden's election win, agreed that the payments could upend Trump's defense.

"If he acts as a president, he gets these things we talk about — executive privilege and immunity," Yoo said. "But if he's acting as a candidate, he's deprived of all of those protections."

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/11/heres-why-the-twice-impeached-disgraced-loser-trump-is-a-favorite-for-2024-conservative-2655472026/ oops longer versins lists co's?

or decades, Reagan Republicans promoted themselves as the "pro-business party." But former President Donald Trump and his MAGA movement have pushed a pseudo-populist message, dramatically cutting taxes for large corporations while railing against big tech and "woke capitalism." And according to Time's Molly Ball, corporate CEOs panicked when, after the 2020 election, Trump refused to accept the election results and attempted a coup d'état or golpe de estado.

One of the people who sounded the alarm, Ball reports in an article published on November 1, was Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, a well-known business professor at the Yale School of Management.

According to Ball, "The CEOs of leading media, financial, pharmaceutical, retail and consulting firms all wanted to talk…. For decades, Sonnenfeld has been bringing business leaders together for well-attended seminars on the challenges of leadership, earning a reputation as a 'CEO whisperer.' A committed capitalist and self-described centrist, he has informally advised presidents of both parties and spoke at Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell's wedding."

Ball goes on to say that a "group of 45 CEOs" got together during a conference call on November 6 — a group that, according to Ball, "represented nearly one-third of Fortune's 100 largest companies: Walmart and Cowen Inc., Johnson & Johnson and Comcast, Blackstone Group and American Airlines."

"Disney's Bob Iger rolled out of bed at 4 a.m. Pacific time to join, accompanied by a large mug of coffee," Ball reports. "Sonnenfeld, who promised the participants confidentiality, declined to disclose or confirm their names. But Time spoke with more than a dozen people on the call, who confirmed their and others' participation."

Timothy Snyder, a Sonnenfeld colleague at Yale and author of the book "On Tyranny," participated in the call and discussed it with Time — which was, according to Ball, was something he "never previously discussed" with the media.

Snyder told Time, "I went through it point by point, in a methodical way. Historically speaking, democracies are usually overthrown from the inside, and it is very common for an election to be the trigger for a head of state or government to declare some kind of emergency in which the normal rules do not apply. This is a pattern we know, and the name for this is a coup d'état…. If you are going to defeat a coup, you have to move right away. The timing and the clarity of response are very, very important."

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/10/steve-bannon-jan-6/

on October 21, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to hold former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon in criminal contempt of Congress for defying a subpoena from Speaker Nancy Pelosi's select committee on the January 6 insurrection. Many far-right MAGA Republicans view Bannon as a martyr, but critics view him as an insurrectionist. And an article by Media Matters' Madeline Peltz this week takes a damning and in-depth look at what Bannon had to say on his "War Room" podcast in the days leading up to January 6.

"In the days before the January 6 insurrection, former Trump adviser Steve Bannon bragged on his podcast about his behind-the-scenes efforts to undermine the results of the 2020 presidential election," Peltz explains. "These claims include calls and meetings he joined with conservative lawyer John Eastman and Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani, who were then running the Trump legal team's 'war room' out of the Willard Hotel in Downtown Washington, D.C., where allies conspired to advance crackpot legal theories and misinformation campaigns aimed at stealing the 2020 presidential election from Joe Biden."

According to Peltz, "A Media Matters review has found that in addition to repeatedly boasting about his involvement with and insider knowledge of the Trump legal team's strategy to overturn the election results in Congress on January 6, Bannon previewed the events in dramatic and violent historical context and singled out then-Vice President Mike Pence as the figure who could steal the election for Trump. He also used the language of war to describe how Trump supporters should view the events of January 6 and encouraged them to travel to Washington, D.C. to participate in the rallies taking place that day."

Media Matters' timeline of things Bannon said on his "War Room" podcast spans December 28, 2020-January 5, 2021. In late December on his podcast, Bannon claimed that then-Vice President Mike Pence had "many alternatives" to certifying the Electoral College results on January 6. And on his January 2 show, Bannon featured Giuliani and Eastman and said that Giuliani was "working in the Senate" to stop the election's certification[vid]

On January 4, Bannon told listeners, "We're hurtling towards a constitutional crisis…. (that is) going to be complicated, and it's going to be nasty." And he predicted that Trump's "first term is ending with action, and his second term is going to start with a bang."

Then, on January 5, Bannon had a lot to say about what he thought would be happening the following day. Bannon told listeners, "It's not going to happen like you think it's going to happen, OK. It's going to be quite extraordinarily different. And all I can say is: Strap in, the 'War Room' posse. You have made this happen, and tomorrow, it's game day."

Bannon predicted that a constitutional crisis was "about to go up, I think, five orders of magnitude tomorrow" and said, "We're going to go through a couple of three very turbulent 24-hour periods."

It was also on January 5 that Bannon, according to Peltz, said that Trump's allies had "put calls out last night trying to put bail up" for the Proud Boys' Enrique Tarrio, who had been arrested after tearing a Black Lives Matter banner down from an African-American church and burning it.

"At least two dozen members of Proud Boys, a violent neo-fascist street gang, face federal charges in connection with the attack on the Capitol, including four who were charged with conspiracy," Peltz notes. "Proud Boy Dominic Pezzola was among the first of the insurrectionists to break into the Capitol by smashing a window with a riot shield he stole from a police officer."

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Scathing new report sheds light on the most shocking aspect of John Eastman's involvement in the Capitol riots

Meaghan Ellis October 30, 2021

New damning developments pertaining to the insurrection on the U.S. Capitol have come to light. According to Washington Post, the latest investigative update involves former President Donald Trump's lawyer John Eastman.

The report, written by Washington Post reporters Josh Dawsey, Jacqueline Alemany, Jon Swaine, and Emma Brown, explains how Eastman attempted to build a case to persuade former Vice President Mike Pence to overturn the election. It has been revealed that "even as rioters overran the Capitol and a recalcitrant Pence was forced into hiding, Eastman emailed a Pence aide to actually blame Pence for the scene."

At one point, Pence's aide Greg Jacob also became embroiled in a heated exchange with Eastman telling him that "his 'bullshit legal advice was why Pence's team was 'under siege.' An accusation Eastman replied to with a suggestion pushing the blame off on Pence.

:{:{}:

"The 'siege' is because YOU and your boss did not do what was necessary to allow this [election challenge] to be aired in a public way so that the American people can see for themselves what happened," Eastman replied.

The reporters also highlighted more damning details that occurred after U.S. Capitol Police managed to clear the breached federal building so lawmakers could reconvene.

Pence allowed other lawmakers to speak before they returned to counting the votes, and said he wasn't counting the time from his speech or the other lawmakers against the time allotted in the Electoral Count Act.

:{:{}:

Eastman said that this prompted him to email Jacob to say that Pence should not certify the election because he had already violated the Electoral College Act, which Pence had cited as a reason that he could not send the electors back to the states.

"My point was they had already violated the electoral count act by allowing debate to extend past the allotted two hours, and by not reconvening 'immediately' in joint session after the vote in the objection," Eastman told The Post. "It seemed that had already set the precedent that it was not an impediment."

Based on Eastman's actions and his response to Pence's aide, it appears he was well aware of how they could possibly leverage the angry mob of rioters that stormed the Capitol.

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an 10 21

trump coup see meadows

a slate of Republican members of Congress is being outed by those who attended planning meetings for the protest that resulted in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, according to a new report in Rolling Stone.

Two sources, according to their story, revealed that Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ), Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO), Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL), Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC), Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ), and Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) were all present on "dozens" of calls with organizers of the group.

Trump aide Katrina Pierson was also named by them a "liaison" between the White House and the rally organizers. Trump's chief of staff Mark Meadows was cited as someone who also aided the group.

"I remember Marjorie Taylor Greene specifically," the organizer told Rolling Stone. "I remember talking to probably close to a dozen other members at one point or another or their staffs."

The former president also spoke to the group, saying that they were going to march to the U.S. Capitol and tell the members of Congress that they needed to hand Trump the election. He promised that he would lead them and walk with them, but that never happened.

"These two sources also helped plan a series of demonstrations that took place in multiple states around the country in the weeks between the election and the storming of the Capitol," said Rolling Stone. "According to these sources, multiple people associated with the March for Trump and Stop the Steal events that took place during this period communicated with members of Congress throughout this process."

"We would talk to Boebert's team, Cawthorn's team, Gosar's team like back to back to back to back," the organizer recalled.

While there have been reports of officials being part of the planning, this is the first report from those involved on the inside, willing to go on the record with investigators and the press.

"Nick Dyer, who is Greene's communications director, said she was solely involved in planning to object to the electoral certification on the House floor," said the report. "Spokespeople for the other members of Congress, who the sources describe as involved in the planning for protests, did not respond to requests for comment."

"Congresswoman Greene and her staff were focused on the Congressional election objection on the House floor and had nothing to do with planning of any protest," Dyer said in an email.

"She objected just like Democrats who have objected to Republican presidential victories over the years," Dyer wrote, which is incorrect. No Democrats have ever attempted to stop certification of election results. Greene's office named a list of Democrats, falsely saying that they attempted to do exactly that when it came to President Donald Trump in 2017.

Dyer went on to say that no one in the U.S. cares about Jan. 6.

Ali Alexander, the original organizer of the event is now in hiding, but he's already said in a since-deleted video that Gosar, Brooks, and Biggs all aided his efforts for the event

"I was the person who came up with the Jan. 6 idea with Congressman Gosar, Congressman Mo Brooks, and Congressman Andy Biggs," Alexander said in the video. "We four schemed up on putting maximum pressure on Congress while they were voting so that — who we couldn't lobby — we could change the hearts and the minds of Republicans who were in that body hearing our loud roar from outside."

When he organized an event in Phoenix, Gosar was the main speaker. Alexander even referred to him as "my captain" and called him "one of the other heroes has been Congressman Andy Biggs."

"He just couldn't help himself but go on his live [feed] and just talk about everything that he did and who he talked to," one of the planners told Rolling Stone about Alexander. "So, he, like, really told on himself."

"The breaking point for me [on Jan. 6 was when] Trump starts talking about walking to the Capitol," said the organizer. "I was like. 'Let's get the f*ck out of here.'"

"I do kind of feel abandoned by Trump," the planner added. "I'm actually pretty pissed about it, and I'm pissed at him. What the f*ck?"

"I have no problem openly testifying," the planner also said.

Read the full report at Rolling Stone.

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Republican Paul Gosar told Jan. 6 rioters they'd get a blanket pardon from Trump: report

Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona speaking at the 2018 Arizona Manufacturing Summit, hosted by the Arizona Manufacturing Council and the Arizona Chamber of Commerce & Industry at the Renaissance Downtown Hotel in Phoenix, Gage Skidmore.

Sarah K. Burris and Raw Story October 25, 2021

Rolling Stone is reporting that a pair of witnesses have spoken to the House Jan. 6 Select Committee revealing that Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) told them President Donald Trump would issue a blanket pardon for some who attacked the U.S. Capitol that day.

According to the report, some of the planners of the rally are communicating with the investigators and the committee.

"Two of these people have spoken to Rolling Stone extensively in recent weeks and detailed explosive allegations that multiple members of Congress were intimately involved in planning both Trump's efforts to overturn his election loss and the Jan. 6 events that turned violent," said the report, saying that it confirmed the account from a third person.

It's the first time that Americans have heard about a member of Congress being officially tied to the events that unfolded that day.

"While there have been prior indications that members of Congress were involved, this is also the first account detailing their purported role and its scope," said the report. Both of the sources said that there were several members of Congress who participated in planning calls, but Gosar, in particular, was named for making blanket promises that couldn't be kept.

Gosar participated in a House Oversight and Reform Committee hearing on May 12, 2021, that focused on the Capitol attack and unanswered questions.

"And Gosar, who has been one of the most prominent defenders of the Jan. 6 rioters, allegedly took things a step further," said the report. "Both sources say he dangled the possibility of a 'blanket pardon' in an unrelated ongoing investigation to encourage them to plan the protests."

"Our impression was that it was a done deal," the organizer told Rolling Stone, "that he'd spoken to the president about it in the Oval … in a meeting about pardons and that our names came up. They were working on submitting the paperwork and getting members of the House Freedom Caucus to sign on as a show of support."

They noted that Gosar made the promise "several" times.

"I was just going over the list of pardons and we just wanted to tell you guys how much we appreciate all the hard work you've been doing," Gosar told those on the call.

"I would have done it either way with or without the pardon," the organizer explained. "I do truly believe in this country, but to use something like that and put that out on the table when someone is so desperate, it's really not good business."

The report said that it has "documentary evidence" to prove what the three sources claimed.

Trump campaign aide Katrina Pierson has also been called a "liaison" between the insurrectionists and the White House and Mark Meadows was also named as a key part of the organizing.

Read the full report from Rolling Stone.

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/10/watergate/

no vid

veteran journalist Bob Woodward pointed out seven conspiratorial actions taken by Donald Trump and Steve Bannon to conduct a "Watergate-style" subversion of the election process, which he said should fall under investigation by a special counsel.

Woodward said he and Washington Post colleague Robert Costa uncovered those actions while reporting on their book, "Peril," but he told CNN's "New Day" that he only recently understood how those potential crimes set in motion the violent attempt to overturn Trump's election loss on Jan. 6.

"I just looked back at what we have in the book, and quite directly have we have the dots [but] we didn't connect them, though they're there," Woodward said, "and they're seven conspiratorial actions by Trump and Bannon, essentially, to subvert and destroy the process of certifying who the next president is going to be, and when you think about it, it's just like Watergate. It's a destruction of the process that we want to trust, and the -- I'm sorry, my memory is not great on this -- can I go through some of those conspiratorial actions?"

"First of all, on Dec. 30, Bannon talks to Trump and says, 'You've got to make a dramatic return to Washington,'" Woodward continued. "Trump is in Mar-A-Lago, he's going to have the New Year's Eve party down there, but he comes back, and Bannon says to Trump, 'You've got to call Vice President Pence off the ski slopes where they, Pence's staff and advisers, have stashed him away because they know in a week he's going to have to certify or decide what he's going to do about who the next president is, and then Bannon says to Trump, Jan. 6 is the moment of reckoning here, and if we can challenge the legitimacy of Biden, it casts a shadow over the Biden presidency, and then he says, 'We are going to kill the Biden presidency in the crib.'The violent language, of course, it was manifest, the violence itself, on Jan. 6."

"Then on Jan. 5, as Liz Cheney was pointing out, Bannon meets with others, including Rudy Giuliani and their phony Republicans, to block the certification of Biden, and then you put all this in and Trump put out a phony statement at the time -- this is on the public record -- saying he and Pence agreed that Pence has the power to walk away and essentially get Trump certified as president," Woodward added. "But that's totally untrue. So, anyway, we have a very clear-cut case, I would suspect it is quite possible that Attorney General Merrick Garland will appoint a special counsel to look at this, because the evidence is so clear for a massive Watergate-style attempt to destroy the process of electing a president."

---

In addition, many of the documents requested by the committee have nothing to do with Bannon’s interactions with Trump. They concern rather Bannon’s interactions with forces that assisted, organized and participated in the coup.

These include the “Women for America First” political group, which organized the fascist rally outside the White House on January 6; Republican strategist, attorney and frequent guest on Bannon’s podcast Boris Epshteyn;members of the group who attended the January 5 planning meeting at the Willard Hotel (including Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Roger Stone and Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller); and other Trump officials, such as Kash Patel, former chief-of-staff to acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller, and Ezra Cohen-Watnick, another Trump loyalist who was appointed to a high-level position in the Department of Defense following the firing of Defense Secretary Mark Esper after Trump’s electoral defeat.

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WHAT IS SUBSTACK?

https://sethabramson.substack.com/p/major-breaking-news-team-trump-had

NO LNX MANY VID?

Team Trump Had a Second Pre-Insurrection War Room

An investigation of who was in this second Insurrection Eve war room has now begun.

Seth Abramson

Jun 6

Introduction

As this publication has exclusively and exhaustively detailed, on the eve of the January 6 insurrection Team Trump convened a 23-person war council at Trump International Hotel in D.C. to plot out—as attendees have since confessed—what would happen the following day. It is now clear that a second, contemporaneous pre-insurrection war council was held at a nearby Washington hotel and that it may well have been linked, through either phone or video conferencing, to the first.

This previously unreported news could significantly swell the size of Donald Trump’s pre-insurrection planning team, even as it remains possible (indeed, a possibility that has been extensively investigated here at Proof) that any remote conferencing that occurred the night before the January 6 insurrection also included the White House.

The Two War Rooms

The group that convened at Trump International on January 5 included, per eyewitness accounts previously compiled by Proof, the following members of Trump’s family, legal team, campaign staff, advisory corps, donor class, circle of friends, allies in Congress, and presidential administration:

Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump, Kimberly Guilfoyle, Corey Lewandowski, David Bossie, Michael Flynn, Peter Navarro, Adam Piper, Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), Nebraska GOP gubernatorial candidate Charles Herbster, Rudy Giuliani, Michael Lindell, Eduardo Bolsonaro, Doyle Beck, Daniel Beck, Layne Bangerter, and two additional unnamed U.S. senators, one of whom prior Proof reportssuggest was Ted Cruz (R-TX). Domestic terrorist Ali Alexander“attended” by phone.

Other possible attendees—whose status is still being investigated in light of evidence they were present—include Alex Jones, Sidney Powell, Patrick Byrne, and Guiliani cybersecurity adviser Phil Waldron. As Proof has previously noted, and as will become vital to the account below, four individuals from the two lists above now claim (or have had it claimed by legal counsel) that they weren’t, in fact, part of any meeting involving Trump International Hotel on January 5, despite eyewitness accounts to the contrary. Those individuals are Michael Flynn, Rudy Giuliani, Peter Navarro, and David Bossie.

Based on the evidence now available, the largest possible size of the group that met at Trump International Hotel on January 5—all members of Trump’s inner circle—is 23.

But emerging evidence—see below—now suggests a sizable team of Trump insiders concurrently gathered, on January 5, at the Willard InterContinental Washington D.C. Hotel (“the Willard”) at 1401 Pennsylvania Ave., 0.3 miles from the White House.

The group that gathered at the Willard Hotel on January 5 appears to have been nearly as large, if not larger, than the group at Trump International Hotel. Possible attendees include, of those not also reported to have been involved in the January 5 meeting at Trump International, the following: Roger Stone, Alex Jones, Steve Bannon, John Eastman, Robert Hyde, Russell Ramsland Jr., Jim Penrose, Sal Greco, Jennifer Lynn Lawrence, and Dustin Stockton. Moreover, among the Willard war room attendees concurrently said to have been involved in a meeting at Trump International Hotel we find Rudy Giuliani, Ali Alexander, Sidney Powell, Michael Flynn, Phil Waldron, and Peter Navarro.In all, the suspected roster of Willard war room attendees numbers 16, though that number may swell after additional investigations at Proof and elsewhere.

Indeed, just two photos of the Willard war room taken by Robert Hyde on Insurrection Day alone (the one below and this one) show ten people, only three of whom—Giuliani, Eastman and Hyde—can be identified,and are thus included in the attendee list above.

{Note: The man in the white shirt in the first picture belowmay be Owen Shroyer, who works with and for Alex Jones at InfoWars. The second picture below is Shroyer on January 5, 2021. Shroyer introduced Jones at the Freedom Plaza event that day.The two were followed on stage by Ali Alexander, who oddly said that Trump “calls me ‘Sammy Davis Jr.’ every time he sees me” (emphasis supplied). Alexander introduced Roger Stone by noting that Stone, who was then staying at the Willard, had offered “counsel” to Trump’s legal team—headquartered at the Willard—and that, as of January 5, Stone’s Stop the Steal “movement” was at “war.” After Stone speaks, someone is heard repeatedly calling “Victoria! Victoria! Victoria!”, which may refer to Trump lawyer Victoria Toensing. It is unclear if Toensing stayed at the Willard also.}:

Those who have followed the January 6 investigation closely will note that the Willard Hotel war room attendee list includes a substantially larger number of dubious figures (for instance Hyde, who aided in Trump’s efforts to steal the 2020 presidential election in Ukraine, as detailed in a chapter in my 2020 Macmillan book Proof of Corruption) as compared to the Trump International list, which may underscores why it has taken so long for this second war room to be disclosed to the public.

Roger Stone, Alex Jones, Steve Bannon and the Willard

While Roger Stone spoke briefly to the crowd at Freedom Plaza on January 5—and in his remarks incited insurrection through militant, bizarrely pseudo-religious rhetoric—and while he also spoke in front the Supreme Court building earlier on January 5, in both instances traveling via golf cart and flanked by Oath Keepers, everyone seems to agree that Stone wasn’t at Trump International on January 5; that he never showed up to Trump’s January 6 Ellipse speech, as his Stop the Steal co-organizers Alexander and Jones and had expected him to do; and that he never showed up for his “Wild Protest” speech at the Capitol, despite having publicly raised money for the latter appearance.

So where was Roger Stone the rest of the time on January 5 and January 6? According to Stone himself, he was at the Willard Hotel. A video from ABC News confirms that this is where Stone was staying during the insurrection, with Stone further telling the network that he “never left the site of my hotel until leaving for Dulles Airport” on the afternoon of January 6. Stone’s statement makes clear that it was not that he stayed in his room at the Willard, but that he remained on hotel grounds—a distinction that is critical now. Stone’s NYPD bodyguard Sal Greco stayed with him at the Willard Hotel.

As for Alex Jones—who has said the White House asked him to lead the march on the Capitol; who has said he (with Alexander) was in text communication with the Trump campaign from the Capitol as it was being attacked; and whose top lieutenant Owen Shroyer appears to be pictured above, with Rudy Giuliani, in the Willard war room—per Yahoo! News he stayed at the Willard for a Stop the Steal event in November 2020 and, per Politico, also stayed at the Willard for a December 2020 Stop the Steal event.

But now an amazing five-part exposé by a French independent journalist publishing via Montréal-based website Centpapiers further reveals—using simple and easily confirmed photographic analysis—that the January 5 interview Michael Flynn conducted with Alex Jones, reported on at length at Proof, was held at the Willard, meaning both men were at the site of Trump’s second war room on Insurrection Eve.

{Note: This same exposé offers pictures that seem to indicate top Trump adviserPeter Navarro was with Dustin Stockton at the Willard at some point during the lead-up to the insurrection, as well as providing pictures of Stockton and his wife Jennifer Lynn Lawrence in the VIP area of Trump’s Ellipse speech alongside top Trump congressional ally Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, one of Ali Alexander’s self-confessed co-conspirators in plotting the dire events of January 6.}:

The aforementioned couple, Lawrence and Stockton, have at various points been Steve Bannon acolytes, employees, and business associates, and were known to have been at the Willard Hotel pre-insurrection. According to this report by the New York Times,

Two organizers helping the [post-election Stop the Steal] effort, Jennifer Lawrence and Dustin Stockton, were close to Bannon, having worked at Breitbart and then at his nonprofit seeking private financing to help complete Trump’s border wall. In August [2020], federal prosecutors accused Bannon of defrauding the nonprofit’s donors, after an investigation that included a raid of Lawrence and Stockton’s motor home; they were not implicated, and Bannon, who pleaded not guilty, was later pardoned by the president. A onetime organizer for the hard-line Gun Owners of America, according to his LinkedIn page, Stockton had come to know members of the Three Percenters militia group.

…

[Jennifer Lynn] Lawrence had personal ties to Trump. Her father was a real estate broker in the Hudson Valley, where Trump has a golf club and his sons have a hunting ranch. “He’s done business with Trump for over a decade, so I’ve had the opportunity of meeting the president and interacting with him on a lot of occasions”, she said in an interview. She also knew [Michael] Flynn through their mutual association with a conservative think tank.

…

By [approximately 2PM ET on January 6], with “all hell breaking loose”, as Stockton put it, he and Lawrence decided to take golf carts back to their room at the Willard Hotel and “await instructions about whether to go back to the Ellipse.”

While Lawrence and Stockton’s presence at the Willard Hotel doesn’t ensure Bannon’s, the two Bannon associates’ unusual use of golf carts in downtown Washington during the insurrection—mirroring the use of such vehicles by Stop the Steal, Roger Stone, and the Oath Keepers—as well as the notion that they went to the Willard to “await instructions” from an unnamed superior, group of superiors, or group of compatriots, suggests the possibility that Bannon and/or the Three Percenter leadership were at the Willard at some point during the run-up to the insurrection or on Insurrection Day.

How Proof Learned About the War Room at the Willard

On May 5, 2021, in a little-heard interview with self-described “birther” Peter Boyles, former Chapman University and University of Colorado-Boulder law professor John Eastman—known for falsely saying prior to the 2020 election that Democratic vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris was ineligible to run for Vice President due to not being a U.S. citizen—told Boyles that that in January 2021 he “was representing the President of the United States in the Supreme Court on one of the most significant legal issues to have come down the pike in half a century.” Eastman, who notes that he “spoke right before the president” at the Ellipse on January 6, further tells Boyles he can reveal private conversations he had with his “client” Donald Trump pre-insurrection because he has received “express” permission from Trump to do so.

Eastman confesses to Boyles that in the days prior to and including the attack on the Capitol, he, Giuliani, and unnamed others “had a war room at the Willard Hotel [in Washington] kind of coordinating all of the communications.…[it was in] a suite of offices.” Significant in this, of course, is not only Eastman’s description of the space as a “war room,” but his contention that Giuliani used the room in the days prior to the insurrection. Why does this matter? Because it raises new questions about another pre-insurrection war room: the one at Trump International. Was Giuliani at the Trump International war room on January 5, the Willard war room, or both? This question has larger implications than may at first appear, so we begin by unpacking what we know:

(1) Charles W. Herbster vacillated on the presence of only one person at the January 5 pre-insurrection war council at the Trump International Hotel: Rudy Giuliani.

After first writing on Facebook that he (Herbster) was “standing in the White House”, Herbster edited his post to write that he was in fact in Trump’s “private residence” in Trump International. But he also edited out Giuliani’s name, as if he’d either (a) been mistaken about Giuliani being at Trump International, or (b) suddenly felt it critical to not say that Giuliani was with him. Note that Herbster took this view of no one else at Trump International;as Proof has detailed, David Bossie and Michael Flynn both now maintain they weren’t at Trump International, and yet Herbster still hasn’t changed his contradictory statement on the matter.For a time even Tuberville contradicted Herbster and said he wasn’t at Trump International, and yet, despite Tuberville being a senator, Herbster still didn’t amend his statement on Facebook. Yet as to Giuliani Herbster did correct himself, suggesting a possibility Giuliani really was at a different location than the other individuals Herbster mentioned—but nevertheless attended the meeting Herbster described. Proof previously noted that this would be possible if the January 5 meeting at Trump International was “conferenced” with other locations.

(2) When the Associated Press asked Rudy Giuliani if he was at Trump International Hotel on January 6, Giuliani told the AP that he would have to check, via his “diary.”

Giuliani never got back to the AP, despite there being no known illegality—as yet—with respect to the event at Trump International. So why not tell the AP where he was on January 5? Doyle Beck told the AP Giuliani was at Trump International; it’s unclear why the conversation regarding his whereabouts isn’t one Giuliani is willing to have.

(3) On January 5, Flynn gave a long interview with Alex Jones at the Willard Hotel.

Both Stone and Giuliani were staying at the Willard Hotel, and Alex Jones and his team would have had to reserve a room at the Willard for any live recording there, so this creates numerous opportunities for overlap between Jones, Stone, Flynn, and Giuliani—the last of whom was then running an on-site Trump war room. Note that, as previously reported at Proof, Michael Lindell has said he was consistently with Flynn and Giuliani in the days prior to the insurrection. If Herbster is unclear and Giuliani cagey about whether Giuliani was ever at Trump International on January 5; and Flynn maintains he wasn’t at any meeting at Trump International (despite an Instagram photo placing him in the hotel lobby that day), one possibility is that any war room meeting(s) Flynn attended on January 5 were attended from the Willard, where we now know he was with Jones on January 5. Flynn is so adamant he wasn’t at Trump International on January 5 that he had his attorney send this author a letter threatening legal action for citing news reports placing him at that location on that day; this suggests a degree of confidence that no one can place him inside the Trump Townhouse at Trump International, his presence in the hotel lobby notwithstanding.

(4)As Proof has reported, Corey Lewandowski was also cagey about his location on January 5, telling a reporter for The Atlantic that he “met” with Donald Trump on that day—but also implying that he didn’t go to the White House in order to do so.

How could Lewandowski meet with Trump without being in the same space? Again, the specter of a very simple explanation—the use of phone or video conferencing—manifests. This might also explain the confidence that David Bossie, Lewandowski’s business associate, has had in maintaining he never entered Trump International on January 5, even as Herbster places him at an event Herbster attended from the hotel.

What Happened at the Willard Hotel

Eastman describes the “suite” of offices at the Willard—a term that suggests multiple rooms and work stations—as designed for “coordinating all of the [pre-insurrection] communication[s]” between members of Team Trump. Certainly, the suite could have coordinated communications via phone conferencing rather than video conferencing, but in either case it would seem that to “coordinate” communications between a large team of people at least some conferencing would have to have occurred at some point.

So if Giuliani had a “war room” at the Willard on January 5 that was specifically set up to “coordinate communications” pre-insurrection, why on earth would he need to walk over to Trump International to attend a second war room? Why not just conference the rooms? This question begs another: if Giuliani did decide to needlessly travel from one war room to another on January 5—during a period of hours that time was precious to Team Trump—why didn’t he bring Eastman with him? Indeed, an unresolved paradox is that Eastman appears to place himself with Giuliani fairly consistently during the days before the insurrection, yet no one places Eastman at Trump International Hotel.

A similar paradox involves Giuliani, Flynn, Lindell, and Powell. As Proof has reported, Lindell says he was with Giuliani, Flynn, and Powell on January 5, yet Flynn says he wasn’t at Trump International, Herbster at first wrote that Giuliani was there and then corrected himself, and no one places Powell at Trump International. Given that Powell was, like Eastman and Giuliani, a Trump legal adviser on January 5, one explanation for this would be that Flynn, Giuliani, and Powell were with Eastman at the Willard on January 5, whether or not they—or Lindell—also visited the Trump International war room.

More Bombshells From the Eastman-Boyles Interview

(1) Trump cybersecurity advisers Russell Ramsland Jr., Doug Frank, and Jim Penrose were with Eastman in the Willard Hotel war room at some point on January 5, 2021.

Specifically, Eastman told Boyles that “the [election] experts that I had met with [in November and December 2020, a group into which Eastman puts Ramsland, Frank, and Penrose] were with me on January 5.” Given this statement, it’s worthwhile to say a little more about two of these men.

Jim Penrose

According to The Hill, Penrose is “a former head of the National Security Agency’s Operational Discovery Center.”

Besides having run an operational center for the NSA—which sounds oddly similar to Eastman’s depiction of the Willard Hotel war room as having been a “communications coordination” center during the insurrection—one of Jim Penrose’s specializations, reportedly, is “how misinformation campaigns [can]…influence elections.” Does this mean that Trump had a misinformation operations expert running a secret war room during the January 6 insurrection? That’s a question the FBI will now need to answer.

Russell (“Russ”) Ramsland Jr.

Russ Ramsland co-founded Allied Security Operations Group (ASOG), a Dallas-area cybersecurity firm, with a number of men, among whom was Adam Kraft, a former DIA employee of Michael Flynn. Jenna Ellis, a senior legal adviser to Trump after the 2020 election, has referred to ASOG as “our [Trump’s] team” on Fox News Channel.

The Washington Post writes that in 2018 ASOG began pitching GOP candidates on schemes to challenge their election losses by claiming election fraud. Per the Post,

By late 2019, ASOG’s examination [of elections in which Republicans had lost] had moved beyond audit logs. Among other claims, Ramsland was repeating the ominous idea that election software used in the United States originated in Venezuela, and saying nefarious actors could surreptitiously manipulate votes on a massive scale. As the 2020 election approached, he privately briefed GOP lawmakers in Washington and met with officials from the Department of Homeland Security, documents and interviews show. ASOG’s examination [of elections] by last summer [the summer of 2020] had already cost more than $1 million, according to a document the company gave government officials that was obtained by the Post. Ramsland had sought funding from Republican donors whose fortunes were made in the oil, gas and fracking industries.

There’s more of interest here than can be unpacked in one article. For instance, Stop the Steal’s Ali Alexander is believed to have contacted a DHS number to join a 90-minute conference call on December 21, 2020, the same day Trump met in the Oval Office with a delegation from the House Freedom Caucus led by Rep. Gosar (R-AZ), Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL), Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ), Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA).Of the call to DHS, Alexander wrote on Twitter that he hoped it would “change the world”, raising the question of who at DHS could have been in contact with Alexander, and whether they were also in touch with Ramsland as he worked with Trump’s legal team. {Note: While I’ve confirmed that Alexander called a “DHS” number, it remains unclear whether it’s a “Department of Homeland Security” call-in number or a D.C. “Department of Human Services” number; in the latter case, the call may have been about January 6 permitting, though it’s unclear why this would “change the world.”}:

Trump’s 2019 and 2020 efforts to steal the election—detailed in Proof of Corruption—were linked to, among others, Texas Republican donors whose fortunes were made in the oil, gas, and fracking industries, an echo of the phrase used to describe Ramsland’s donors and investors. Were any of the individuals who met in Texas in 2019 with Rudy Giuliani, Lev Parnas, Igor Fruman, and Florida-based Trump donor Harry Sargeant III to discuss the 2020 election, energy issues, and pro-Kremlin Ukrainian oligarchs who allegedly had dirt on Joe Biden involved in funding Ramsland’s dubious pre- and post-election “election integrity” efforts? Republican donors who made their fortunes in the oil, gas, and fracking industries were also, as Proof of Corruption details, involved in Trump’s clandestine outreach to Venezuela in 2019 and 2020—Venezuela being the nation in which the Post saysRamsland’s donors were hoping he’d look for and find political dissidents to reveal a supposed election-theft scheme originating in Caracas.[ghost of hugo chavez?]

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The Post notes that Ramsland’s lies “were circulated by Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX), a staunch Trump ally who had been briefed by ASOG. And Ramsland’s assertions were incorporated in the ‘kraken’ lawsuits filed by conservative lawyer Sidney Powell—who the Post has learned had also been briefed two years earlier by ASOG—and aired publicly by Rudy Giuliani, then Trump’s personal attorney, as they tried to overturn Joe Biden’s victories in key states.” Rep. Gohmert attended the December 21 pre-insurrection meeting at the White House, intended as a follow-up to the raucous December 18 Oval Office meeting attended by Giuliani and Powell. This underscores that, at a minimum, three individuals who Ramsland had worked with to spread false claims of election fraud were in the Oval Office with Trump during the 120 hours—December 17 to December 21—it appears the initial planning for the insurrection occurred. Indeed, the Post writes the following of November and December of 2020:

During that period, Trump was hyper-focused on making the case that the election had been rigged, former White House aides said. He would listen to “literally anyone” who had a theory about it, in the words of one former senior administration official.

The Post alleges that at least three such “anyones”—Gohmert, Powell, and Giuliani—were part of Ramsland’s “network” of collaborators. Per the Post, “ASOG provided research for Powell and Giuliani but…[Ramsland] never spoke[ ] to Trump himself.”

Whether or not Ramsland spoke with Trump pre-insurrection, the fact that he is, per the Post, a Cruz donor as well as a Trump donor; someone whose first client was an “associate of Steve Bannon”; co-founder of ASOG with a Flynn associate; and a man who successfully lobbied top Trump congressional ally Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX) to use his services underscores that if he was in the Willard war room on January 5 the number of Trump associates who may have been there, nearby, or in contact with the war room is considerable.

Beyond the obvious figures, others written about at Proof but with less frequency may also be in the picture with respect to the Willard war room. The Post reports that one apparent investor in Ramsland’s efforts to spread election conspiracy theories prior to the 2020 election was Charles Richard Saulsbury, the fabulously wealthy Texan whose son Bubba Saulsbury was with Mike Pence at the vice presidential mansion on the night of January 5,as exclusively reported by Proof. If a Ramsland investor was with Pence while Ramsland was at the Willard, is it possible that any phone- or video-conferenced strategy session that evening involved not just the Trump International and Willard Hotel war rooms but both the White House and vice president’s mansion? We can’t, at present, know this. But we do know that Bubba Saulsbury—who’d come to D.C. thrilled about marching to the Capitol—saw or heard something on the evening of January 5, while with Pence, that caused him to flee Washington the next morning to avoid all of the events of January 6. What had Bubba Saulsbury heard, and from whom?

{Note: Saulsbury’s Facebook photos indicate he was staying at Trump International Hotel.}:

The Post reports that, during the time Ramsland may have been receiving investments from the Saulsburys—in 2019 and beyond—everything he did “became about getting to Trump. He had this idea [that] it [his plan to challenge elections Republicans had lost] had to get to Trump.” This doesn’t sound like a man who would have sat at the Willard on January 5 without making any attempt to get in touch with the president.

Indeed, the Post reports that “In July 2020, ASOG gave a two-hour briefing to seven members of the House Freedom Caucus”—possibly the same seven Freedom Caucus members who five months later would be in the Oval Office discussing an allegedly stolen election with Trump: Gosar, Brooks, Biggs, Gohmert, Gaetz, Greene, and Rep. Jody Hice (R-GA). Certainly, Trump was well aware of Ramsland by mid-November of 2020, with the Post reporting that “late on November 15, Trump retweeted to his millions of followers a video clip of Ramsland saying in a pre-election interview that votes from twenty-nine states were routed through ‘a server in Frankfurt, Germany’ and that [Spanish election systems company] Scytl ‘controls and reports your vote.’”

But Ramsland’s connections to key insurrectionists go well beyond these, to include ex-Trump legal adviser Lin Wood and Giuliani cybersecurity adviser Phil Waldron. The Post writes that “Ramsland contributed material to [Sidney] Powell’s lawsuits and to one brought by L. Lin Wood Jr., another pro-Trump lawyer, seeking to overturn Biden’s victory”, and also that “Phil Waldron, a retired Army colonel who specialized in psychological operations and is now chief executive of a cybersecurity firm…said he was working with ASOG to examine the 2020 election.”

Even former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne, a participant in the unprecedentedly wild December 18 meeting at the White House, is tied to Ramsland.Per the Post, “By December [2020], Ramsland was opening doors for people seeking to challenge the election results. He connected Patrick Byrne, the billionaire former CEO of the online retailer Overstock, with Powell, and Powell connected Byrne with Giuliani.”

So if Eastman was with Ramsland in the second Trump war room on Insurrection Eve, did Ramsland’s associates Ellis, Gohmert, Byrne, Bannon, Wood, Powell, Saulsbury, Sessions, Waldron, Giuliani, or Flynn join them there at any point on January 5 or 6?

(2) Eastman was in the Oval Office on January 4 in a previously unreported meeting.

According to the ex-law professor, on January 4 three people met in the Oval Office with him and Donald Trump: Pence, Pence’s chief of staff Marc Short, and Pence’s general counsel Greg Jacob. Per Eastman, prior to the meeting someone had advised Trump that “law review articles” written about the 2000 election indicated that “maybe the Vice President had unilateral authority to determine the validity of electoral votes.” Presumably it was not Eastman who provided such erroneous counsel to Trump, as Eastman says that during his meeting with Trump and Pence, Pence asked Eastman if he believed vice presidents had the authority that Trump had been advised they had, and Eastman purportedly told Pence it was an “open question.” But per Eastman, he nevertheless told Pence it would be “foolish” to accept the alternate slates of electors the Trump campaign had had sent to D.C., as none had been certified by any state legislature. Eastman says he advised Pence to “delay the proceedings [in Congress]” in “response to the [GOP] state legislatures” that wanted time to “audit” their votes.

This meeting corroborates prior Proof reporting on Trump’s plan for January 6, which was not to win re-election—an impossibility—but simply to allow for so much chaos on Capitol Hill that Congress’ joint session would have to be postponed, giving GOP-led batlleground-state legislatures time to decertify their electors. As Eastman advised Pence and Trump on January 4, under such a scenario GOP-led state legislatures could try to certify new slates of Trump electors, arguably putting Pence in a novel situation the second time Congress met to certify Biden’s victory. Many of the voter suppression bills the GOP is now pushing across America are “insurrectionist” in just this way; they aim to realize the vision of our democracy that Eastman shared with Trump and Pence on January 4—one in which state legislatures decide elections, not U.S. voters.

Conclusion

The Willard war room seems to have been focused on “coordinating communications” to ensure sufficient delay in the joint session of Congress that a coup of the incoming Biden administration would be possible through the creation of new slates of certified electors. While we know that the Willard war room hosted an advisory corps focused on the administrative components of this plot, the evidence also suggests that present in this second war room may have been individuals like Stone, Jones, Alexander, Flynn, Stockton, Lawrence, and Shroyer, who lacked the qualifications to have any role in any such administrative component—but would have been of great utility in orchestrating a paramilitary component to Trump’s plan to delay the certification of Biden’s victory.

At the nexus of these two parts of Trump’s apparent coup plan was Giuliani, whose ties to both of the two teams that appear to have used the Willard were considerable.Notably, it was Giuliani who said at the Ellipse, “Let’s have trial by combat!”—a line equally relevant to the administrative components of such a plot or paramilitary ones.

A robust investigation of the Willard Hotel “war room” has only just begun. Its size, technological capacities, traffic, purpose, and full roster of attendees remain an open question. This article therefore serves as only the first of a series of articles about this critical development in the story of the January 6 insurrection. More is forthcoming.

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Team Trump Had a Second Pre-Insurrection War Room - Seth ...

https://sethabramson.substack.com › major-breaking-ne...

Eastman confesses to Boyles that in the days prior to and including the attack on the Capitol, he, Giuliani, and unnamed others “had a war room at the Willard ...

### New Member of Trump's January 6 Willard Hotel "War Room ...

https://sethabramson.substack.com › breaking-news-ne...

Jun 13, 2021 — As NPR reported after Newsmax (run by longtime Trump confidant Chris Ruddy) retracted all its allegations about Dominion and Coomer, “Shortly ...

a Willard Hotel bunker during the Insurrection dealt Trump's ...

https://m.dailykos.com › stories › 2021/10/20 ›

16 hours ago — Their was a meeting between Steven Miller,Steven Bannon& Rudy Giuliani &Trump on the phone.Then their the Eastman coup memo. This was a criminal ...

The Sparrow Project on Twitter: "Russ Ramsland Jr. who has ...

https://twitter.com › sparrowmedia › status

2 days ago — “Mr. Bannon was in the war room at the Willard on January 6th” - Liz Cheney ... Among those in attendance: Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, ...

Steve Bannon Out in the Open - The Bulwark

https://www.thebulwark.com › steve-bannon-out-in-the...

2 days ago — Bannon's podcast, “War Room,” continues to promote conspiracy theories about the 2020 election—the day after his subpoena running a segment ...

House Select Committee on January 6 coup attempt votes to ...

https://www.wsws.org › articles › 2021/10/20 › bann-o20

2 days ago — “Mr. Bannon was in the war room at the Willard [Hotel] on January 6,” said ... at the Willard Hotel (including Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, ...

These include the “Women for America First” political group, which organized the fascist rally outside the White House on January 6; Republican strategist, attorney and frequent guest on Bannon’s podcast Boris Epshteyn; members of the group who attended the January 5 planning meeting at the Willard Hotel (including Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Roger Stone and Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller); and other Trump officials, such as Kash Patel, former chief-of-staff to acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller, and Ezra Cohen-Watnick, another Trump loyalist who was appointed to a high-level position in the Department of Defense following the firing of Defense Secretary Mark Esper after Trump’s electoral defeat.

Bannon's Jan. 6 role walks the thin line between revolutionary

https://www.washingtonpost.com › politics › 2021/10/20

1 day ago — 5: joining Trump's allies in a room at the Willard Hotel where, ... 6 committee as a “war room” — included a number of other Trumpworld ...

Missing: coup ‎| Must include: coup

### A Trump lawyer wrote an instruction manual for a coup. Why ...

https://www.washingtonpost.com › media › 2021/09/29

Sep 30, 2021 — Why haven't you seen it on the news? Attorney John Eastman, left, gestures as he speaks next to Donald Trump's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani ...

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On CNN Wednesday, reporter Sunlen Surfaty did a deep dive into Cleta Mitchell — a little-known pro-Trump lawyer who played a big part in trying to overthrow the results of the 2020 presidential election.

"She is not a household name," said Surfaty. "But lawyer Cleta Mitchell is a leader in President Trump's attempt to overturn the 2020 election. Named multiple times in a newly released Senate Judiciary report for her role in the pressure campaign on the Department of Justice to investigate unfounded claims of election fraud."

Surfaty then documented the ways Mitchell pushed to have the 2020 election results overturned, including emailing then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows about purported evidence she'd collected about election fraud in Georgia.

Mitchell was also heard on Trump's infamous January 2nd call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, whom he encouraged to "find" 12,000 votes needed to overtake President Joe Biden in the state.

"Her investment with Trump came as a surprise to many, including her law firm, and led to her swift departure," said Surfaty. "Mitchell was first pulled in 24 hours after election day as she recounts in a little noticed podcast viewed by CNN."

"I got a call from Mark Meadows," said Mitchell in the podcast. "I flew to Atlanta, and I — and thus began my involvement with the post-election."

Later, Mitchell was involved in the failed "audit" of votes in Arizona, which actually gave Biden a bigger lead over Trump than the official state count.

Watch the full report below:

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an 1021 no lnx

America is sleepwalking towards fascism

Amanda Marcotte and Salon October 08, 2021

AT&T and Facebook are unaccountable. Donald Trump's still free. This week saw an overwhelming number of stories all pointing to the same conclusion: American authoritarianism is on the rise, juiced and protected by some of the richest and most powerful people in the United States.

Due to a combination of whistleblowers, investigations, and, in many cases, utter shamelessness on the part of fascism enablers, this is now out in the open. And yet, despite Democrats controlling both Congress and the White House, serious action to fight back and save American democracy remains underwhelming to nonexistent.

The Senate Judiciary Committee, for instance, released a sobering report this week detailing the extent of Donald Trump's efforts to force the Department of Justice to fabricate evidence for use as a pretext to nullify the 2020 election. The report details nine separate instances of Trump pressuring acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen to enact a scheme, concocted by another DOJ lawyer named Jeffrey Clark, to overturn the election. Trump was not exactly subtle about what he expected from Rosen. On January 3 — three days before Trump resorted to inciting violence in a last-ditch effort to overthrow the election — Trump called a meeting and opened it by complaining, "One thing we know is you, Rosen, aren't going to do anything to overturn the election."

As Heather "Digby" Parton writes at Salon, "The president of the United States tried for weeks to get the Attorney General to overturn the election. That is the definition of an attempted coup."

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Senate Republicans are defending Trump on the grounds that this effort failed, which, as I point out in today's Standing Room Only newsletter, is the equivalent of saying attempted murder isn't a real crime. And the reason they're defending him is not mysterious. He's going to run again in 2024 — and will try to steal the election again, as well — and he does so with the full support of the GOP establishment, which is manipulating state election laws to make it easier for Trump next time.

This week, as well, Reuters published a disturbing report exposing how One America News, which can aptly be described as an authoritarian propaganda channel supporting Trump's demands to be installed illegally as president, is being bankrolled by the communications giant AT&T.

OAN's founder, Robert Herring Sr., not only claims that OAN was started at the request of AT&T executives but that court records show "AT&T has been a crucial source of funds flowing into OAN, providing tens of millions of dollars in revenue." AT&T defends this by saying they offer "many news channels that offer viewpoints across the political spectrum," but of course, OAN is not "news," because they heavily supported false claims that the 2020 election was fraudulent. OAN is profiting handsomely from Trump's insurrection, as the "network's online audience soared in November after conservative mainstay and OAN competitor Fox News affirmed Joe Biden's victory."

Fascist propaganda, it turns out, is very good business indeed. This ugly reality, that there's money to be made in elevating false, authoritarian propaganda, was also highlighted in the rolling news stories this week around Facebook, stemming from the revelations offered by whistleblower Frances Haugen.

Haugen collected thousands of documents during her time working for the civic integrity department at Facebook, which she says was marginalized precisely because having civic integrity is not good for profit. Haugen's documentation demonstrated what many have long suspected based on public evidence: Facebook knows that right-wingers are using their platform to spread disinformation and undermine democracy. They just don't care because authoritarian disinformation is wildly popular and therefore good for business.

This is why the right is freaking out and spreading conspiracy theories to discredit Haugen. They depend heavily on Facebook to distribute their false, inflammatory propaganda, and without it, their efforts to undermine democracy would lose a lot of power.

These stories are all troubling. The situation is clear-cut. There's a powerful authoritarian leader gunning to destroy democracy and install himself as the nation's leader. He has not just the full support of a major political party and the political power to arrange the laws to make this happen for him, but a propaganda apparatus that touches every corner of American life. Corporate interests may front like they oppose this, but behind the scenes, they offer material support to fascists because they see doing so as profitable. None of this is a secret.

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And yet ... nothing substantive is being done.

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The Senate Judiciary released a report detailing Trump's extensive efforts to overthrow democracy, and yet there's not a whiff of a hint that there's any movement from the Department of Justice to hold him criminally accountable for his actions. On the contrary, the DOJ is helping Trump, by shielding his Justice Department appointees from being questioned by congressional investigators. The assault on free and fair elections on the state level has been thoroughly documented, but legislation that would prevent these anti-democratic actions is moribund in a Democratic-controlled Congress because a couple of Democratic senators prioritize the filibuster over democracy itself. Democrats control some of the most powerful offices in the land, and yet they act helpless to stop the ongoing coup effort being conducted by a private citizen in Florida who has a criminal rap sheet many times longer than should be necessary to put him away for years.

There curiously has also been no accountability for the corporate interests who support rising fascism because it's in their financial interests to do so.

Haugen's whistleblowing efforts focused heavily on attempts to expose Facebook's role in spreading right-wing disinformation, but when she was brought up for a Senate hearing, it was to talk about teen girls and self-esteem, a problem even the Insurrectionist Caucus is happy to pull faces and claim to be upset by. It's an important issue, to be sure, but in the face of the literal end to American democracy, it's questionable whether teen self-esteem should be the main priority for the Senate when it comes to Facebook.

There's just no way out of it. The country is sleepwalking its way into an authoritarian overthrow of democracy.

There's plenty of journalism and exposés on all of these social forces Trump is exploiting to capture the White House in 2024. Yet, despite all of the noise, there's little in the way of action to change things. But it doesn't have to be this way.

Democrats have real power, and even if a couple of no-good centrist Democrats are standing in the way of electoral reform, there are surely other actions that could be taken to stop Trump. A lack of imagination and political cowardice, however, is inducing this attitude of helplessness in Democrats. And it's one that Trump will all too easily exploit to get his way.

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harv 2017 taLK

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real reason Trump didn't follow through with his 2020 plot has been exposed in new Senate report: analysis

Sky Palma

October 07, 2021

Citing the new Senate Judiciary Committee report on Donald Trump's efforts to subvert the 2020 election, the Washington Post's Aaron Blake says that it reveals new details about the ex-president's alleged plot...

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undercover jrnlist windsor

"Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio confided in her that Donald J. Trump would soon announce he was running again for president in 2024," Gabriel reports. "Glenn Youngkin, the Republican nominee for governor of Virginia, revealed to her that he could not publicly press his anti-abortion agenda for fear of losing independent voters….Her encounter in December 2020 with Tommy Tuberville, then a senator-elect from Alabama, elicited the first real evidence that some Republicans in the Senate would reject the Electoral College votes certifying Mr. Biden's victory — a move based on groundless claims of fraud."

Windsor, according to Gabriel, hasn't been shy about saying outrageous things she doesn't actually believe in the hope that Republicans will agree with them. For example, she once told far-right Republican Cecil Bell, Jr. — who serves in the Texas House of Representatives — "This is a Christian state, and Democrats are not Christian." Bell wasn't the least bit offended:

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A well-known Conservative Christian lawyer played a behind-the-scenes role in the December lawsuit filed by Republican attorneys general to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

According to The New York Times,Michael P. Farris — the chief executive of the conservative Christian nonprofit advocacy group, Alliance Defending Freedom — was responsible for circulating a comprehensive draft of what became the lawsuit filed by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) in hopes of overturning the presidential election in favor of former President Donald Trump.

Per the publication:

"Our Country stands at an important crossroads," the complaint filed by Mr. Paxton said in its opening argument. Those words were lifted verbatim from the draft Mr. Farris had sent, as was a subsequent passage asserting that "either the Constitution matters and must be followed, even when some officials consider it inconvenient or out of date, or it is simply a piece of parchment on display at the National Archives. We ask the Court to choose the former."

After making small changes to the draft, Paxton filed the lawsuit on December 7. The Times reports that the lawsuit was also filed in multiple other battleground states including Georgia, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. In total, 17 Republican attorneys general filed Supreme Court briefs in support of Paxton's lawsuit. However, the lawsuit was tossed out of court in just four days.

Farris' contribution to the legal effort to overturn the presidential election underscores how Christian conservatives also circulated claims of voter fraud perpetuated by Trump.

The chief deputy attorney general in South Carolina, one of several Republicans whom Mr. Farris and a team of other conservative lawyers were trying to convince to file the lawsuit. On November 30, Farris wrote an email addressed to South Carolina's chief deputy attorney general in an effort to convince him to file a lawsuit challenging the election results.

"Please find a much-improved version of the complaint attached," Farris wrote. "I will call you and update you on the alternatives."

Although Farris reportedly declined to be interviewed by the Times,he did respond by email admitting his involvement in the post-election effort to overturn the election.

"While it's true that I care about this issue on a personal level, it is not something that ADF works on in any capacity," he wrote. "As President and CEO, my charge is to focus on ADF's mission, which is to protect Americans' God-given freedoms. I have nothing to say about the details of the way forward on the issue of election integrity other than the hope that all Americans take the issue seriously."

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trump tells 1st 4 to ~ subpoenas

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/10/internet-explodes-with-reactions-to-bombshell-senate-judiciary-report-on-trumps-efforts-to-pressure-doj-into-helping-him-overturn-the-election/

The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee has released a sweeping report detailing how former President Donald Trump and a former high-ranking lawyer for the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) attempted to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

The Democratic-led committee's 394-page document contains intricate details about the former president's actions in the days after the presidential election was called for President Joe Biden. A number of bombshell claims were revealed in the report and ⁠— here aresix key takeaways from it.

1. "President Trump repeatedly asked DOJ leadership to endorse his false claims that the election was stolen and to assist his efforts to overturn the election results."

The report reveals Trump asked the Justice Department for assistance in overturning the election a total of nine times. The call history includes details about who Trump spoke with along with dates those calls took place.

December 15, 2020 – Oval Office meeting including incoming Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen and Acting Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue (both men assumed office when William Barr left on Dec. 23)
December 23, 2020 – Trump-Rosen Call
December 24, 2020 – Trump-Rosen Call
December 27, 2020 – Trump-Rosen-Donoghue Call
December 28, 2020 – Trump-Donoghue Call
December 30, 2020 – Trump-Rosen Call
December 31, 2020 – Oval Office meeting including Rosen and Donoghue
January 3, 2021 – Oval Office meeting including Rosen and Donoghue
January 3, 2021 – Trump-Donoghue Call

2. "White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows asked Acting Attorney General Rosen to initiate election fraud investigations on multiple occasions, violating longstanding restrictions on White House-DOJ communications about specific law enforcement matters."

Between December 29 and January 1, Meadows pushed for Rosen to open an investigation into "at least four categories of false election fraud claims" being circulated by Trump, his campaign team, legal team and other allies. At the time, no substantial evidence of election fraud had been produced to support any of the claims. The report also breaks down the four key categories Meadows pressed Rosen about:

"Investigate various discredited claims of election fraud in Georgia that the Trump campaign was simultaneously advancing in a lawsuit that the Georgia Supreme Court had refused to hear on an expedited basis;

Investigate false claims of 'signature match anomalies' in Fulton County, Georgia, even though Republican state elections officials had made clear "there has been no evidence presented of any issues with the signature matching process."

Investigate a theory known as 'Italygate,' which was promoted by an ally of the President's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, and which held that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and an Italian IT contractor used military satellites to manipulate voting machines and change Trump votes to Biden votes. Meadows also asked DOJ to meet with Giuliani on Italygate and other election fraud claims.

Investigate a series of claims of election fraud in New Mexico that had been widely refuted and in some cases rejected by the courts, including a claim that Dominion Voting Systems machines caused late-night 'vote dumps' for Democratic candidates."

The report also notes that Meadows' actions are in violation of policies that place limitations on communication between White House and DOJ officials in regards to certain law enforcement matters. This policy was put in place after the Watergate scandal.

3. "After personally meeting with Trump, Jeffrey Bossert Clark[former Assistant Attorney General for the Environment and Natural Resources Division] pushed Rosen and Donoghue to assist Trump's election subversion scheme — and told Rosen he would decline Trump's potential offer to install him as Acting Attorney General if Rosen agreed to aid that scheme."

After having private conversations with Trump, Clark pressed Rosen and Donoghue to announce an investigation into election fraud and have legislatures in key swing states appoint alternate election officials. The report highlights a draft letter Clark sent to Rosen and Donoghue on December 28. The letter, which was addressed to Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R), the General Assembly Speaker, and Senate President Pro Tempore, included a number of recommended directives, many of which violated election laws.

In fact, Clark's proposed action, which would have had the DOJ override an already-certified popular vote, was described as "a stunning distortion of DOJ's authority," according to the report:

"The letter was titled "Georgia Proof of Concept" and Clark suggested replicating it in "each relevant state." The letter would have informed state officials that DOJ had "taken notice" of election irregularities in their state and recommended calling a special legislative session to evaluate these irregularities, determine who "won the most legal votes," and consider appointing a new slate of Electors. Clark's proposal to wield DOJ's power to override the already-certified popular vote reflected a stunning distortion of DOJ's authority: DOJ protects ballot access and ballot integrity, but has no role in determining which candidate won a particular election."

4. "Trump allies with links to the 'Stop the Steal' movement and the January 6 insurrection participated in the pressure campaign against DOJ."

The report included a brief list of the Trump allies who have been accused of pressuring DOJ officials to do the former president's bidding. Those individuals also had ties to the former president's "Stop the Steal" movement and the insurrection on the U.S. Capitol that followed Trump's rally on January 6.

They are:

Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.): The report indicates that the Republican lawmaker spoke directly to Donoghue about baseless claims of election fraud in his state.
Pennsylvania State Senator Doug Mastriano (R): As an avid Trump ally, Mastriano reportedly "spent thousands of dollars from his campaign account to provide transportation for Trump supporters to attend the 'Save America Rally' on January 6." The report also indicates that he "was present on the Capitol grounds as the insurrection unfolded." Like Perry, Mastriano also spoke with Donoghue in reference to unfounded claims of election fraud in Pennsylvania.
Trump campaign legal advisor Cleta Mitchell: Described as one of the earliest advocates for Trump's baseless claims of widespread voter fraud, the Senate report also notes Mitchell was a "participant in the January 2, 2021 call where Trump 5 pressured Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to 'find 11,780 votes.'"

5. "Trump forced the resignation of U.S. Attorney Byung Jin ('BJay') Pak, whom he believed was not doing enough to address false claims of election fraud in Georgia. Trump then went outside the line of succession when naming an Acting U.S. Attorney, bypassing First Assistant U.S. Attorney Kurt Erskine and instead, appointing Bobby Christine because he believed Christine would 'do something' about his election fraud claims."

When former U.S. Attorney General Pak's investigative results did not align with the outcome Trump was hoping for, the outraged former president publicly berated him and described him as "a "Never Trumper." The former president also bulldozed over protocol and the proper line of succession to appoint someone he believed would produce favorable results to help him overturn the presidential election.

6. "By pursuing false claims of election fraud before votes were certified, DOJ deviated from longstanding practice meant to avoid inserting DOJ itself as an issue in the election."

On November 9, 2020 the former U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr released a memo that "directed prosecutors not to wait until after certification to investigate allegations of voting irregularities that 'could potentially impact the outcome of a federal election in an individual State.'"

In doing this, the report emphasizes Barr "weakened" the DOJ's policy to "avoid taking overt steps in election fraud investigations until after votes were certified, in order to avoid inserting DOJ itself as an issue in the election." His actions before and after the election disregarded the DOJ's longstanding practice.

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…and then they teamed up with an OAN reporter?

Giuliani told attorneys that the Trump legal team effectively deputized a reporter for OAN, the pro-Trump news network, to work for the Big Lie.

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That, Giuliani said, involved Christina Bobb working for Trump’s “personal lawyers,” referring to her as “part of the legal team.” In that capacity, Giuliani claimed, she focused on searching for anything that would support the myth that the election had been fraudulent in the key states of Arizona, Michigan, and Georgia.

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“My staff said she was terrific, she was very trustworthy and if we could work out an agreement with One America News, it would be very helpful,” Giuliani said. “She was a very good investigator.”

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Bobb has used her TV perch at OAN to both promote the Big Lie and fundraise for elements of it. As the reality of Trump’s loss became clearer after the 2020 election, Bobb became increasingly detached from reality in her rhetoric.

Giuliani claimed that over that time period, she agreed to give the Trump legal team veto power over stories.

“The rules that we made with [OAN editor] Charles [Herring] were that he would defer to us to whatever our needs were,that he couldn’t give it to us permanently but he could loosen up her assignments for the next couple of months, therefore she wouldn’t be working all that much for OAN,” Giuliani said.

Herring, in his deposition, denied that he was aware of the arrangement.

Giuliani added that Bobb agreed that “if she did develop a discrete, good story, she would have to run it past us so it didn’t violate any of our rules or whatever.”

“And I was pretty comfortable they would live by it because they had before,” Giuliani remarked.

OAN has produced a string of documentaries that take ideas floating in the Trumpworld ether and give them form.

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