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      Prominent Lawyers Want Giuliani’s Law License Suspended Over Trump Work

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Capitol Riot FalloutLatest UpdatesInside the SiegeVisual TimelineNotable ArrestsCapitol Police in CrisisAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyProminent Lawyers Want Giuliani’s Law License Suspended Over Trump WorkThe move by dozens of lawyers, including judges and former federal prosecutors, was the latest in a series of calls to censure him.Despite fierce criticism from the legal community, Rudolph W. Giuliani had doubled down on his baseless election fraud claims in recent weeks.Credit…Jim Watson/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesJan. 21, 2021Updated 7:08 p.m. ETDozens of prominent lawyers have signed a formal complaint seeking the suspension of Rudolph W. Giuliani’s law license — the latest and loudest in a series of calls to censure him for his actions as President Donald J. Trump’s personal attorney.The lawyers said Mr. Giuliani had trampled ethical boundaries as he helped Mr. Trump pursue false claims of election fraud, then gave an incendiary speech repeating those claims just before the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6.A draft of the complaint to the Supreme Court of New York’s attorney grievance committee accuses Mr. Giuliani of knowingly making false claims about the election and urges an investigation into “conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation in or out of court.”Calls to discipline Mr. Giuliani have mounted in the weeks since the riot and are intensifying even now, after Mr. Trump has left office. The latest complaint, signed by a bipartisan who’s-who of legal luminaries from New York and beyond, represents perhaps the most serious condemnation of Mr. Giuliani’s conduct to date.The list included former acting U.S. Attorney General Stuart M. Gerson, former U.S. district judges H. Lee Sarokin and Fern M. Smith, and two former state attorneys general, Scott Harshbarger of Massachusetts and Grant Woods of Arizona. Also signing the complaint were prosecutors who worked in the same United States attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York that Mr. Giuliani led during the 1980s, including Christine H. Chung.Ms. Chung, a steering committee member of Lawyers Defending American Democracy, the organization that filed the complaint, said that the group had reviewed the work that Mr. Giuliani did on Mr. Trump’s behalf, and that it amounted to “a purposeful campaign to go to the American people with a lie about a stolen election.”“This is a man that once led the highest prosecuting offices in this nation, and he knows what fraud is, and what it’s not,” said Ms. Chung, who did not work for the U.S. attorney’s office during Mr. Giuliani’s tenure. She added, “For a lawyer to be attacking the rule of law is disallowed, and it’s dangerous.”Ms. Chung said that by Thursday evening more than 1,000 people had signed the complaint, which anyone can sign on Lawyers Defending American Democracy’s website, and that she expected “thousands” more to add their names.The complaint, which calls to suspend Mr. Giuliani’s license to practice law during an investigation into his conduct, is one of several that have been filed with the grievance board. It comes a week after New York State Senator Brad Hoylman, the chairman of the State Senate’s judiciary committee, called for the state court system to begin the formal process of stripping Mr. Giuliani of his license to practice law.Conducting the investigation and deciding on a fitting penalty could take months, or even years, largely because of procedural hurdles and the complexity of Mr. Giuliani’s case, said Stephen Gillers, a law professor at New York University and an expert on legal ethics.Mr. Gillers said that he hoped the court would conduct a thorough investigation and would suspend Mr. Giuliani’s license while it did so, because Mr. Giuliani had traded on his reputation as a lawyer to promulgate false accounts.“It’s a privilege and an honor to be a New York lawyer, and by investigating Giuliani and possibly sanctioning him for his behavior the courts reaffirm that fact,” Mr. Gillers said.Mr. Giuliani, who did not respond to requests for comment, discussed the complaint on his radio show on Thursday afternoon.“The whole purpose of this is to disbar me from my exercising my right of free speech and defending my client, because they can’t fathom the fact that maybe, just maybe, they may be wrong,” Mr. Giuliani said..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-c7gg1r{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:0.875rem;line-height:0.875rem;margin-bottom:15px;color:#121212 !important;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-c7gg1r{font-size:0.9375rem;line-height:0.9375rem;}}.css-rqynmc{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:0.9375rem;line-height:1.25rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-rqynmc{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-rqynmc strong{font-weight:600;}.css-rqynmc em{font-style:italic;}.css-yoay6m{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-yoay6m{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-1dg6kl4{margin-top:5px;margin-bottom:15px;}.css-16ed7iq{width:100%;display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;-webkit-box-pack:center;-webkit-justify-content:center;-ms-flex-pack:center;justify-content:center;padding:10px 0;background-color:white;}.css-pmm6ed{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;}.css-pmm6ed > :not(:first-child){margin-left:5px;}.css-5gimkt{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:0.8125rem;font-weight:700;-webkit-letter-spacing:0.03em;-moz-letter-spacing:0.03em;-ms-letter-spacing:0.03em;letter-spacing:0.03em;text-transform:uppercase;color:#333;}.css-5gimkt:after{content:’Collapse’;}.css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transition:all 0.5s ease;transition:all 0.5s ease;-webkit-transform:rotate(180deg);-ms-transform:rotate(180deg);transform:rotate(180deg);}.css-eb027h{max-height:5000px;-webkit-transition:max-height 0.5s ease;transition:max-height 0.5s ease;}.css-6mllg9{-webkit-transition:all 0.5s ease;transition:all 0.5s ease;position:relative;opacity:0;}.css-6mllg9:before{content:”;background-image:linear-gradient(180deg,transparent,#ffffff);background-image:-webkit-linear-gradient(270deg,rgba(255,255,255,0),#ffffff);height:80px;width:100%;position:absolute;bottom:0px;pointer-events:none;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}.css-1amoy78{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1amoy78{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-1amoy78:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}.css-1amoy78[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-1amoy78[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-1amoy78[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-1amoy78[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-k9atqk{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-k9atqk strong{font-weight:700;}.css-k9atqk em{font-style:italic;}.css-k9atqk a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;border-bottom:1px solid #ccd9e3;}.css-k9atqk a:visited{color:#333;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;border-bottom:1px solid #ddd;}.css-k9atqk a:hover{border-bottom:none;}Capitol Riot FalloutFrom Riot to ImpeachmentThe riot inside the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, Jan. 6, followed a rally at which President Trump made an inflammatory speech to his supporters, questioning the results of the election. Here’s a look at what happened and the ongoing fallout:As this video shows, poor planning and a restive crowd encouraged by President Trump set the stage for the riot.A two hour period was crucial to turning the rally into the riot.Several Trump administration officials, including cabinet members Betsy DeVos and Elaine Chao, announced that they were stepping down as a result of the riot.Federal prosecutors have charged more than 70 people, including some who appeared in viral photos and videos of the riot. Officials expect to eventually charge hundreds of others.The House voted to impeach the president on charges of “inciting an insurrection” that led to the rampage by his supporters.He went on to detail what he described as evidence of his accusations of fraud, and to claim that all his statements were based in fact. He called the complainants “idiots,” “malicious left-wingers” and “irresponsible political hacks.”“You want to disbar me?” Mr. Giuliani asked. “I think I’m going to move to disbar you.”The slew of calls for disciplinary action underscores how much Mr. Giuliani’s reputation has changed from his years as a federal prosecutor known for taking on organized crime and his two terms as the mayor of New York City, during which he championed law enforcement and emphasized cleaning up the streets.At Mr. Trump’s rally on Jan. 6, not long before a violent mob stormed the Capitol, Mr. Giuliani called for a “trial by combat” to address discredited claims of voter fraud.“I’m willing to stake my reputation, the president is willing to stake his reputation, on the fact that we’re going to find criminality there,” Mr. Giuliani said.The complaint accuses Mr. Giuliani of sticking to his false accusations of widespread voter fraud as recently as Sunday, sacrificing his reputation in the process.“Other lawyers observed ethical obligations by stepping back from representing Mr. Trump and his campaign,” the complaint reads. “Mr. Giuliani not only lent his stature and status as a lawyer to the venture but shows no inclination to stop lying.”Earlier this week, a person close to Mr. Trump said that Mr. Giuliani would not participate in Mr. Trump’s defense during his second impeachment trial in the Senate.Azi Paybarah contributed reporting.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Atlanta Prosecutor Appears to Move Closer to Trump Inquiry

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyAtlanta Prosecutor Appears to Move Closer to Trump InquiryThe Fulton County district attorney is weighing an inquiry into possible election interference and is said to be considering hiring an outside counsel.President Trump made several calls to Georgia officials that raised alarms about election interference.Credit…Doug Mills/The New York TimesRichard Fausset and Jan. 15, 2021Updated 8:21 p.m. ETATLANTA — Prosecutors in Georgia appear increasingly likely to open a criminal investigation of President Trump over his attempts to overturn the results of the state’s 2020 election, an inquiry into offenses that would be beyond his federal pardon power.The new Fulton County district attorney, Fani Willis, is already weighing whether to proceed, and among the options she is considering is the hiring of a special assistant from outside to oversee the investigation, according to people familiar with her office’s deliberations.At the same time, David Worley, the lone Democrat on Georgia’s five-member election board, said this week that he would ask the board to make a referral to the Fulton County district attorney by next month. Among the matters he will ask prosecutors to investigate is a phone call Mr. Trump made in which he pressured Georgia’s secretary of state to overturn the state’s election results.Jeff DiSantis, a district attorney spokesman, said the office had not taken any action to hire outside counsel and declined to comment further on the case.Some veteran Georgia prosecutors said they believed Mr. Trump had clearly violated state law.“If you took the fact out that he is the president of the United States and look at the conduct of the call, it tracks the communication you might see in any drug case or organized crime case,” said Michael J. Moore, the former United States attorney for the Middle District of Georgia. “It’s full of threatening undertone and strong-arm tactics.”He said he believed there had been “a clear attempt to influence the conduct of the secretary of state, and to commit election fraud, or to solicit the commission of election fraud.”The White House declined to comment.Mr. Worley said in an interview that if no investigation had been announced by Feb. 10, the day of the election board’s next scheduled meeting he would make a motion for the board to refer the matter of Mr. Trump’s phone calls to Ms. Willis’s office. Mr. Worley, a lawyer, believes that such a referral should, under Georgia law, automatically prompt an investigation.If the board declines to make a referral, Mr. Worley said he would ask Ms. Willis’s office himself to start an inquiry.Brad Raffensperger, the secretary of state, is one of the members of the board and has said that he might have a conflict of interest in the matter, as Mr. Trump called him to exert pressure. That could lead him to recuse himself from any decisions on a referral by the board.Mr. Worley said he would introduce the motion based on an outside complaint filed with the state election board by John F. Banzhaf III, a George Washington University law professor.Mr. Banzhaf and other legal experts say Mr. Trump’s calls may run afoul of at least three state criminal laws. One is criminal solicitation to commit election fraud, which can be either a felony or a misdemeanor.There is also a related conspiracy charge, which can be prosecuted either as a misdemeanor or a felony. A third law, a misdemeanor offense, bars “intentional interference” with another person’s “performance of election duties.”“My feeling based on listening to the phone call is that they probably will see if they can get it past a grand jury,” said Joshua Morrison, a former senior assistant district attorney in Fulton County who once worked closely with Ms. Willis. “It seems clearly there was a crime committed.”He noted that Fulton County, which encompasses much of Atlanta, is not friendly territory for Mr. Trump if he were to face a grand jury there. The inquiry, if it comes to pass, would be the second known criminal investigation of Mr. Trump outside of federal pardon power. He is already facing a criminal fraud inquiry into his finances by the Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus R. Vance Jr. Even Georgia’s Republican governor, Brian Kemp, does not have the power to pardon at the state level, though it’s not assured that he would issue a pardon anyway, given his frayed relationship with Mr. Trump. Nonetheless, in Georgia, pardons are handled by a state board.The question of whether or not to charge the nation’s 45th president would present a unique challenge for any district attorney. Ms. Willis, who took office only days ago, is a seasoned prosecutor not unaccustomed to the limelight and criticism. A graduate of Howard University and the Emory University School of Law in the Atlanta area, she is the first woman, and the second African-American, to hold the job of top prosecutor in Fulton County, Georgia’s most populous, with more than one million residents.Ms. Willis, 49, is known for the leading role she played in the 2015 convictions of 11 educators in a standardized-test cheating scandal that rocked Atlanta’s public school system. She is taking office at a time when Atlanta, like other big cities, is seeing a rise in crime.She must also deal with the high-profile fatal shooting of a Black man, Rayshard Brooks, by a white police officer in June 2020 and has said she will take a fresh look at charges brought against the officer by her predecessor.Several calls by Mr. Trump to Georgia Republicans have raised alarms about election interference. In early December, he called Mr. Kemp to pressure him to call a special legislative session to overturn his election loss. Later that month, Mr. Trump called a state investigator and pressed the official to “find the fraud,” according to those with knowledge of the call.The pressure campaign culminated in a Jan. 2 call by Mr. Trump to Mr. Raffensperger. “I just want to find 11,780 votes,” Mr. Trump said on the call, during which Mr. Raffensperger and his aides dismissed the president’s baseless claims of fraud. After the Jan. 2 call, a complaint was sent to the election board by Mr. Banzhaf. (Three of his law students once brought a complaint that forced former Vice President Spiro Agnew to pay back to the state of Maryland money he had received as kickbacks.) Mr. Banzhaf has subsequently supplemented his complaint to incorporate the call made to the Georgia election investigator.The complaint was also sent to Ms. Willis, and to Chris Carr, the Republican attorney general; a spokesperson for Mr. Carr could not be reached Friday.Of the three Republicans on the board besides Mr. Raffensperger, one of them, Rebecca N. Sullivan, did not return a phone call, and another, Anh Le, declined to comment. The third, T. Matthew Mashburn, said that it would be inappropriate for him to comment on how he would vote before the motion was presented.However, Mr. Mashburn also said that he was troubled by some of the language Mr. Trump had used in his phone call to Mr. Raffensperger. Mr. Mashburn noted, in particular, a moment when the president told Mr. Raffensperger, “There’s nothing wrong with saying that, you know, um, that you’ve recalculated.”“The use of the word ‘recalculate’ is very dangerous ground to tread,” Mr. Mashburn said.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      After Second Impeachment, Giuliani Vows to Support Trump

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Trump ImpeachmentliveLatest UpdatesTrump ImpeachedHow the House VotedRepublican SupportKey QuotesAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyAfter 2 Impeachments, Giuliani Vows to Continue His Fervor for TrumpWhite House officials are universally angry with Rudolph W. Giuliani and blame him for both of President Trump’s impeachments. But he remains one of few people still willing to join Mr. Trump in the foxhole.Rudolph W. Giuliani spoke at the Trump rally on Jan. 6, before a mob stormed the Capitol. Credit…Brendan Smialowski/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesKatie Rogers and Jan. 14, 2021Updated 8:47 p.m. ETWASHINGTON — When Rudolph W. Giuliani was treating his efforts to carry out President Trump’s wishes to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election as a payment opportunity — he proposed a daily retainer of $20,000 for his legal services from the burgeoning Trump campaign legal fund — the president dismissed it and responded by demanding to personally approve each expense.Nine weeks and another impeachment later, Mr. Trump began the day on Thursday by asking aides to erase any sign of a rift. Stripped of his Twitter account, Mr. Trump conveyed his praise through an adviser, Jason Miller, who tweeted: “Just spoke with President Trump, and he told me that @RudyGiuliani is a great guy and a Patriot who devoted his services to the country! We all love America’s Mayor!”White House officials are universally angry with Mr. Giuliani and blame him for both of Mr. Trump’s impeachments. But the president is another story.Even as he complains about Mr. Giuliani’s latest efforts as fruitless, the president remains unusually deferential to him in public and in private. “Don’t underestimate him,” Mr. Trump has told advisers.But only up to a point. While Mr. Trump and his advisers balked at the $20,000 request weeks ago, it is unclear whether the president will sign off on Mr. Giuliani being paid anything other than expenses.The on-again, off-again tensions are a feature of a decades-long, mutually beneficial relationship between the former New York City mayor from Brooklyn and the former real estate developer from Queens. Although the two were never particularly close in New York, Mr. Trump enjoyed having the former mayor as his personal legal pit bull during the special counsel investigation into his campaign’s ties to Russia.In return, Mr. Giuliani, who failed at his own bid for the presidency in 2008, got to hang out with the president in the Oval Office and used his new connections to pursue lucrative contracts.Mr. Trump deployed Mr. Giuliani on politically ruinous missions that led to his impeachment — twice. Now, isolated and stripped of his usual political megaphones, the president faces the devastation of his business and political affairs for his part in encouraging a pro-Trump mob that went on to attack the Capitol on Jan. 6.Mr. Giuliani — who, for his part, encouraged a group of the president’s supporters that day to carry out “trial by combat” — is one of few people still willing and eager to join Mr. Trump in the foxhole. While most lawyers are reluctant to represent the president in a second Senate impeachment trial, Trump advisers said Mr. Giuliani remained the likeliest to be involved. Despite President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s certification as the winner, Mr. Giuliani has continued to push unproven theories about the election results and falsely attributed the violence to anarchists on the left.A podcast hosted by Stephen K. Bannon, Mr. Trump’s former chief strategist, was taken down on Thursday because of an interview in which Mr. Giuliani repeated false claims about the election. During the interview, Mr. Bannon pleaded with Mr. Giuliani to move on to a new topic.“I don’t mind being shut down for my craziness,” Mr. Bannon told Mr. Giuliani, according to Alexander Panetta, a reporter for CBC News who listened to the podcast before it was removed. “I’m not going to be shut down for yours.”Mr. Trump has always had an abundance of yes men and women around him, but Mr. Giuliani occupies a unique space in his orbit. Few people have had such durability with the president, and few have been so willing to say and do things for him that others will not.“Your typical role as legal counselor is to tell your client the hard truth and walk them away from risk,” Matthew Sanderson, a Republican political lawyer based in Washington, said in an interview. “Rudy instead seems to tell his client exactly what he wants to hear and walk him toward risk like they’re both moths to a flame.”That journey has left him looking worse for wear. Days after the election, Mr. Giuliani hit the road, challenging the results in a much maligned news conference in front of a Pennsylvania landscaping company. In another appearance that month, Mr. Giuliani was on camera with black liquid, apparently hair dye, streaming down his face as he railed against the election outcome.Few have been so willing to defend the president, and, paradoxically, few have been so damaging to his legacy..css-c7gg1r{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:0.875rem;line-height:0.875rem;margin-bottom:15px;color:#121212 !important;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-c7gg1r{font-size:0.9375rem;line-height:0.9375rem;}}.css-1sjr751{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}.css-1sjr751 a:hover{border-bottom:1px solid #dcdcdc;}.css-rqynmc{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:0.9375rem;line-height:1.25rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-rqynmc{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-rqynmc strong{font-weight:600;}.css-rqynmc em{font-style:italic;}.css-yoay6m{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-yoay6m{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-1dg6kl4{margin-top:5px;margin-bottom:15px;}.css-16ed7iq{width:100%;display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;-webkit-box-pack:center;-webkit-justify-content:center;-ms-flex-pack:center;justify-content:center;padding:10px 0;background-color:white;}.css-pmm6ed{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;}.css-pmm6ed > :not(:first-child){margin-left:5px;}.css-5gimkt{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:0.8125rem;font-weight:700;-webkit-letter-spacing:0.03em;-moz-letter-spacing:0.03em;-ms-letter-spacing:0.03em;letter-spacing:0.03em;text-transform:uppercase;color:#333;}.css-5gimkt:after{content:’Collapse’;}.css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transition:all 0.5s ease;transition:all 0.5s ease;-webkit-transform:rotate(180deg);-ms-transform:rotate(180deg);transform:rotate(180deg);}.css-eb027h{max-height:5000px;-webkit-transition:max-height 0.5s ease;transition:max-height 0.5s ease;}.css-6mllg9{-webkit-transition:all 0.5s ease;transition:all 0.5s ease;position:relative;opacity:0;}.css-6mllg9:before{content:”;background-image:linear-gradient(180deg,transparent,#ffffff);background-image:-webkit-linear-gradient(270deg,rgba(255,255,255,0),#ffffff);height:80px;width:100%;position:absolute;bottom:0px;pointer-events:none;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}.css-1cs27wo{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1cs27wo{padding:20px;}}.css-1cs27wo:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}.css-1cs27wo[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-1cs27wo[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-1cs27wo[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-1cs27wo[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-k9atqk{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-k9atqk strong{font-weight:700;}.css-k9atqk em{font-style:italic;}.css-k9atqk a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;border-bottom:1px solid #ccd9e3;}.css-k9atqk a:visited{color:#333;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;border-bottom:1px solid #ddd;}.css-k9atqk a:hover{border-bottom:none;}The Trump Impeachment ›Answers to your questions about the impeachment process:The current impeachment proceedings are testing the bounds of the process, raising questions never contemplated before. Here’s what we know.How does the impeachment process work? Members of the House consider whether to impeach the president — the equivalent of an indictment in a criminal case — and members of the Senate consider whether to remove him, holding a trial in which senators act as the jury. The test, as set by the Constitution, is whether the president has committed “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.” The House vote required only a simple majority of lawmakers to agree that the president has, in fact, committed high crimes and misdemeanors; the Senate vote requires a two-thirds majority.Does impeaching Trump disqualify him from holding office again? Conviction in an impeachment trial does not automatically disqualify Mr. Trump from future public office. But if the Senate were to convict him, the Constitution allows a subsequent vote to bar an official from holding “any office of honor, trust or profit under the United States.” That vote would require only a simple majority of senators. There is no precedent, however, for disqualifying a president from future office, and the issue could end up before the Supreme Court.Can the Senate hold a trial after Biden becomes president? The Senate could hold a trial for Mr. Trump even after he has left office, though there is no precedent for it. Democrats who control the House can choose when to send their article of impeachment to the Senate, at which point that chamber would have to immediately move to begin the trial. But even if the House immediately transmitted the charge to the other side of the Capitol, an agreement between Republican and Democratic leaders in the Senate would be needed to take it up before Jan. 19, a day before Mr. Biden is inaugurated. Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, said on Wednesday that he would not agree to such an agreement. Given that timetable, the trial probably will not start until after Mr. Biden is president.Mr. Giuliani stepped into the president’s legal affairs in April 2018. His eagerness to attack Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel, impressed Mr. Trump, who was constantly making changes to his legal team. Most Trump advisers came to see Mr. Giuliani’s efforts with Mr. Mueller as a success.“There was never a moment when Rudy wasn’t willing to go lower, and that’s what Trump requires,” the Trump biographer Michael D’Antonio said. “He proved that actually delivering for Donald was not as important as continuing to try.”In addition to his work with Mr. Trump, Mr. Giuliani pursued side projects with the added cachet of being the president’s personal lawyer. Free of ethics laws that restrict government employees, Mr. Giuliani pursued lucrative deals even in the midst of the special counsel investigation.And then came the impeachments. When the history of the Trump presidency is written, Mr. Giuliani will be a central figure, first by pursuing a pressure campaign against the Ukrainian government to investigate Mr. Biden’s family members, and then by traveling the country in efforts to overturn Mr. Biden’s victory.Mr. Giuliani’s own legal problems have mounted alongside those of the president. As Mr. Giuliani pursued separate business opportunities in Ukraine, intelligence agencies warned that he could have been used by Russian intelligence officers seeking to spread disinformation about the election — reports that Mr. Trump shrugged off. Mr. Giuliani’s work in Ukraine continues to be a matter of interest in a continuing investigation by federal prosecutors in New York. And his remarks to Trump supporters before the Capitol riot are now the subject of an effort by the New York State Bar Association to expel him.Mr. Giuliani appears undeterred.In a 37-minute video published Wednesday evening, Mr. Giuliani tried to rewrite the history of the Capitol riot. Although Mr. Trump incited his supporters to march to the building and “show strength,” Mr. Giuliani suggested in the video that antifa activists had been involved, a repeatedly debunked theory that has proliferated in pro-Trump circles online.“The rally ended up to some extent being used as a fulcrum in order to create something else totally different that the president had nothing to do with,” Mr. Giuliani said.Now his calls to the president are sometimes blocked at the orders of White House officials. Advisers say that Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, holds Mr. Giuliani partly responsible for the mess currently embroiling the White House.But Mr. Giuliani hangs on in the shrinking circle around Mr. Trump.“He’s not alone,” Alan Marcus, a former Trump Organization consultant, said of the president. “He’s abandoned. Rudy’s just the last in a whole group of people.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Trump, in Taped Call, Pressured Georgia Official to ‘Find’ Votes to Overturn Election

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      Happy Thanksgiving to All Those Who Told the Truth in This Election

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      With so many families gathering, in person or virtually, for this most unusual Thanksgiving after this most unusual election, if you’re looking for a special way to say grace this year, I recommend the West Point Cadet Prayer. It calls upon each of these future military leaders to always choose “the harder right instead of the easier wrong” and to know “no fear when truth and right are in jeopardy.”Because we should be truly thankful this Thanksgiving that — after Donald Trump spent the last three weeks refusing to acknowledge that he’d lost re-election and enlisted much of his party in a naked power play to ignore the vote counts and reinstall him in office — we had a critical mass of civil servants, elected officials and judges who did their jobs, always opting for the “harder right” that justice demanded, not the “easier wrong” that Trump and his allies were pressing for.It was their collective integrity, their willingness to stand with “Team America,” not either party, that protected our democracy when it was facing one of its greatest threats — from within. History will remember them fondly.Who am I talking about? I am talking about F.B.I. Director Christopher Wray, a Trump appointee, who in September openly contradicted the president and declared that historically we have not seen “any kind of coordinated national voter fraud effort in a major election” involving mail-in voting.I am talking about Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger — a conservative Republican — who oversaw the Georgia count and recount and insisted that Joe Biden had won fair and square and that his state’s two G.O.P. senators, David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, did not garner enough votes to avoid election runoffs. Perdue and Loeffler dishonorably opted for the easier wrong and brazenly demanded Raffensperger resign for not declaring them winners.I am talking about Chris Krebs, the director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, who not only refused to back up Trump’s claims of election fraud, but whose agency issued a statement calling the 2020 election “the most secure in American history,” adding in bold type, “There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes or was in any way compromised.”Krebs did the hard right thing, and Trump fired him by tweet for it. Mitch McConnell, doing the easy wrong thing, did not utter a peep of protest.I am talking about the Republican-led Board of Supervisors in Maricopa County, Ariz., which, according to The Washington Post, “voted unanimously Friday to certify the county’s election results, with the board chairman declaring there was no evidence of fraud or misconduct ‘and that is with a big zero.’”I am talking about Mitt Romney, the first (and still virtually only) Republican senator to truly call out Trump’s postelection actions for what they really were: “overt pressure on state and local officials to subvert the will of the people and overturn the election.”I am talking about U.S. District Judge Matthew W. Brann, a registered Republican, who dismissed Trump’s allegations that Republican voters in Pennsylvania had been illegally disadvantaged because some counties permitted voters to cure administrative errors on their mail ballots.As The Washington Post reported, Brann scathingly wrote on Saturday “that Trump’s attorneys had haphazardly stitched this allegation together ‘like Frankenstein’s Monster’ in an attempt to avoid unfavorable legal precedent.”And I am talking about all the other election verification commissioners who did the hard right things in tossing out Trump’s fraudulent claims of fraud.Asking for recounts in close elections was perfectly legitimate. But when that failed to produce any significant change in the results, Trump took us to a new dark depth. He pushed utterly bogus claims of voting irregularities and then tried to get Republican state legislatures to simply ignore the popular vote totals and appoint their own pro-Trump electors before the Electoral College meets on Dec. 14.That shifted this postelection struggle from Trump versus Biden — and who had the most votes — to Trump versus the Constitution — and who had the raw power and will to defend it or ignore it.To all of these people who chose to do the hard right thing and defend the Constitution and the rule of law over their party’s interest or personal gain, may you have a blessed Thanksgiving.You stand in stark contrast to Bill Barr, Mike Pompeo (who apparently never attended chapel at West Point), Mike Pence, Rudy Giuliani, Lindsey Graham, Mitch McConnell, Kevin McCarthy, Nikki Haley, Kayleigh McEnany and all the other G.O.P. senators and House members, who put their party and self-interest before their country and opted for the easy wrongs. History will remember them, too.Though Trump is now grudgingly letting the presidential transition proceed, we must never, ever, forget the damage he and his allies inflicted on American democracy by attacking its very core — our ability to hold free and fair elections and transfer power peacefully. Tens of millions of Americans now believe something that is untrue — that our system is rigged. Who knows what that will mean in the long run?The depths to which Trump and his legal team sank was manifested last Thursday when Giuliani and Sidney Powell held a news conference alleging, among other things, that software used to disadvantage Trump voters was created at the direction of the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez. It was insane.As Jonah Goldberg, a conservative critic of Trumpism, wrote in thedispatch.com: “The G.O.P.’s social media account spewed sound bites from Powell and Giuliani out into the country like a fire hose attached to a sewage tank.” Fox carried the whole news conference live — uninterrupted — for virtually its entire 90 minutes.Shame on all these people.Sure, now Trump and many of his enablers are finally bowing to reality — but it is not because they’ve developed integrity. It is because they WERE STOPPED by all those people who had integrity and did the hard right things.And “shame” is the right word for these people, because a sense of shame was lost these past four years and it needs to be re-established. Otherwise, what Trump and all his sycophants did gets normalized and permanently erodes confidence in our elections. That is how democracies die.You can only hope that once they are out of power, Barr, Pompeo, Giuliani and all their compatriots will be stopped on the streets, in restaurants or at conferences and politely but firmly asked by everyday Americans: “How could you have stayed all-in when Trump was violating the deepest norms that bind us as a democracy?”And if they are deaf to the message being sent from their fellow citizens, then let’s hope some will have to face an interrogation from their own children at the Thanksgiving table this year:“Mom, Dad — did you really side with Trump when it was Trump versus the Constitution?”The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More