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      McCarthy Feared G.O.P. Lawmakers Put ‘People in Jeopardy’ After Jan. 6

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      New audio recordings reveal Kevin McCarthy worried that comments by his far-right colleagues could incite violence. He said he would try to rein in the lawmakers, but has instead defended them.Representative Kevin McCarthy, the House Republican leader, feared in the aftermath of the Jan. 6 attack that several far-right members of Congress would incite violence against other lawmakers, identifying several by name as security risks in private conversations with party leaders.Mr. McCarthy talked to other congressional Republicans about wanting to rein in multiple hard-liners who were deeply involved in Donald J. Trump’s efforts to contest the 2020 election and undermine the peaceful transfer of power, according to an audio recording obtained by The New York Times.But Mr. McCarthy did not follow through on the sterner steps that some Republicans encouraged him to take, opting instead to seek a political accommodation with the most extreme members of the G.O.P. in the interests of advancing his own career.Mr. McCarthy’s remarks represent one of the starkest acknowledgments from a Republican leader that the party’s rank-and-file lawmakers played a role in stoking violence on Jan. 6, 2021 — and posed a threat in the days after the Capitol attack. Audio recordings of the comments were obtained in reporting for a forthcoming book, “This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden and the Battle for America’s Future.”In the phone call with other Republican leaders on Jan. 10, Mr. McCarthy referred chiefly to two representatives, Matt Gaetz of Florida and Mo Brooks of Alabama, as endangering the security of other lawmakers and the Capitol complex. But he and his allies discussed several other representatives who made comments they saw as offensive or dangerous, including Lauren Boebert of Colorado and Barry Moore of Alabama.The country was “too crazy,” Mr. McCarthy said, for members to be talking and tweeting recklessly at such a volatile moment.McCarthy Expresses Concern About Republican Lawmakers’ RhetoricOn a Jan. 10, 2021, conference call with House G.O.P. leaders, Representative Kevin McCarthy expresses concern that Republican lawmakers’ rhetoric could lead to someone getting hurt.Mr. Brooks and Mr. Gaetz were the prime offenders in the eyes of G.O.P. leaders. Mr. Brooks addressed the Jan. 6 rally on the National Mall, which preceded the Capitol riot, using incendiary language. After Jan. 6, Mr. Gaetz went on television to attack multiple Republicans who had criticized Mr. Trump, including Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming, a member of the leadership team.Those comments by Mr. Gaetz alarmed Mr. McCarthy and his colleagues in leadership — particularly the reference to Ms. Cheney, who was already the target of threats and public abuse from Mr. Trump’s faction in the party because of her criticism of the defeated president.Mr. McCarthy considered remarks made by Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida a threat to the security of other lawmakers and the Capitol complex.Audra Melton for The New York Times“He’s putting people in jeopardy,” Mr. McCarthy said of Mr. Gaetz. “And he doesn’t need to be doing this. We saw what people would do in the Capitol, you know, and these people came prepared with rope, with everything else.”Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the No. 2 House Republican, suggested that Mr. Gaetz might be crossing a legal boundary.“It’s potentially illegal what he’s doing,” Mr. Scalise said.McCarthy on Comments by GaetzRepresentative Kevin McCarthy and Representative Steve Scalise, along with a number of aides, discuss Representative Matt Gaetz criticizing other Republicans by name in the days after the Jan. 6 attack.On Tuesday night, Mr. Gaetz responded with a blistering statement, castigating the two House Republican leaders as “weak men.”“While I was protecting President Trump from impeachment, they were protecting Liz Cheney from criticism,” he said.Mr. McCarthy, referring to Mr. Brooks, said the Trump loyalist had behaved even worse on Jan. 6 than Mr. Trump, who told the crowd assembled on the National Mall to “fight like hell” before his supporters stormed the Capitol in an attempt to disrupt the electoral vote count. Mr. Brooks told the rally that it was “the day American patriots start taking down names and kicking ass.”“You think the president deserves to be impeached for his comments?” Mr. McCarthy asked rhetorically. “That’s almost something that goes further than what the president said.”Representative Mo Brooks of Alabama gave a fiery speech at the Jan. 6 rally that preceded the Capitol riot.Jacquelyn Martin/Associated PressSpeaking about rank-and-file lawmakers to his fellow leaders, Mr. McCarthy was sharply critical and suggested he was going to tell them to stop their inflammatory conduct.“Our members have got to start paying attention to what they say, too, and you can’t put up with that,” he said, adding an expletive.McCarthy Says He ‘Can’t Put Up With’ Inflammatory TalkKevin McCarthy and Steve Scalise discuss incendiary comments made by multiple G.O.P. lawmakers on a Jan. 10, 2021, conference call with other Republican congressional leaders and their aides.Mr. McCarthy and Mr. Scalise did not respond to a request for comment.Mr. Brooks on Tuesday dismissed the Republican leader’s criticism and noted that a lawsuit brought against him by a Democratic member of Congress for his Jan. 6 speech had been dismissed in court.“Kevin McCarthy spoke before knowing the facts,” Mr. Brooks said, adding that he did not recall Mr. McCarthy ever speaking with him directly about his speech.During the Jan. 10, 2021, phone call, Mr. McCarthy was speaking with a small group of Republican leaders, including Mr. Scalise, Ms. Cheney and Representative Tom Emmer of Minnesota, as well as a number of aides.It was on this G.O.P. leadership call that Mr. McCarthy told his colleagues he would call Mr. Trump and tell him, “it would be my recommendation you should resign.”The House minority leader has in recent days lied about and tried to downplay his comments: Last week, after The Times reported the remarks, Mr. McCarthy called the report “totally false and wrong.” After Mr. McCarthy’s denial, a source who had confidentially shared a recording of the call with the book’s authors agreed to let The Times publish parts of the audio. In the days since that recording has been made public, the Republican leader has repeated his denial and emphasized that he never actually carried out his plan to urge Mr. Trump to quit.Mr. McCarthy’s comments casting other Republican lawmakers as a menace within Congress illustrate the difference between how he spoke about his own party right after Jan. 6, in what he imagined to be strict confidence, and the way he has interacted with those lawmakers in the 15 months since then.On the Jan. 10 call, Mr. McCarthy said he planned to speak with Mr. Gaetz and ask him not to attack other lawmakers by name. The following day, in a larger meeting for all House Republicans, Mr. McCarthy pleaded with lawmakers not to “incite” but rather to “respect one another.”McCarthy Calls for Party UnityKevin McCarthy tells Republican lawmakers during a meeting of the G.O.P. conference on Jan. 11, 2021, that they should not attack each other over their views on the 2020 election.But in his determination to become speaker of the House after the 2022 elections, Mr. McCarthy has spent much of the last year forging a closer political partnership with the far right, showing little public concern that his most extreme colleagues could instigate bloodshed with their overheated or hateful rhetoric.In recent months Mr. McCarthy has opposed punishing Republican members of Congress who have been accused of inciting violence, including Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and, most recently, Representative Paul Gosar of Arizona, who posted an animated video on social media that depicted him killing Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, the left-wing Democrat.Capitol Riot’s Aftermath: Key DevelopmentsCard 1 of 3Trump allies’ involvement. 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      New Details Underscore House G.O.P. Role in Jan. 6 Planning

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      A court filing and newly disclosed text messages provide additional evidence of how closely some fervent pro-Trump lawmakers worked with the White House on efforts to overturn the election.WASHINGTON — It was less than two weeks before President Donald J. Trump’s staunchest allies in Congress would have what they saw as their last chance to overturn the 2020 election, and Representative Scott Perry, Republican of Pennsylvania, was growing anxious.“Time continues to count down,” he wrote in a text message to Mark Meadows, then the White House chief of staff, adding: “11 days to 1/6 and 25 days to inauguration. We gotta get going!”It has been clear for more than a year that ultraconservative members of Congress were deeply involved in attempts to keep Mr. Trump in power: They joined baseless lawsuits, spread the lie of widespread election fraud and were among the 147 Republicans who voted on Jan. 6, 2021, against certifying President Biden’s victory in at least one state.But in a court filing and in text messages obtained by CNN, new pieces of evidence have emerged in recent days fleshing out the degree of their involvement with the Trump White House in strategy sessions, at least one of which included discussions about encouraging Mr. Trump’s supporters to march to the Capitol on Jan. 6, despite warnings of potential violence. Some continued to push to try to keep Mr. Trump in office even after a mob of his supporters attacked the complex.“In our private chat with only Members, several are saying the only way to save our Republic is for Trump to call for Marshall law,” Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, Republican of Georgia, wrote to Mr. Meadows on Jan. 17, 2021, misspelling the word “martial.” The revelations underscore how integrated Mr. Trump’s most fervent allies in Congress were into the effort to overturn the election on several fronts, including a scheme to appoint pro-Trump electors from states won by Mr. Biden — even after they were told such a plan was unlawful — and how they strategized to pressure their fellow lawmakers to go along.The fake electors scheme, the question of how demonstrators at Mr. Trump’s rally on the Ellipse on Jan. 6 were directed toward the Capitol and the plotting in the White House and on Capitol Hill about the potential for Vice President Mike Pence to block or delay certification of the results are at the heart not just of the inquiry by the House select committee on Jan. 6 but also of an expanding criminal inquiry by the Justice Department.“If there was a level of coordination that was designed not just to exercise First Amendment rights, but to interfere with Congress, as it certified the electoral count, then we’re in a whole different universe,” said Joyce Vance, a law professor at the University of Alabama and a former U.S. attorney. “There’s a difference between assembling and protesting, and trying to interfere with the smooth transfer of power.”Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Mr. Meadows, told the House committee that she recalled at least 11 members of Congress who were involved in discussions with White House officials about overturning the election, including plans to pressure Mr. Pence to throw out electoral votes from states won by Mr. Biden.She said members of Congress involved in the discussions at various points included Mr. Perry; Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio; Representatives Andy Biggs, Paul Gosar and Debbie Lesko of Arizona; Representative Mo Brooks of Alabama; Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida; Representative Jody Hice and Ms. Greene of Georgia; Representative Louie Gohmert of Texas; and Representative Lauren Boebert of Colorado.“They felt that he had the authority to — pardon me if my phrasing isn’t correct on this, but — send votes back to the states or the electors back to the states,” Ms. Hutchinson testified, adding that they had appeared to embrace a plan promoted by the conservative lawyer John Eastman that members of both parties have likened to a blueprint for a coup.Ms. Hutchinson said that Mr. Perry, Mr. Gaetz and Mr. Gohmert were present when White House lawyers told the group that the plan to use so-called alternative electors was not “legally sound,” but that Mr. Meadows allowed it to move forward nonetheless.Cassidy Hutchinson, left, a former aide to Mark Meadows, has testified to the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack.Jonathan Ernst/ReutersText messages show that Mr. Biggs embraced the plan early on, writing to Mr. Meadows on Nov. 6 that while it was “highly controversial, it can’t be much more controversial than the lunacy that were sitting out there now.”Mr. Jordan continued to push the strategy to the end, sending a message to Mr. Meadows on Jan. 5: “Vice President Mike Pence, as President of the Senate, should call out all electoral votes that he believes are unconstitutional as no electoral votes at all.”Mr. Jordan has criticized the Jan. 6 committee for publishing only a partial version of this text that did not make clear he was forwarding the legal advice of a conservative lawyer.Ms. Hutchinson also testified that in one discussion, Mr. Perry, who now leads the right-wing House Freedom Caucus, endorsed the idea of encouraging supporters to march to the Capitol, and that no one on the call objected to the proposal. She made clear that the members of Congress were “inclined to go with White House guidance” about directing a crowd to the Capitol.Ms. Hutchinson testified that in one discussion, Representative Scott Perry, Republican of Pennsylvania, endorsed the idea of encouraging supporters to march to the Capitol.Oliver Contreras for The New York TimesSome Republican members of Congress agreed to speak at rallies outside the building meant to further encourage the disruption of the peaceful transition of power.Mr. Brooks and Mr. Biggs — both members of the Freedom Caucus — were scheduled to speak on Jan. 6 at a rally planned for the east side of the Capitol by the prominent Stop the Steal organizer Ali Alexander, according to a permit application. The application, dated Dec. 21, 2020, noted that “the MOC” — or members of Congress — “have been confirmed.”Less than 10 days later, according to an addendum to the permit application, Mr. Alexander filed an expanded list of speakers that included more far-right members of Congress, among them Mr. Gosar, Ms. Boebert and Ms. Greene, who formally took office on Jan. 3, 2021. None of these speakers actually appeared at the event, which was never held because of the violence that erupted at the Capitol.Mr. Brooks, however, did appear at a public event on Jan. 6, speaking at Mr. Trump’s event at the Ellipse near the White House with body armor underneath his black and yellow jacket.“Today is the day American patriots start taking down names and kicking ass,” Mr. Brooks told a huge crowd of Mr. Trump’s supporters, adding, “Are you willing to do what it takes to fight for America?”Representative Mo Brooks, Republican of Alabama, appeared at President Donald J. Trump’s rally on the Ellipse on Jan. 6.Jacquelyn Martin/Associated PressConservative members of Congress also amplified Mr. Trump’s efforts to fight the election results, echoing his aggressive posture on social media and in television interviews.Capitol Riot’s Aftermath: Key DevelopmentsCard 1 of 3McCarthy’s outrage. More

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      In Call Before Jan. 6 Riot, a Plea to ‘Descend on the Capitol’

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      Days before Jan. 6, a onetime aide to Roger J. Stone Jr. told Trump backers to make lawmakers meeting to finalize the 2020 election results feel that “people are breathing down their necks.”One week before an angry mob stormed the Capitol, a communications expert named Jason Sullivan, a onetime aide to Roger J. Stone Jr., joined a conference call with a group of President Donald J. Trump’s supporters and made an urgent plea.After assuring his listeners that the 2020 election had been stolen, Mr. Sullivan told them that they had to go to Washington on Jan. 6, 2021 — the day that Congress was to meet to finalize the electoral count — and “descend on the Capitol,” according to a recording of the call obtained by The New York Times.While Mr. Sullivan claimed that he was “not inciting violence or any kind of riots,” he urged those on the call to make their presence felt at the Capitol in a way that would intimidate members of Congress, telling the group that they had to ensure that lawmakers inside the building “understand that people are breathing down their necks.”He also pledged that Mr. Trump was going to take action on his own; the president, he said, was going to impose a form of martial law on Jan. 6 and would not be leaving office.“Biden will never be in that White House,” Mr. Sullivan declared. “That’s my promise to each and every one of you.”Before Riot, Operative Urged Trump Supporters to ‘Descend on the Capitol’ on Jan. 6In a conference call days before the Jan. 6 attack, Jason Sullivan, a onetime aide to Roger J. Stone Jr., exhorted supporters of President Donald J. Trump to go to the Capitol that day and pressure lawmakers meeting to finalize the 2020 election results.The recording of the call, which took place on Dec. 30, 2020, emerged as the Justice Department has expanded its criminal investigation of the Capitol attack. It offers a glimpse of the planning that went on in the run-up to the storming of the Capitol and the mind-set of some of those who zeroed in on Jan. 6 as a kind of last stand for keeping Mr. Trump in office.It also reflects the complexities that federal prosecutors are likely to face as they begin the task of figuring out how much — or even whether — people involved in the political rallies that preceded the assault can be held accountable for the violence that erupted.After more than a year of focusing exclusively on rioters who took part in the storming of the Capitol, prosecutors have widened their gaze in recent weeks and have started to question whether those involved in encouraging protests — like the one that Mr. Sullivan was describing — can be held culpable for disrupting the work of Congress.Mr. Sullivan’s remarks during the call appeared to be an effort to motivate a group of people aggrieved by the election to take direct action against members of Congress on Jan. 6, presaging what Mr. Trump himself would say in a speech that day. While it remains unclear whether anyone on Mr. Sullivan’s call went on to join the mob that breached the Capitol, he seemed to be exhorting his listeners to apply unusual pressure on lawmakers just as they were overseeing the final count of Electoral College votes.In a statement provided by his lawyer, Mr. Sullivan played down the nature of the call, saying he had merely “shared some encouragement” with what he described as “people who all felt their votes had been disenfranchised in the 2020 elections.” Mr. Sullivan said he had been asked to participate in the call by a group of anti-vaccine activists — or what he called “health freedom advocate moms” — who were hosting “a small, permitted event” at the Capitol on Jan. 6.“I only promoted peaceful solutions where Americans could raise their voices and be heard as expressed in our First Amendment,” Mr. Sullivan said in the statement. “I in no way condone the violence of any protesters.”Still, in the recording of the call, Mr. Sullivan can be heard telling his listeners that the lawmakers inside the Capitol “need to feel pressure.”“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,” he said. “We have to put that pressure there.”As the Justice Department widens its inquiry, federal prosecutors are using a grand jury in Washington to gather information on political organizers, speakers and so-called V.I.P.s connected to a series of pro-Trump rallies after the 2020 election. One prominent planner of those rallies, Ali Alexander, received a subpoena from the grand jury and said last week that he intended to comply with its requests.In the run-up to Jan. 6, Mr. Alexander publicly discussed a pressure campaign against lawmakers that was meant to stop the final electoral count, saying he was working with Representative Mo Brooks of Alabama and Representatives Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar of Arizona, all Republicans.“We four schemed up of putting maximum pressure on Congress while they were voting,” Mr. Alexander said in a since-deleted video on Periscope. The plan, he said, was to “change the hearts and the minds of Republicans who were in that body, hearing our loud roar from outside.”It is unclear if the Justice Department is aware of Mr. Sullivan’s conference call; the department declined to comment. The House committee investigating the events of Jan. 6 was provided with a copy of the recording some months ago by the woman who made it, Staci Burk, a law student and Republican activist from Arizona.Shortly after the election, Ms. Burk became convinced that phony ballots had been flown in bulk into Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. She eventually submitted an anonymous affidavit concerning the ballots in an election fraud case filed in Federal District Court in Phoenix by the pro-Trump lawyer Sidney Powell.Capitol Riot’s Aftermath: New DevelopmentsCard 1 of 5Debating a criminal referral. More

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      How the 2022 Primaries Are Testing Trump’s Role as the G.O.P. ‘Kingpin’

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      Two of Donald Trump’s most prominent Senate endorsements have already backfired. Now the month of May looms large to measure his pull on the party. Donald J. Trump has sought to establish himself as the Republican Party’s undisputed kingmaker in the 2022 midterms, issuing more than 120 endorsements to elevate allies, punish those who have crossed him and turn his baseless claim that the 2020 election was stolen into a litmus test for the party.But the range of Trump-backed candidates has become so unwieldy that even some of his own advisers have warned that his expansive effort to install loyalists nationwide has not only threatened his brand but diluted its impact, exposing him unnecessarily to political risk, according to advisers and Republican strategists.Mr. Trump’s face-saving decision on Wednesday to retract his endorsement of Representative Mo Brooks, a longtime ally who has slumped in the polls in Alabama’s Senate race, only highlighted the perils of an upcoming primary season that will test the former president’s sway over the Republican Party.Already, two of Mr. Trump’s early and most prominent Senate endorsements have backfired long before voters head to the polls. In addition to Alabama, his initial choice in Pennsylvania, Sean Parnell, quit the race last fall after abuse allegations emerged in a child custody dispute. And fears of further setbacks have helped keep Mr. Trump on the sidelines so far in choosing a replacement there or a candidate in the Ohio or Missouri Senate races.Georgia, where Mr. Trump is headed this weekend, represents one of his riskiest bets. He has been fixated on unseating the Republican governor, Brian Kemp. But Mr. Trump’s handpicked challenger has been struggling to gain traction against the well-financed governor less than two months before the primary.“I don’t know whether he is letting emotion rule his decision making or if he is getting bad advice,” said Glen Bolger, a Republican pollster, “but it seems like he is picking candidates who are pretty weak, and that’s not a place — when you’re trying to be kingpin — where you want to be.” He added that Mr. Trump’s image remained “very strong” among Republican primary voters. The early stumbles have come as Mr. Trump’s rivals, and even some erstwhile allies, including former Vice President Mike Pence, have become more emboldened to break ranks publicly with Mr. Trump.The former president’s own obsession with his endorsement success rate as a metric of his power has only magnified attention on upcoming primaries. Mr. Trump crowed after the Texas primary this month about how all 33 people he had endorsed either won outright or were far ahead. But nearly all of those candidates were on a glide path to victory without his backing.Bigger tests loom. Mr. Trump’s advisers and his adversaries alike have circled May as the month that will either cement his hold on the Republican base or puncture his aura as the party’s untouchable leader.The only two races for governor in which Mr. Trump is seeking to unseat Republican incumbents, in Georgia and Idaho, are taking place that month, as is the Alabama Senate primary, in which Mr. Trump said he now planned to endorse again. There is also a North Carolina Senate race where Mr. Trump’s choice is not considered the favorite. And in West Virginia, one of the country’s Trumpiest states, his preferred candidate is locked in a bruising race that pits two House members against each other.How Donald J. Trump Still LoomsGrip on G.O.P.: Mr. Trump remains the most powerful figure in the Republican Party. However, there are signs his control is loosening.Power Struggle: Led by Senator Mitch McConnell, a band of anti-Trump Republicans is maneuvering to thwart the ex-president.Midterms Effect: Mr. Trump has become a party kingmaker, but his involvement in state races worries many Republicans.Post-Presidency Profits: Mr. Trump is melding business with politics, capitalizing for personal gain.Just the Beginning: For many Trump supporters who marched on Jan. 6, the day was not a disgraced insurrection but the start of a movement.Mr. Trump’s backing is still the most coveted in Republican politics, and his outpost at Mar-a-Lago in Florida sees a constant flow of candidates pitching themselves and pledging loyalty.“The complete and total failure of the Democrat ‘leadership’ has created a demand for the immediate return to the America First agenda President Trump championed,” Taylor Budowich, a spokesman for Mr. Trump, said. “The democratic process has never before seen the kind of power that President Trump’s endorsement has heading into the primary season.”Polls have shown Gov. Brian Kemp of Georgia maintaining a lead in his re-election bid.Ben Gray/Atlanta Journal-Constitution, via Associated PressChallenging Georgia’s governor is former Senator David Perdue, whom Mr. Trump is endorsing.Matthew Odom for The New York TimesPerhaps no state embodies the risky gambit that Mr. Trump is undertaking to reorient the Republican Party around his false 2020 fraud claims than Georgia, where he will rally support on Saturday for former Senator David Perdue against Mr. Kemp. Mr. Trump has loudly feuded with the governor over his decision to certify the 2020 election.Polls have shown Mr. Kemp’s maintaining a lead despite Mr. Trump’s endorsement of Mr. Perdue and appearance in television commercials. In recent days, Mr. Trump also backed challengers to the Kemp-aligned attorney general and insurance commissioner after previously wading into the contests for Georgia’s secretary of state and lieutenant governor.“I think Trump has overextended himself in Georgia,” said Erick Erickson, a conservative radio host in Georgia. “Many of these candidates won’t have the budget to get that information out there, and Trump doesn’t seem to be throwing big money their way.”While Mr. Trump seeks to put his imprint on the party across the country, the footprint of his political operation — despite a war chest of more than $122 million entering 2022 — is far smaller. Most of his endorsements come with only a small check and a public statement of support, with some candidates paying him to use his Mar-a-Lago resort for fund-raisers. The candidates must then raise sufficient money on their own to take advantage of his backing — and not all have.One of Mr. Trump’s political successes has been in the Georgia Senate primary, where Herschel Walker, the former football player, has essentially cleared the field with Mr. Trump’s backing and has emerged as a strong fund-raiser. But Mr. Walker also has a lengthy set of political vulnerabilities that Mr. Trump looked past and Democrats are expected to seize upon. He has faced accusations that he threatened his ex-wife as well as questions about his business dealings and recent residency in Texas. Other Trump-backed Georgia Republicans are facing challenging primaries, including John Gordon, who entered the attorney general’s race only days ago and is being advised by Corey Lewandowski, Mr. Trump’s first 2016 campaign manager. Mr. Trump greeted Herschel Walker, the former football player whom the president endorsed in the Georgia Senate race, in 2020.Anna Moneymaker for The New York TimesIn state after state, Mr. Trump’s endorsements have put him at odds with some of the most powerful local Republicans, including several governors.In Nebraska, Mr. Trump is crosswise with Gov. Pete Ricketts by supporting the rival of Mr. Ricketts’s preferred candidate in the open governor’s race. In Maryland, Mr. Trump is supporting Dan Cox for governor against the former state commerce secretary, Kelly Schulz, who has the support of her old boss, Gov. Larry Hogan. In Arizona, Mr. Trump’s feud with Gov. Doug Ducey is expected to spill into the open governor’s race there, too. Mr. Trump is backing a former newscaster, Kari Lake, and Mr. Ducey has not yet endorsed anyone.Kari Lake, the Trump-endorsed candidate for governor of Arizona, greeting supporters at a rally last year.Adriana Zehbrauskas for The New York TimesMr. Trump is holding events in many states to rally his base, pledging to fly as far away as Alaska to try to unseat Senator Lisa Murkowski, the only Republican in the Senate who voted to convict him in his impeachment trial and who is on the ballot this year.In House races, Mr. Trump is most determined to oust the 10 Republicans who voted for his impeachment, particularly Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming. Mr. Trump has scored some early successes, helping to drive three Republicans who voted for his impeachment into retirement. But the remaining races have far fewer sure bets for him.In Michigan, where Mr. Trump will hold a rally in early April, he is trying to defeat two House Republicans who backed his impeachment as well as install numerous loyalists in a state where he has falsely claimed the 2020 election was rigged.Eric Greitens resigned as governor in 2018 amid a scandal. This week his ex-wife accused him of physical abuse. Jeff Roberson/Associated PressIn Missouri, Mr. Trump stayed on the sidelines despite intense lobbying, including from former Gov. Eric Greitens, who resigned in scandal in 2018 but now as a Senate candidate has wooed Mr. Trump in part by pledging to oppose Senator Mitch McConnell as Republican leader.But this week, Mr. Greitens’s ex-wife accused him of physical abuse in a court filing, and Republicans who have spoken to Mr. Trump are skeptical now that he will back Mr. Greitens. Mr. Trump put out a glowing statement about Representative Billy Long, another Republican candidate for the Senate seat, calling him a “warrior,” though he labeled it a nonendorsement. Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri, meanwhile, has made the case to Mr. Trump for another candidate: Representative Vicky Hartzler. Mr. Hawley said that Mr. Trump’s “having something to say in the race would mean a lot” in the effort to stop Mr. Greitens.Mr. McConnell has been deeply concerned about the Missouri race and stayed publicly silent, though at a Senate Republican luncheon this week he told colleagues that “we caught a break,” in reference to the new Greitens accusations, according to one Republican official.Missouri Republicans are unsure if the new allegations against Mr. Greitens will prove politically fatal, but many remain alarmed by the possibility that Mr. Trump could still support him.“I do not want to see Mr. Trump embarrassed by a hasty endorsement,” said Peter Kinder, a former lieutenant governor who was a co-chair of the 2016 Missouri Trump campaign. Mr. Kinder called Mr. Greitens a “badly flawed, badly damaged candidate.” Alyssa Farah Griffin, a former Trump aide who has since become a critic, said the success of Mr. Trump’s endorsements in 2022 would directly impact the next presidential campaign.“It does bear on 2024,” she said, “because Republicans are going to see who the biggest power broker is.” More

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      Mo Brooks Says Trump Asked Him to Illegally ‘Rescind’ Election

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      Representative Mo Brooks of Alabama, who was involved in the former president’s efforts to challenge the election, made the charge after Mr. Trump took back his endorsement.Representative Mo Brooks, an Alabama Republican who was deeply involved in former President Donald J. Trump’s effort to use Congress to upend the 2020 election and stay in office, claimed on Wednesday that the former president had asked him repeatedly in the months since to illegally “rescind” the election, remove President Biden and force a new special election.Mr. Brooks made the extraordinary charge as the two onetime allies were engaged in a bitter political feud, and it was not immediately clear how their falling out related to the accusation. But the account from the Alabama congressman, who played a central role in challenging electoral votes for Mr. Biden on Jan. 6, 2021, suggested that Mr. Trump has continued his efforts to overturn his defeat and be reinstated.It marked the first time a lawmaker who was involved in Mr. Trump’s attempts to invalidate his election defeat has said that Mr. Trump asked for actions that, were they possible, would violate federal law.His statement came after Mr. Trump withdrew his endorsement of Mr. Brooks in the Republican primary for Alabama’s Senate seat, undercutting the congressman’s already slim chances in a crowded intraparty race.“President Trump asked me to rescind the 2020 elections, immediately remove Joe Biden from the White House, immediately put President Trump back in the White House, and hold a new special election for the presidency,” Mr. Brooks said in a statement on Wednesday. “As a lawyer, I’ve repeatedly advised President Trump that Jan. 6 was the final election contest verdict and neither the U.S. Constitution nor the U.S. Code permit what President Trump asks. Period.”In a subsequent text message, Mr. Brooks said Mr. Trump had made the request of him on “multiple occasions” since Sept. 1, 2021. He said the former president did not specify how exactly Congress would reinstall him as president, and Mr. Brooks repeatedly told him it was impossible.“I told President Trump that ‘rescinding’ the 2020 election was not a legal option. Period,” Mr. Brooks wrote.Mr. Brooks said Mr. Trump brought up the matter to him repeatedly over the past six months. He said he had initially hoped the requests were not connected to his endorsement in the Senate race, but now believes that Mr. Trump was dangling public support of Mr. Brooks’s candidacy as leverage to try to get a new election.“I hoped not but you’ve seen what happened today,” Mr. Brooks said in a text. “For emphasis, the conversations about Jan. 6, 2021 being the only 2020 remedy have been going off and on for 6+ months.”“I know what the legal remedy for a contested presidential election is,” he continued. “There is one and only one per the Constitution and U. S. Code and it occurs on the first Jan. 6 after each presidential election. Period. Game over after January 6.”Mr. Brooks’s high-profile break with Mr. Trump raised the possibility that he might cooperate with the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack, providing information the panel has so far been unable to secure about what Mr. Trump told his allies in Congress before, during and after the riot. Other Republicans involved in the effort to overturn the 2020 election — Representatives Jim Jordan of Ohio and Scott Perry of Pennsylvania — have refused requests from the panel for interviews.Mr. Brooks did not immediately respond to further questions. In his statement, he said he had fought on behalf of Mr. Trump “between Nov. 3 and Jan. 6” — “when it counted.”On Dec. 21, 2020, Mr. Brooks and other House Republicans met with Mr. Trump at the White House to discuss plans to object to the election. On Jan. 6, he wore body armor as he addressed the throng of Trump supporters who gathered at the Ellipse near the White House, telling them to “start taking down names and kicking ass.”“Are you willing to do what it takes to fight for America?” Mr. Brooks said, prodding the crowd to cheer more loudly. “Will you fight for America?”Later on Capitol Hill, after a pro-Trump mob rampaged through the building, Mr. Brooks tried to object to electoral votes from several states for Mr. Biden. He also spread false claims that people who identify with antifa, a loose collective of antifascist activists, might have been responsible for the violence, and gave a speech on the floor falsely claiming the election was stolen from Mr. Trump.“Noncitizens overwhelmingly voted for Joe Biden in exchange for the promised amnesty and citizenship and, in so doing, helped steal the election from Donald Trump, Republican candidates and American citizens all across America,” Mr. Brooks said at the time.In retracting his endorsement of Mr. Brooks on Wednesday, Mr. Trump abandoned one of his most loyal acolytes in the House after months of simmering frustration and as polls showed Mr. Brooks falling behind in his state’s Republican primary.In a sign of the former president’s continued focus on the 2020 election, he cited Mr. Brooks’s remarks at a rally last summer urging voters to move on from Mr. Trump’s 2020 defeat.Capitol Riot’s Aftermath: Key DevelopmentsCard 1 of 3Requests to “rescind” the election. More

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      How McConnell Hopes to Thwart Trump in the Midterms

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      Senator Mitch McConnell is working furiously to bring allies to Washington who will buck Donald J. Trump. It’s not going according to plan.PHOENIX — For more than a year, former President Donald Trump has berated Gov. Doug Ducey of Arizona, savaging him for refusing to overturn the state’s presidential results and vowing to oppose him should he run for the Senate this year.In early December, though, Mr. Ducey received a far friendlier message from another former Republican president. At a golf tournament luncheon, George W. Bush encouraged him to run against Senator Mark Kelly, a Democrat, suggesting the Republican Party needs more figures like Mr. Ducey to step forward.“It’s something you have to feel a certain sense of humility about,” the governor said this month of Mr. Bush’s appeal. “You listen respectfully, and that’s what I did.”Mr. Bush and a band of anti-Trump Republicans led by Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky are hoping he does more than listen.As Mr. Trump works to retain his hold on the Republican Party, elevating a slate of friendly candidates in midterm elections, Mr. McConnell and his allies are quietly, desperately maneuvering to try to thwart him. The loose alliance, which was once thought of as the G.O.P. establishment, for months has been engaged in a high-stakes candidate recruitment campaign, full of phone calls, meetings, polling memos and promises of millions of dollars. It’s all aimed at recapturing the Senate majority, but the election also represents what could be Republicans’ last chance to reverse the spread of Trumpism before it fully consumes their party.Mr. McConnell for years pushed Mr. Trump’s agenda and only rarely opposed him in public. But the message that he delivers privately now is unsparing, if debatable: Mr. Trump is losing political altitude and need not be feared in a primary, he has told Mr. Ducey in repeated phone calls, as the Senate leader’s lieutenants share polling data they argue proves it.In conversations with senators and would-be senators, Mr. McConnell is blunt about the damage he believes Mr. Trump has done to the G.O.P., according to those who have spoken to him. Privately, he has declared he won’t let unelectable “goofballs” win Republican primaries.History doesn’t bode well for such behind-the-scene efforts to challenge Mr. Trump, and Mr. McConnell’s hard sell is so far yielding mixed results. The former president has rallied behind fewer far-right candidates than initially feared by the party’s old guard. Yet a handful of formidable contenders have spurned Mr. McConnell’s entreaties, declining to subject themselves to Mr. Trump’s wrath all for the chance to head to a bitterly divided Washington.Last week, Gov. Larry Hogan of Maryland announced he would not run for Senate, despite a pressure campaign that involved his wife. Mr. Ducey is expected to make a final decision soon, but he has repeatedly said he has little appetite for a bid.Mr. Trump, however, has also had setbacks. He’s made a handful of endorsements in contentious races, but his choices have not cleared the Republican field, and one has dropped out.How Donald J. Trump Still LoomsGrip on G.O.P.: Mr. Trump remains the most powerful figure in the Republican Party. However, there are signs his control is loosening.Trump vs. DeSantis: Tensions between the ex-president and Florida governor show the challenge confronting the G.O.P. in 2022.Midterms Effect: Mr. Trump has become a party kingmaker, but his involvement in state races worries many Republicans.Just the Beginning: For many Trump supporters who marched on Jan. 6, the day was not a disgraced insurrection but the start of a movement.If Mr. Trump muscles his preferred candidates through primaries and the general election this year, it will leave little doubt of his control of the Republican Party, build momentum for another White House bid and entrench his brand of politics in another generation of Republican leaders.If he loses in a series of races after an attempt to play kingmaker, however, it would deflate Mr. Trump’s standing, luring other ambitious Republicans into the White House contest and providing a path for the party to move on.“No one should be afraid of President Trump, period,” said Senator Susan Collins of Maine, who won in 2020 without endorsing the then-president and has worked with Mr. McConnell to try to woo anti-Trump candidates.While there is some evidence that Mr. Trump’s grip on Republican voters has eased, polls show the former president remains overwhelmingly popular in the party. Among politicians trying to win primaries, no other figure’s support is more ardently sought.“In my state, he’s still looked at as the leader of the party,” Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri said.The proxy war isn’t just playing out in Senate races.Mr. Trump is backing primary opponents to incumbent governors in Georgia and Idaho, encouraged an ally to take on the Alabama governor and helped drive Gov. Charlie Baker of Massachusetts into retirement by supporting a rival. The Republican Governors Association, which Mr. Ducey leads, this week began pushing back, airing a television commercial defending the Georgia governor, Brian Kemp, against his opponent, former Senator David Perdue. It was the first time in the group’s history they’ve financed ads for an incumbent battling a primary.“Trump has got a lot of chips on the board,” said Bill Haslam, the former Tennessee governor.Mr. McConnell has been careful in picking his moments to push back against the former president. Last week, he denounced a Republican National Committee resolution orchestrated by Mr. Trump’s allies that censured two House Republican Trump critics.As the former president heckles the soon-to-be 80-year-old Kentuckian as an “Old Crow,” Mr. McConnell’s response has been to embrace the moniker: Last week, he sent an invitation for a reception in which donors who hand over $5,000 checks can take home bottles of the Kentucky-made Old Crow brand bourbon signed by the senator.Mr. McConnell has been loath to discuss his recruitment campaign and even less forthcoming about his rivalry with Mr. Trump. In an interview last week, he warded off questions about their conflict, avoiding mentioning Mr. Trump’s name even when it was obvious to whom he was referring.If Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who is an outspoken Trump antagonist running for Senate this fall, wins her primary, it will show that “endorsements from some people didn’t determine the outcome,” he said.Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska at the Capitol last week. Senator Mitch McConnell and Mr. Trump are at odds over her reelection bid.Sarahbeth Maney/The New York TimesMs. Murkowski appears well-positioned at the moment, with over $4 million on hand while her Trump-backed rival, Kelly Tshibaka, has $630,000.“He’s made very clear that you’ve been there for Alaska, you’ve been there for the team and I’m going to be there for you,” Ms. Murkowski said of Mr. McConnell’s message to her.Even more pointedly, Mr. McConnell vowed that if Senator John Thune of South Dakota, the second-ranking Senate Republican, faces the primary that Mr. Trump once promised, Mr. Thune “will crush whoever runs against him.” (The most threatening candidate, Gov. Kristi Noem, has declined.)The Senate Republican leader has been worried that Mr. Trump will tap candidates too weak to win in the general election, the sort of nominees who cost the party control of the Senate in 2010 and 2012.“We changed the business model in 2014, and have not had one of these goofballs nominated since,” he told a group of donors on a private conference call last year, according to a recording obtained by The New York Times.Mr. McConnell has sometimes decided to pick his battles — in Georgia, he acceded to Herschel Walker, a former football star and Trump-backed candidate, after failing to recruit Mr. Perdue to rejoin the Senate. He also came up empty-handed in New Hampshire, where Gov. Chris Sununu passed on a bid after an aggressive campaign that also included lobbying from Mr. Bush.In Maryland, Mr. Hogan was plainly taken with the all-out push to recruit him, although he declined to take on Senator Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat.“Elaine Chao was working over my wife,” Mr. Hogan recalled of a lunch, first reported by The Associated Press, between Ms. Chao, the former cabinet secretary and wife of Mr. McConnell, and Maryland’s first lady, Yumi Hogan. “Her argument was, ‘You can really be a voice.’”Gov. Larry Hogan of Maryland, left, with Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland in Baltimore. Mr. McConnell has tried to recruit Mr. Hogan as a Senate candidate.Al Drago for The New York TimesMr. McConnell also dispatched Ms. Collins and Senator Mitt Romney of Utah to lobby Mr. Hogan. That campaign culminated last weekend, when Mr. Romney called Mr. Hogan to vent about the R.N.C.’s censure, tell him Senate Republicans needed anti-Trump reinforcements and argue that Mr. Hogan could have more of a platform in his effort to remake the party as a sitting senator rather than an ex-governor.“I’m very interested in changing the party and that was the most effective argument,” said Mr. Hogan, who is believed to be considering a bid for the White House.Mr. Romney lamented Mr. Hogan’s decision and expressed frustration. He claimed most party leaders share their view of the former president, but few will voice it in public.“I don’t see new people standing up and saying, ‘I’m going to do something here which may be politically unpopular’ — in public at least,” Mr. Romney said.At Mar-a-Lago, courtship of the former president’s endorsement has been so intense, and his temptation to pick favorites so alluring, that he regrets getting involved in some races too soon, according to three Republican officials who’ve spoken to him.In Pennsylvania’s open Senate race, Mr. Trump backed Sean Parnell, who withdrew after a bitter custody battle with his estranged wife. And in Alabama, the former president rallied to Representative Mo Brooks to succeed Senator Richard Shelby, who’s retiring. But Mr. Brooks, who attended the rally that preceded the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol, is struggling to gain traction.One Republican strategist who has visited with Mr. Trump said the former president was increasingly suspicious of the consultants and donors beseeching him.“He has become more judicious so not everybody who runs down to Mar-a-Lago for the weekend gets endorsed on Monday,” said Senator Kevin Cramer of North Dakota, another Trump ally.Mr. Trump has made clear he wants the Senate candidates he backs to oust Mr. McConnell from his leadership perch, and even considered making a pledge to do so a condition of his endorsement. Few have done so to date, a fact Mr. McConnell considers a victory. “Only two of them have taken me on,” he crowed, alluding to Ms. Tshibaka in Alaska, and Eric Greitens, the former Missouri governor running for an open seat.But Mr. McConnell’s biggest get yet would be Mr. Ducey.Mr. Trump, right, has supported Representative Mo Brooks’s run for a Senate seat in Alabama.Chip Somodevilla/Getty ImagesWith broad popularity and three statewide victories to his name, the term-limited governor and former ice cream chain executive would be a strong candidate against Mr. Kelly, who has nearly $19 million in the bank — more than double the combined sum of the existing Republican field.To some of the state’s Republicans, Mr. Ducey could send a critical message in a swing state. “It would say we’re getting tired of this,” said Rusty Bowers, speaker of the Arizona State House, who encouraged Mr. Ducey to stand up to Mr. Trump’s “bully caucus.”Mr. Ducey also has been lobbied by the G.O.P. strategist Karl Rove, the liaison to Mr. Bush, who sought to reassure the governor that he could win.Mr. Ducey said he believed that this year’s “primaries are going to determine the future of the party.” However, he sounded much like Mr. Hogan and Mr. Sununu when asked about his enthusiasm for jumping into another campaign.“This is the job I’ve wanted,” he said.He noted there was one prominent member of the Trump administration, though, who has been supportive. Former Vice President Mike Pence “encouraged me to stay in the fight,” Mr. Ducey said. More

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      Trump Found Crucial Support in Congress as He Fought to Stay in Power

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      WASHINGTON — Two days after Christmas last year, Richard P. Donoghue, a top Justice Department official in the waning days of the Trump administration, saw an unknown number appear on his phone.Mr. Donoghue had spent weeks fielding calls, emails and in-person requests from President Donald J. Trump and his allies, all of whom asked the Justice Department to declare, falsely, that the election was corrupt. The lame-duck president had surrounded himself with a crew of unscrupulous lawyers, conspiracy theorists, even the chief executive of MyPillow — and they were stoking his election lies.Mr. Trump had been handing out Mr. Donoghue’s cellphone number so that people could pass on rumors of election fraud. Who could be calling him now?It turned out to be a member of Congress: Representative Scott Perry, Republican of Pennsylvania, who began pressing the president’s case. Mr. Perry said he had compiled a dossier of voter fraud allegations that the department needed to vet. Jeffrey Clark, a Justice Department lawyer who had found favor with Mr. Trump, could “do something” about the president’s claims, Mr. Perry said, even if others in the department would not.The message was delivered by an obscure lawmaker who was doing Mr. Trump’s bidding. Justice Department officials viewed it as outrageous political pressure from a White House that had become consumed by conspiracy theories.It was also one example of how a half-dozen right-wing members of Congress became key foot soldiers in Mr. Trump’s effort to overturn the election, according to dozens of interviews and a review of hundreds of pages of congressional testimony about the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6.Representatives Jim Jordan of Ohio, left, and Scott Perry of Pennsylvania at a rally in Harrisburg, Pa., two days after the 2020 election.Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York TimesThe lawmakers — all of them members of the ultraconservative House Freedom Caucus — worked closely with the White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, whose central role in Mr. Trump’s efforts to overturn a democratic election is coming into focus as the congressional investigation into Jan. 6 gains traction.The men were not alone in their efforts — most Republican lawmakers fell in line behind Mr. Trump’s false claims of fraud, at least rhetorically — but this circle moved well beyond words and into action. They bombarded the Justice Department with dubious claims of voting irregularities. They pressured members of state legislatures to conduct audits that would cast doubt on the election results. They plotted to disrupt the certification on Jan. 6 of Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s victory.There was Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio, the pugnacious former wrestler who bolstered his national profile by defending Mr. Trump on cable television; Representative Andy Biggs of Arizona, whose political ascent was padded by a $10 million sweepstakes win; and Representative Paul Gosar, an Arizona dentist who trafficked in conspiracy theories, spoke at a white nationalist rally and posted an animated video that depicted him killing Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democrat of New York.Representatives Paul Gosar of Arizona, left, and Louie Gohmert of Texas spoke at a news conference this month expressing concerns about the treatment of those who had stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6.T.J. Kirkpatrick for The New York TimesThey were joined by Representative Louie Gohmert of Texas, who was known for fiery speeches delivered to an empty House chamber and unsuccessfully sued Vice President Mike Pence over his refusal to interfere in the election certification; and Representative Mo Brooks of Alabama, a lawyer who rode the Tea Party wave to Congress and was later sued by a Democratic congressman for inciting the Jan. 6 riot.Mr. Perry, a former Army helicopter pilot who is close to Mr. Jordan and Mr. Meadows, acted as a de facto sergeant. He coordinated many of the efforts to keep Mr. Trump in office, including a plan to replace the acting attorney general with a more compliant official. His colleagues call him General Perry.Mr. Meadows, a former congressman from North Carolina who co-founded the Freedom Caucus in 2015, knew the six lawmakers well. His role as Mr. Trump’s right-hand man helped to remarkably empower the group in the president’s final, chaotic weeks in office.In his book, “The Chief’s Chief,” Mr. Meadows insisted that he and Mr. Trump were simply trying to unfurl serious claims of election fraud. “All he wanted was time to get to the bottom of what really happened and get a fair count,” Mr. Meadows wrote.Congressional Republicans have fought the Jan. 6 committee’s investigation at every turn, but it is increasingly clear that Mr. Trump relied on the lawmakers to help his attempts to retain power. When Justice Department officials said they could not find evidence of widespread fraud, Mr. Trump was unconcerned: “Just say that the election was corrupt + leave the rest to me and the R. Congressmen,” he said, according to Mr. Donoghue’s notes of the call.Rudolph W. Giuliani, Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer, promoted several conspiracy theories as he fought the electoral process.Erin Schaff/The New York TimesNovemberOn Nov. 9, two days after The Associated Press called the race for Mr. Biden, crisis meetings were underway at Trump campaign headquarters in Arlington, Va.Understand the U.S. Capitol RiotOn Jan. 6, 2021, a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol.What Happened: Here’s the most complete picture to date of what happened — and why.Timeline of Jan. 6: A presidential rally turned into a Capitol rampage in a critical two-hour time period. Here’s how.Key Takeaways: Here are some of the major revelations from The Times’s riot footage analysis.Death Toll: Five people died in the riot. Here’s what we know about them.Decoding the Riot Iconography: What do the symbols, slogans and images on display during the violence really mean?Mr. Perry and Mr. Jordan huddled with senior White House officials, including Mr. Meadows; Stephen Miller, a top Trump adviser; Bill Stepien, the campaign manager; and Kayleigh McEnany, the White House press secretary.According to two people familiar with the meetings, which have not been previously reported, the group settled on a strategy that would become a blueprint for Mr. Trump’s supporters in Congress: Hammer home the idea that the election was tainted, announce legal actions being taken by the campaign, and bolster the case with allegations of fraud.At a news conference later that day, Ms. McEnany delivered the message.“This election is not over,” she said. “Far from it.”Mr. Jordan’s spokesman said that the meeting was to discuss media strategy, not to overturn the election.On cable television and radio shows and at rallies, the lawmakers used unproved fraud claims to promote the idea that the election had been stolen. Mr. Brooks said he would never vote to certify Mr. Trump’s loss. Mr. Jordan told Fox News that ballots were counted in Pennsylvania after the election, contrary to state law. Mr. Gohmert claimed in Philadelphia that there was “rampant” voter fraud and later said on YouTube that the U.S. military had seized computer servers in Germany used to flip American votes.Mr. Gosar pressed Doug Ducey, the Republican governor of Arizona, to investigate voting equipment made by Dominion Voting Systems, a company at the heart of several false conspiracy theories that Mr. Trump and his allies spread.Mr. Trump’s supporters protested at the Maricopa County Recorder’s Office in Phoenix as ballots were being counted in November 2020.Adriana Zehbrauskas for The New York TimesMr. Gosar embraced the fraud claims so closely that his chief of staff, Tom Van Flein, rushed to an airplane hangar parking lot in Phoenix after a conspiracy theory began circulating that a suspicious jet carrying ballots from South Korea was about to land, perhaps in a bid to steal the election from Mr. Trump, according to court documents filed by one of the participants. The claim turned out to be baseless.Mr. Van Flein did not respond to detailed questions about the episode.Even as the fraud claims grew increasingly outlandish, Attorney General William P. Barr authorized federal prosecutors to look into “substantial allegations” of voting irregularities. Critics inside and outside the Justice Department slammed the move, saying it went against years of the department’s norms and chipped away at its credibility. But Mr. Barr privately told advisers that ignoring the allegations — no matter how implausible — would undermine faith in the election, according to Mr. Donoghue’s testimony.And in any event, administration officials and lawmakers believed the claims would have little effect on the peaceful transfer of power to Mr. Biden from Mr. Trump, according to multiple former officials.Mainstream Republicans like Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, said on Nov. 9 that Mr. Trump had a right to investigate allegations of irregularities, “A few legal inquiries from the president do not exactly spell the end of the Republic,” Mr. McConnell said.Mr. Gohmert unsuccessfully sued Vice President Mike Pence, center, in an attempt to force him to nullify the election results.Stefani Reynolds for The New York TimesDecemberOn Dec. 1, 2020, Mr. Barr said publicly what he knew to be true: The Justice Department had found no evidence of widespread election fraud. Mr. Biden was the lawful winner.The attorney general’s declaration seemed only to energize the six lawmakers. Mr. Gohmert suggested that the F.B.I. in Washington could not be trusted to investigate election fraud. Mr. Biggs said that Mr. Trump’s allies needed “the imprimatur, quite frankly of the D.O.J.,” to win their lawsuits claiming fraud.They turned their attention to Jan. 6, when Mr. Pence was to officially certify Mr. Biden’s victory. Mr. Jordan, asked if the president should concede, replied, “No way.”The lawmakers started drumming up support to derail the transfer of power.Mr. Gohmert sued Mr. Pence in an attempt to force him to nullify the results of the election. Mr. Perry circulated a letter written by Pennsylvania state legislators to Mr. McConnell and Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the House Republican leader, asking Congress to delay certification. “I’m obliged to concur,” Mr. Perry wrote.Mr. Meadows remained the key leader. When disputes broke out among organizers of the pro-Trump “Stop the Steal” rallies, he stepped in to mediate, according to two organizers, Dustin Stockton and Jennifer Lynn Lawrence.In one case, Mr. Meadows helped settle a feud about whether to have one or two rallies on Jan. 6. The organizers decided that Mr. Trump would make what amounted to an opening statement about election fraud during his speech at the Ellipse, then the lawmakers would rise in succession during the congressional proceeding and present evidence they had gathered of purported fraud.(That plan was ultimately derailed by the attack on Congress, Mr. Stockton said.)Mr. Trump at the rally outside the White House on Jan. 6. “We fight like hell, and if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore,” he told his supporters.Pete Marovich for The New York TimesOn Dec. 21, Mr. Trump met with members of the Freedom Caucus to discuss their plans. Mr. Jordan, Mr. Gosar, Mr. Biggs, Mr. Brooks and Mr. Meadows were there.“This sedition will be stopped,” Mr. Gosar wrote on Twitter.Asked about such meetings, Mr. Gosar’s chief of staff said the congressman and his colleagues “have and had every right to attend rallies and speeches.”“None of the members could have anticipated what occurred (on Jan. 6),” Mr. Van Flein added.Mr. Perry was finding ways to exert pressure on the Justice Department. He introduced Mr. Trump to Mr. Clark, the acting head of the department’s civil division who became one of the Stop the Steal movement’s most ardent supporters.Then, after Christmas, Mr. Perry called Mr. Donoghue to share his voter fraud dossier, which focused on unfounded election fraud claims in Pennsylvania.“I had never heard of him before that day,” Mr. Donoghue would later testify to Senate investigators. He assumed that Mr. Trump had given Mr. Perry his personal cellphone number, as the president had done with others who were eager to pressure Justice Department officials to support the false idea of a rigged election.Key Aspects of the Jan. 6 InquiryCard 1 of 8The House investigation. More

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      McCarthy Threatens Technology Firms That Comply With Riot Inquiry

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      The top House Republican said his party would retaliate against any company that cooperated with an order to preserve the phone and social media records of G.O.P. lawmakers.WASHINGTON — Representative Kevin McCarthy, the House Republican leader, has threatened to retaliate against any company that complies with the congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot, after the panel asked dozens of firms to preserve the phone and social media records of 11 far-right members of Congress who pushed to overturn the results of the 2020 election.Mr. McCarthy’s warning was an escalation of his efforts to thwart a full accounting of the deadly attack at the Capitol carried out by a pro-Trump mob, and his latest attempt to insulate the former president and Republican lawmakers from scrutiny of any ties to the violence. It came after he led the G.O.P. opposition to the creation of an independent bipartisan commission to investigate the riot, and then pulled five Republican congressmen from the select committee that Democrats created on their own, boycotting the proceedings.In preservation orders the special committee sent to 35 technology firms this week, members of the panel included the names of hundreds of people whose records they might want to review, among them some of Donald J. Trump’s most ardent allies in Congress, according to several people familiar with the documents who were not authorized to speak about their contents.The 11 Republicans are Representatives Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar of Arizona, Lauren Boebert of Colorado, Mo Brooks of Alabama, Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina, Matt Gaetz of Florida, Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, Louie Gohmert of Texas, Jody B. Hice of Georgia, Jim Jordan of Ohio and Scott Perry of Pennsylvania.The preservation demands were accompanied by a statement that said the committee was merely “gathering facts, not alleging wrongdoing by any individual.” But the inclusion of the Republicans’ names, reported earlier by CNN, indicated that the panel planned to scrutinize any role they may have played in fueling the violence.“These are the individuals who have been publicly supportive of Jan. 6 and the people who participated in the insurrection on Jan. 6,” Representative Bennie G. Thompson, Democrat of Mississippi and the panel’s chairman, said in an interview.“We need to find out exactly what their level of participation in this event was,” he said. “If you helped raise money, if you provided misinformation to people, if you served on a planning committee — whatever your role in Jan. 6, I think the public has a right to know.”The panel has not asked to preserve the records of Mr. McCarthy, who has said he had a tense phone call with Mr. Trump as the mob laid siege to the Capitol, but Mr. Thompson said the top Republican’s name could yet be added.Mr. Thompson said Mr. McCarthy’s protestations were “typical of somebody who may or may not have been involved in Jan. 6 and doesn’t want that information to become public.”On Tuesday, Mr. McCarthy said Republicans would “not forget” and “hold accountable” those tech companies that preserve records sought by the committee. His remarks followed denunciations of the committee’s work by Representative Jim Banks, Republican of Indiana, who has called the panel’s tactics “authoritarian,” and Mr. Trump, who has called it a “partisan sham.”Ms. Greene threatened on Fox News that telecommunications companies that cooperated with the investigation would be “shut down.”Mr. McCarthy asserted, without citing any law, that it would be illegal for the technology companies to cooperate with the inquiry, even though congressional investigations have obtained phone records before. He said that if his party won control of the House, it would use its power to punish any that did.“If these companies comply with the Democrat order to turn over private information, they are in violation of federal law and subject to losing their ability to operate in the United States,” Mr. McCarthy wrote on Twitter on Tuesday. “If companies still choose to violate federal law, a Republican majority will not forget and will stand with Americans to hold them fully accountable under the law.”Representative Jamie Raskin, Democrat of Maryland and a member of the committee, said he was stunned by Mr. McCarthy’s remarks, describing them as akin to obstructing an investigation.“He is leveling threats against people cooperating with a congressional investigation,” Mr. Raskin said. “That’s an astounding turn of events. Why would the minority leader of the House of Representatives not be interested in our ability to get all of the facts in relation to the Jan. 6 attack?”Barbara L. McQuade, a former U.S. attorney and University of Michigan law professor, called Mr. McCarthy’s claims “baseless,” noting that the panel had not requested the content of any communication.“He is falsely portraying the committee as overreaching so that he can protect his own political interests, to the detriment of Congress’s ability to do its job and the public trust in our institutions of government,” she said.In the past week, the select committee has ramped up its work, taking three wide-ranging investigative steps: a records demand to seven federal agencies focusing in part on any ties Mr. Trump may have had to the attack’s planning or execution; a document demand to 15 social media companies for material about efforts to overturn the election and domestic violent extremists who may have been involved; and the record preservation orders including the Republican representatives.The 11 Republicans include lawmakers who spearheaded the effort to challenge the election outcome in Congress on Jan. 6 and those who played at least some role in the “Stop the Steal” effort to protest the results, including promoting rallies around the country and the one in Washington whose attendees attacked the Capitol.Some of the lawmakers named in the order have continued to publicly spread the election lies that inspired the riot, and to allude to the possibility of more violence to come. Mr. Cawthorn falsely claimed on Sunday that the election had been “rigged” and “stolen,” telling a crowd in Franklin, N.C., that if elections were not safeguarded in the future, it could result in “bloodshed.”The select committee has been meeting twice a week, even during Congress’s summer recess, as its members plan their next steps. Mr. Thompson said two more hearings were in the works, one to dig deeper into the pressure campaign Mr. Trump and his allies started to overturn President Biden’s victory, and another to explore who encouraged militia and extremist groups to come to Washington before the assault.Representative Bennie G. Thompson, right, and members of the select committee have ramped up their work in the past week. Stefani Reynolds for The New York Times“There’s a concern on the committee about the executive branch leaning on state elected officials to change the outcome of the election,” Mr. Thompson said. “There’s concern about the identification with domestic terrorist organizations and their participation and encouragement to participate in the Jan. 6 march and insurrection.”Last week, the panel sought communications among top Trump administration officials about attempts to place politically loyal personnel in senior positions in the run-up to the attack; the planning and funding of pro-Trump rallies on Jan. 5 and 6; and other attempts to stop or slow the process of Mr. Trump handing over the presidency to Mr. Biden.It demanded records of communications between the White House and Ali Alexander, who publicized the “Stop the Steal” rallies, as well as Tom Van Flein, Mr. Gosar’s chief of staff.Representative Adam B. Schiff, Democrat of California and a committee member, said the requests were “broad” by design as the panel sought to produce a “comprehensive report.” He said they could be expanded to include more members of Congress if evidence emerges to suggest it is necessary.“We know that there are members who were involved in the ‘Stop the Steal’ rally; we know that there are members who had direct communications with the president while the attack on the Capitol was going on,” he said. “There are any number of members who have very pertinent information.”On Friday, the panel sent letters to 15 social media companies — including sites where misinformation about election fraud spread, such as the pro-Trump website theDonald.win — seeking any documents in their possession pertaining to efforts to overturn the election and any domestic violent extremists associated with the Jan. 6 rally and attack.The committee had already asked for records on extremist groups and militias that were present at the Capitol that day, including QAnon, the Proud Boys, Stop the Steal, the Oath Keepers and the Three Percenters. A person familiar with the committee’s discussions said its members intended to investigate more deeply plans among militia groups to coordinate.At least 10 suspected militia extremists attended paramilitary training in Ohio, Florida and North Carolina before the breach, according to court documents. Suspected domestic violent extremists also “coordinated efforts to bring tactical equipment to the event, presumably in anticipation of violence,” according to an April homeland security analysis obtained by The New York Times through a public records request filed by the group Property of the People.“There were undoubtedly insurrectionist groups that were dead-set on committing violence,” Mr. Raskin said. “If you listen to their chatter post-Jan. 6, it’s all abut how close they came, and next time they will be carrying arms.”The records preservation request delivered on Monday asked telecommunications companies to keep on file information about cell tower locations, text messages and call logs, and information uploaded to cloud storage systems.Representative Zoe Lofgren, Democrat of California and a member of the committee, emphasized that the request was “an investigation, not an accusation.”“We’ll see what we find out,” she said. “It’s fair to say you didn’t have 10,000 people just happen to show up and attack Capitol Police officers, maim them and threaten to kill the vice president and members of Congress just because they felt like it. There was a reason, there was a structure to this, and we need to uncover everything about that.” More