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      Giuliani Is a Target in Georgia’s Trump Election Inquiry, Lawyer Says

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      Rudolph W. Giuliani, as former President Donald J. Trump’s personal lawyer, spearheaded efforts to keep Mr. Trump in power.ATLANTA — The legal pressures on Donald J. Trump and his closest allies intensified further on Monday, as prosecutors informed his former personal attorney, Rudolph W. Giuliani, that Mr. Giuliani was a target in a wide-ranging criminal investigation into election interference in Georgia.The notification came on the same day that a federal judge rejected efforts by another key Trump ally, Senator Lindsey Graham, to avoid giving testimony before the special grand jury hearing evidence in the case in Atlanta.One of Mr. Giuliani’s lawyers, Robert Costello, said in an interview that he was notified on Monday that his client was a target. Being so identified does not guarantee that a person will be indicted; rather, it usually means that prosecutors believe an indictment is possible, based on evidence they have seen up to that point.Mr. Giuliani, who as Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer spearheaded efforts to keep Mr. Trump in power, emerged in recent weeks as a central figure in the inquiry being conducted by Fani T. Willis, the district attorney of Fulton County, Ga., which encompasses most of Atlanta.Earlier this summer, prosecutors questioned witnesses before the special grand jury about Mr. Giuliani’s appearances before state legislative panels in December 2020, when he spent hours peddling false conspiracy theories about secret suitcases of Democratic ballots and corrupted voting machines.For Mr. Giuliani, the former mayor of New York, the developments are the latest in a widening swath of trouble, though he got some good news recently when it emerged that he was unlikely to face charges in a federal criminal inquiry into his ties to Ukraine during the 2020 presidential campaign.Mr. Giuliani is scheduled to appear before the special grand jury on Wednesday at a downtown Atlanta courthouse. His lawyer, Mr. Costello, said in the interview that Mr. Giuliani would probably invoke attorney-client privilege if asked questions about his dealings with Mr. Trump. “If these people think he’s going to talk about conversations between him and President Trump, they’re delusional,” Mr. Costello said.The rejection of Senator Graham’s effort to avoid testifying came in a written order from a Federal District Court judge in Atlanta, Leigh Martin May. Mr. Graham, a Republican of South Carolina, is now set to testify on Aug. 23.The judge found that prosecutors had shown that there is “a special need for Mr. Graham’s testimony on issues relating to alleged attempts to influence or disrupt the lawful administration of Georgia’s 2022 elections.”Lawyers for Mr. Graham have said that he was informed by prosecutors that he was a witness, not a target.Understand Georgia’s Trump Election InvestigationCard 1 of 5Understand Georgia’s Trump Election InvestigationAn immediate legal threat to Trump. More

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      John Eastman Proposed Challenging Georgia Senate Elections in Search of Fraud

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      On the day of President Biden’s inauguration, John Eastman suggested looking for voting irregularities in Georgia — and asked for help in getting paid the $270,000 he had billed the Trump campaign.John Eastman, the conservative lawyer whose plan to block congressional certification of the 2020 election failed in spectacular fashion on Jan. 6, 2021, sent an email two weeks later arguing that pro-Trump forces should sue to keep searching for the supposed election fraud he acknowledged they had failed to find.On Jan. 20, 2021, hours after President Biden’s inauguration, Mr. Eastman emailed Rudolph W. Giuliani, former President Donald J. Trump’s personal lawyer, proposing that they challenge the outcome of the runoff elections in Georgia for two Senate seats that had been won on Jan. 5 by Democrats.“A lot of us have now staked our reputations on the claims of election fraud, and this would be a way to gather proof,” Mr. Eastman wrote in the previously undisclosed email, which also went to others, including a top Trump campaign adviser. “If we get proof of fraud on Jan. 5, it will likely also demonstrate the fraud on Nov. 3, thereby vindicating President Trump’s claims and serving as a strong bulwark against Senate impeachment trial.”The email, which was reviewed by The New York Times and authenticated by people who worked on the Trump campaign at the time, is the latest evidence that even some of Mr. Trump’s most fervent supporters knew they had not proven their baseless claims of widespread voting fraud — but wanted to continue their efforts to delegitimize the outcome even after Mr. Biden had taken office.Mr. Eastman’s message also underscored that he had not taken on the work of keeping Mr. Trump in office just out of conviction: He asked for Mr. Giuliani’s help in collecting on a $270,000 invoice he had sent the Trump campaign the previous day for his legal services.The charges included $10,000 a day for eight days of work in January 2021, including the two days before Jan. 6 when Mr. Eastman and Mr. Trump, during meetings in the Oval Office, sought unsuccessfully to pressure Vice President Mike Pence to go along with the plan to block congressional certification of the Electoral College results on Jan. 6. (Mr. Eastman appears never to have been paid.)A lawyer for Mr. Eastman did not respond to a request for comment.Disclosure of the email comes at a time when the Justice Department is intensifying its criminal investigation of the effort to overturn the 2020 election. Patrick F. Philbin, who was a deputy White House counsel under Mr. Trump, has received a grand jury subpoena in the case, a person familiar with the situation said.Mr. Philbin is the latest high-ranking former White House official known to be called to testify before the grand jury. Others include his former boss, Pat A. Cipollone, who as White House counsel argued, along with other White House lawyers, against some of the more extreme steps proposed by Mr. Trump and his advisers as they sought to hold onto power.Earlier subpoenas to a number of people had sought information about outside lawyers, including Mr. Eastman and Mr. Giuliani, who were advising Mr. Trump and promoting his efforts to overturn the results.In June, federal agents armed with a search warrant seized Mr. Eastman’s phone, stopping him as he was leaving a restaurant in New Mexico.Key Revelations From the Jan. 6 HearingsCard 1 of 9Making a case against Trump. More

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      The Fake Electors Scheme, Explained

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      The plan to reverse the outcome of the 2020 election by creating slates of electors pledged to Donald Trump in states he had lost was expansive, long-running and often confusing.The brazen plan to create false slates of electors pledged to former President Donald J. Trump in seven swing states that were actually won by Joseph R. Biden Jr. was arguably the longest-running and most expansive of the multiple efforts by Mr. Trump and his allies to overturn the results of the 2020 election.It was also one of the most confusing, involving a sprawling cast of pro-Trump lawyers, state Republican officials and White House aides in an effort that began before some states had even finished counting their ballots. It culminated in the campaign to pressure Vice President Mike Pence to use the false slates to subvert congressional certification of the outcome on Jan. 6, 2021 — and in the violent attack on the Capitol that unfolded as he refused to do so.The scheme had a vague historical precedent and was rooted, at least in theory, in a post-Reconstruction Era law designed to address how to handle disputed elections. But it was deemed illegal by Mr. Trump’s own White House Counsel’s Office. Even some of the lawyers who helped come up with the idea referred to it as fake and acknowledged that it was of dubious legality, according to a cache of email messages brought to light by The New York Times.The fake electors tactic caught the attention of state law enforcement officials around the beginning of this year, and soon became a focus of the inquiry being conducted by the House select committee investigating the events of Jan. 6.The plan has also figured prominently in an investigation that an Atlanta-area prosecutor is conducting into Mr. Trump’s alleged election meddling. And it is at the heart of the Justice Department’s own wide-ranging Jan. 6 inquiry.Here is a look at the plan: where it came from; how it was meant to work; the various inquiries it has now become a part of; and the ways in which it could serve to implicate Mr. Trump in criminal activity.Vice President Richard M. Nixon campaigned in Hilo, Hawaii, during the presidential race of 1960. A dispute over the outcome there was cited by Trump allies in developing slates of so-called alternate electors after the 2020 race.Associated PressHawaii, 1960, Provided the Template In one of the first legal memos laying out the details of the fake elector scheme, a pro-Trump lawyer named Kenneth Chesebro justified the plan by pointing to an odd episode in American history: a quarrel that took place in Hawaii during the 1960 presidential race between Senator John F. Kennedy and Vice President Richard M. Nixon.The results of the vote count in Hawaii remained in dispute — by about 100 ballots — even as a crucial deadline for the Electoral College to meet and cast its votes drew near. A recount was underway but it did not appear as though it would be completed by the time the Electoral College was expected to convene, on Dec. 19, 1960.(The winner of the popular vote in nearly all of the states is allocated all of that state’s electors, which are apportioned based on population. Maine and Nebraska are the exceptions; they allocate their electors based on the winners in congressional districts. To win the presidency, a candidate has to win a majority of the 538 total electoral votes.)Key Revelations From the Jan. 6 HearingsCard 1 of 9Making a case against Trump. More

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      Correos inéditos detallan el plan de Trump para seguir en el poder

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      Un intercambio de correos electrónicos entre algunos asesores externos y asistentes de la campaña de Trump ofrecen una nueva perspectiva de sus esfuerzos para anular las elecciones en las semanas previas al 6 de enero.Unos correos electrónicos que no habían sido divulgados ofrecen una mirada de los esfuerzos cada vez más desesperados, y a menudo descuidados, de los asesores del expresidente de Estados Unidos Donald Trump para revertir su derrota electoral en las semanas que antecedieron al ataque del 6 de enero, incluidos algunos mensajes que reconocían que algunos elementos cruciales de su plan eran de dudosa legalidad, al punto de que se les llegó a calificar como “falsos”.Decenas de correos electrónicos entre personas vinculadas a la campaña de Trump, asesores externos y aliados cercanos del expresidente muestran una atención especial en reunir listas de personas que, en su nombre, afirmarían —sin fundamento— ser electores en estados clave que Trump había perdido en el Colegio Electoral.En los correos electrónicos revisados por The New York Times y autentificados por personas que trabajaban con la campaña de Trump en ese momento, un abogado que participó en las conversaciones usó en repetidas ocasiones la palabra “falsos” para referirse a los supuestos electores, que pretendían proveer una justificación al vicepresidente Mike Pence y a los aliados de Trump en el Congreso para entorpecer el proceso de certificación del resultado electoral. Y los abogados que trabajaron en la propuesta dejaron claro que sabían que era posible que los electores pro-Trump que estaban presentando no resistirían el escrutinio legal.“Simplemente estaríamos enviando votos electorales ‘falsos’ a Pence para que ‘alguien’ en el Congreso pueda presentar una objeción cuando se empiecen contar los votos, y argumentar que los votos ‘falsos’ deben ser contados”, escribió Jack Wilenchik, un abogado con sede en Phoenix que ayudó a organizar a los votantes a favor de Trump en Arizona, en un correo que le envió a Boris Epshteyn, asesor estratégico de la campaña de Trump, el 8 de diciembre de 2020.En un correo electrónico de seguimiento, Wilenchik escribió que “votos ‘alternativos’ probablemente es un mejor término que votos ‘falsos’”, agregando un emoji de cara sonriente.Los correos brindan detalles inéditos sobre cómo un ala de la campaña de Trump trabajó con abogados y asesores externos para organizar un plan electoral y buscar una variedad de otras opciones, a menudo sin pensar en su practicidad. Un correo electrónico revela que muchos de los principales asesores de Trump fueron informados de los problemas que tenían para nombrar a los votantes de Trump en Michigan —un estado que había perdido—, porque las normas pandémicas habían forzado el cierre del edificio del Capitolio estatal, donde los supuestos electores se habrían reunido.Las comunicaciones muestran que los participantes en las discusiones informaron detalles de sus actividades a Rudolph Giuliani, el abogado personal de Trump y, en al menos un caso, a Mark Meadows, el jefe de gabinete de la Casa Blanca. Casi al mismo tiempo, según el comité de la Cámara de Representantes que investiga el ataque del 6 de enero, Meadows envió un correo a otro asesor de campaña en el que advertía: “Solo necesitamos a alguien que coordine a los votantes de los estados”.Muchos de los correos electrónicos están dirigidos a Epshteyn, quien coordinaba a las personas dentro y fuera de la campaña de Trump y la Casa Blanca y sigue siendo un colaborador cercano de Trump.Epshteyn, según muestran los correos, era un contacto usual para John Eastman, el abogado que diseñó el plan adoptado por Trump para entorpecer la certificación del resultado del Colegio Electoral en el Congreso el 6 de enero de 2021.Epshteyn no solo le presentó y envió a Giuliani la propuesta detallada para el 6 de enero que Eastman preparó, sino que también se encargó de cómo pagarle a Eastman e hizo los arreglos necesarios para que asistiera a la Casa Blanca el 4 de enero de 2021, según los correos electrónicos.Ese fue el día de la reunión en el Despacho Oval en la que Trump y Eastman presionaron sin éxito a Pence para que adoptara el plan, un intercambio del que fueron testigos los dos principales asesores de Pence, Marc Short y Greg Jacob, quienes testificaron la semana pasada frente al jurado federal que investiga el asalto al Capitolio, y las decisiones que provocaron ese incidente.Los correos destacan la actuación de Mike Roman, director de operaciones del día de las elecciones para la campaña de Trump, quien se encargó de buena parte del trabajo preliminar para encontrar las formas de desafiar las derrotas de Trump en los estados clave.Epshteyn y Roman estuvieron en coordinación con otras personas que tuvieron un rol en asesorar a Trump, según muestran los correos electrónicos. Entre esas personas estaban los abogados Jenna Ellis y Bruce Marks; Gary Michael Brown, quien fue subdirector de operaciones del día de las elecciones para la campaña de Trump, y Christina Bobb, quien en ese momento trabajaba para One America News Network y ahora trabaja con el comité de acción política de Trump.Al parecer, los correos electrónicos no se compartieron con los abogados de la Oficina del Abogado de la Casa Blanca, quienes informaron que el plan de “electores falsos” no era sólido legalmente, ni con otros abogados en la campaña.Algunos de los involucrados también expresaron en los correos electrónicos su anuencia para mantener algunas de sus actividades fuera del ojo público.Por ejemplo, después de que Trump recibió a los legisladores del estado de Pensilvania en la Casa Blanca a finales de noviembre para discutir la restitución del resultado de las elecciones, Epshteyn celebró cuando la noticia del encuentro no fue filtrada con rapidez. “La reunión en la CB no se ha hecho pública, lo cual es impactante y grandioso”, le escribió a Ellis.Jenna Ellis, a la izquierda, Rudolph Giuliani y Boris Epshteyn, a la derecha, participaron en el esfuerzo coordinado para anular el resultado de las elecciones de 2020.Jonathan Ernst/ReutersEl 8 de diciembre de 2020, Wilenchik escribió que Kelli Ward, una de las republicanas de Arizona que participaron en el plan de los electores falsos, recomendó tratar de “mantenerlo en secreto hasta que el Congreso cuente los votos el 6 de enero (para que podamos intentar ‘sorprender’ a los demócratas y a los medios con eso), y me inclino a estar de acuerdo con ella”.Epshteyn, Wilenchik, Roman, Eastman, Bobb y James Troupis, otro abogado involucrado en el plan, se negaron a comentar o no respondieron a los correos electrónicos o llamadas para solicitar sus comentarios.Marks, en un correo electrónico, cuestionó que hubiera algo inapropiado o indebido en su trabajo.“No creo que haya nada ‘falso’ o ilegal en las listas alternas de delegados, y particularmente en Pensilvania”, dijo. “Había un historial de listas electorales alternativas en Hawái en 1960. Nada sobre esto era secreto: se proporcionaron a los Archivos Nacionales, según entiendo que fue el procedimiento, y luego le correspondía al Congreso decidir qué hacer”.Marks agregó: “No estuve involucrado con el consejo del profesor Eastman con respecto al papel del vicepresidente, del cual me enteré después del hecho y no respaldo”.El comité de la Cámara de Representantes que investiga el ataque del 6 de enero al Capitolio ha recopilado pruebas de que Trump tenía conocimiento del plan sobre los electores. Ronna McDaniel, la presidenta del Comité Nacional Republicano (CNR), dijo en una declaración que Trump la había llamado y puso a Eastman al teléfono “para hablar de la importancia de que el CNR ayude a la campaña para reunir a estos electores contingentes”.El panel también escuchó el testimonio de Jacob, quien fue abogado de Pence en la Casa Blanca, quien indicó que Eastman reconoció en la reunión del Despacho Oval del 4 de enero —donde Trump estaba presente— que su plan de que Pence obstaculizara la certificación electoral violaba la Ley de Conteo Electoral.En ocasiones, los correos electrónicos muestran poca precisión en las conversaciones entre los abogados. Marks se refirió en repetidas ocasiones a Cleta Mitchell, otra abogada que ayudaba a Trump, como “Clita” y “Clavita”, lo que ocasionó que Epshteyn replicara: “Es Cleta, no Clavita”.En otra ocasión, Epshteyn le escribió a Marks: “¿Cuando dices Nevada quieres decir Arizona???”.Para principios de diciembre, Epshteyn parecía estar ayudando a coordinar los esfuerzos, al deliberar repetidamente con Marks y otros. Wilenchik le dijo a sus colegas abogados que había estado discutiendo una idea propuesta por otro abogado que trabajaba con la campaña, Kenneth Chesebro, un aliado de Eastman, para enviar listas de electores leales a Trump.“Su idea básicamente es que todos nosotros (Georgia, Wisconsin, Arizona, Pensilvania), hagamos que nuestros electores envíen sus votos (aunque los votos no son legales bajo la ley federal, porque no están firmados por el gobernador), de modo que los integrantes del Congreso se peleen sobre si deben contarse el 6 de enero”, escribió Wilenchik en un correo electrónico enviado a Epshteyn y a otras personas, el 8 de diciembre de 2020.“Medio loco/creativo, me encantaría conversarlo”, continuó Wilenchick. “Lo que le comentó fue que supongo que no hace daño, (al menos legalmente), es decir, solo estaríamos enviando votos electorales ‘falsos’ a Pence para que ‘alguien’ en el Congreso pueda presentar una objeción cuando empiecen a contarse los votos y empiecen a defender que los votos ‘falsos’ deben contarse”.Seguidores del presidente Donald Trump protestaron en Phoenix dos días después del día de las elecciones. Arizona fue uno de los estados escogidos para el esquema de falsos electores.Adriana Zehbrauskas para The New York TimesAl organizar el esquema de falsos electores, los abogados nombraron a una “persona de enlace” en siete estados para organizar a los electores dispuestos a firmar documentos falsos. En Pensilvania, ese enlace era Douglas V. Mastriano, quien ahora es el nominado republicano a la gubernatura y fue partidario de las mentiras de Trump sobre el robo de las elecciones.Pero incluso Mastriano exigía garantías para seguir el plan que otros republicanos le decían era “ilegal”, según un correo electrónico enviado por Bobb que también apuntaba a Giuliani, exalcalde de la Ciudad de Nueva York, el 12 de diciembre.“Mastriano necesita una llamada del alcalde. Hay que hacerlo. Hablarle de la legalidad de lo que están haciendo”, escribió. Y añadió: “Los electores quieren que los tranquilicen de que el proceso es * legal * y esencial para la estrategía general”.Los correos mostraban que, al principio, el grupo esperaba que las legislaturas estatales republicanas o los gobernadores se unieran a sus planes para darles un sello de legitimidad. Pero para diciembre, estaba claro que ninguna autoridad iba a aceptar participar, así que los abogados de Trump se propusieron presionar a Pence, quien debía presidir una sesión conjunta del Congreso el 6 de enero.El 7 de diciembre, Troupis, que trabajaba para la campaña de Trump en Wisconsin, le escribió a Epshteyn que no había “necesidad de que los legisladores actuaran”. Invocó el análisis jurídico de Chesebro de que la clave para las esperanzas de Trump no era bloquear la certificación estatal de los electores el 14 de diciembre, sino crear un motivo para que Pence bloqueara o dilatara la certificación del Congreso de los resultados del Colegio Electoral el 6 de enero.“La segunda lista solo se presenta al mediodía del lunes y vota y luego transmite los resultados”, escribió Troupis sobre la organización de las listas de electores republicanos para que emitieran votos por Trump el 14 de diciembre. “Le corresponde a Pence abrirlos el 6 de enero. Nuestra estrategia, que pensamos se puede replicar en los 6 estados en disputa, es que los electores se reúnan y voten de modo que una decisión interina de una corte certifique a Trump como ganador pueda ejecutarse por la corte y ordenar al gobernador que emita lo necesario para nombrar a los electores. La clave sería que los seis estados lo hagan de modo que la elección siga en duda hasta enero”.Los documentos también mostraron que el equipo legal se había apoyado en información muy desacreditada para los reclamos de fraude electoral. El 17 de diciembre, Epshteyn escribió a Giuliani que un documento de fraude electoral creado por el asesor de Trump en materia de comercio, Peter Navarro — que ha sido desacreditado por informes periodísticos, funcionarios estatales y tribunales— “parece ser el resumen más completo de fraude de votantes de esta temporada electoral”.Los abogados estaban conscientes de que sus esfuerzos jurídicos eran motivo de sorna El 23 de diciembre, Marks escribió: “A ustedes los están matando en los medios por su estrategia de litigio, incluso en Fox y entre los conservadores”.Pero no se amilanaron.Para la víspera de Navidad, Eastman parecía querer aprovechar el poder de los millones de seguidores de Trump.Esa noche, a las 8:04 p. m. Eastman le envió a Epshteyn un correo electrónico que había recibido en el que una mujer le rogaba pedirle a Trump que “le dijera a sus 74 millones de seguidores lo que quiere que hagan para ayudar”. Y añadió: “Tenemos que ser una sola voz, con precisión láser, EXPRESÁNDOSE CON LA FUERZA DE 74 MILLONES”.Un video de John Eastman, a la izquierda, acogiéndose a la Quinta Enmienda durante una declaración ante el comité de la Cámara el 6 de enero.Doug Mills/The New York TimesEn su correo electrónico a Epshteyn, Eastman escribió, “Pensé en reenviarte esto. La fuerza de 74 millones. Averigüemos un modo específico de desplegarlos. ¿Estruendo vibrante? ¿Una legislatura a la vez? Los demás podrían darse cuenta”.Días antes, Trump les había dicho a sus seguidores que fueran a Washington el 6 de enero para una “protesta” que prometía sería “salvaje”.El 27 de diciembre, Epshteyn escribió que a Trump le “gustaba” el enfoque agresivo que proponían los abogados y que Eastman sería el “rostro de la estrategia de medios” junto con Giuliani.“Necesitamos una voz allá”, escribió Epshteyn sobre Eastman, diciendo que a él “ya lo había dado a conocer/apoyado POTUS”.En ese momento, solo faltaban días para el 6 de enero.Maggie Haberman es corresponsal de la Casa Blanca. Se unió al Times en 2015 como corresponsal de campaña y formó parte de un equipo que ganó un Pulitzer en 2018 por informar sobre los asesores de Trump y sus conexiones con Rusia. @maggieNYTLuke Broadwater cubre el Congreso de Estados Unidos. Fue el reportero principal de una serie de artículos de investigación en The Baltimore Sun que ganó un premio Pulitzer y un premio George Polk en 2020. @lukebroadwater More

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      Emails Reveal Details of Trump Fake Electors Plan

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      Previously undisclosed communications among Trump campaign aides and outside advisers provide new insight into their efforts to overturn the election in the weeks leading to Jan. 6.Previously undisclosed emails provide an inside look at the increasingly desperate and often slapdash efforts by advisers to President Donald J. Trump to reverse his election defeat in the weeks before the Jan. 6 attack, including acknowledgments that a key element of their plan was of dubious legality and lived up to its billing as “fake.”The dozens of emails among people connected to the Trump campaign, outside advisers and close associates of Mr. Trump show a particular focus on assembling lists of people who would claim — with no basis — to be Electoral College electors on his behalf in battleground states that he had lost.In emails reviewed by The New York Times and authenticated by people who had worked with the Trump campaign at the time, one lawyer involved in the detailed discussions repeatedly used the word “fake” to refer to the so-called electors, who were intended to provide Vice President Mike Pence and Mr. Trump’s allies in Congress a rationale for derailing the congressional process of certifying the outcome. And lawyers working on the proposal made clear they knew that the pro-Trump electors they were putting forward might not hold up to legal scrutiny.“We would just be sending in ‘fake’ electoral votes to Pence so that ‘someone’ in Congress can make an objection when they start counting votes, and start arguing that the ‘fake’ votes should be counted,” Jack Wilenchik, a Phoenix-based lawyer who helped organize the pro-Trump electors in Arizona, wrote in a Dec. 8, 2020, email to Boris Epshteyn, a strategic adviser for the Trump campaign.In a follow-up email, Mr. Wilenchik wrote that “‘alternative’ votes is probably a better term than ‘fake’ votes,” adding a smiley face emoji.The emails provide new details of how a wing of the Trump campaign worked with outside lawyers and advisers to organize the elector plan and pursue a range of other options, often with little thought to their practicality. One email showed that many of Mr. Trump’s top advisers were informed of problems naming Trump electors in Michigan — a state he had lost — because pandemic rules had closed the state Capitol building where the so-called electors had to gather.The emails show that participants in the discussions reported details of their activities to Rudolph W. Giuliani, Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer, and in at least one case to Mark Meadows, the White House chief of staff. Around the same time, according to the House committee investigating Jan. 6, Mr. Meadows emailed another campaign adviser saying, “We just need to have someone coordinating the electors for states.”Many of the emails went to Mr. Epshteyn, who was acting as a coordinator for people inside and outside the Trump campaign and the White House and remains a close aide to Mr. Trump.Mr. Epshteyn, the emails show, was a regular point of contact for John Eastman, the lawyer whose plan for derailing congressional certification of the Electoral College result on Jan. 6, 2021, was embraced by Mr. Trump.Key Revelations From the Jan. 6 HearingsCard 1 of 9Making a case against Trump. More

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      On the Docket: Atlanta v. Trumpworld

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      ATLANTA — The criminal investigation into efforts by former President Donald J. Trump and his allies to overturn his election loss in Georgia has begun to entangle, in one way or another, an expanding assemblage of characters:A United States senator. A congressman. A local Cadillac dealer. A high school economics teacher. The chairman of the state Republican Party. The Republican candidate for lieutenant governor. Six lawyers aiding Mr. Trump, including a former New York City mayor. The former president himself. And a woman who has identified herself as a publicist for the rapper Kanye West.Fani T. Willis, the Atlanta area district attorney, has been leading the investigation since early last year. But it is only this month, with a flurry of subpoenas and target letters, as well as court documents that illuminate some of the closed proceedings of a special grand jury, that the inquiry’s sprawling contours have emerged.For legal experts, that sprawl is a sign that Ms. Willis is doing what she has indicated all along: building the framework for a broad case that could target multiple defendants with charges of conspiracy to commit election fraud, or racketeering-related charges for engaging in a coordinated scheme to undermine the election.“All of these people are from very disparate places in life,” Anthony Michael Kreis, a constitutional law professor at Georgia State University, said of the known witnesses and targets. “The fact that they’re all being brought together really suggests she’s building this broader case for conspiracy.”What happened in Georgia was not altogether singular. The House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol has put on display how Mr. Trump and his allies sought to subvert the election results in several crucial states, including by creating slates of fake pro-Trump electors. Yet even as many Democrats lament that the Justice Department is moving too slowly in its inquiry, the local Georgia prosecutor has been pursuing a quickening case that could pose the most immediate legal peril for the former president and his associates.Whether Mr. Trump will ultimately be targeted for indictment remains unclear. But the David-before-Goliath dynamic may in part reflect that Ms. Willis’s legal decision-making is less encumbered than that of federal officials in Washington by the vast political and societal weight of prosecuting a former president, especially in a bitterly fissured country.But some key differences in Georgia law may also make the path to prosecution easier than in federal courts. And there was the signal event that drew attention to Mr. Trump’s conduct in Georgia: his call to the secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, whose office, in Ms. Willis’s Fulton County, recorded the president imploring him to “find” the 11,780 votes needed to reverse his defeat.A House hearing this past week discussed a phone call in which President Donald J. Trump asked Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, to “find” an additional 11,780 votes.Shawn Thew/EPA, via ShutterstockMr. Trump’s staff did not comment, nor did his local counsel. When Ms. Willis opened the inquiry in February 2021, a Trump spokesman described it as “simply the Democrats’ latest attempt to score political points by continuing their witch hunt against President Trump.” Lawyers for 11 of the 16 Trump electors, Kimberly Bourroughs Debrow and Holly A. Pierson, accused Ms. Willis of “misusing the grand jury process to harass, embarrass and attempt to intimidate the nominee electors, not to investigate their conduct.”Last year, Ms. Willis told The New York Times that racketeering charges could be in play. Whenever people “hear the word ‘racketeering,’ they think of ‘The Godfather,’” she said, before explaining that charges under Georgia’s version of the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act could apply in any number of realms where corrupt enterprises are operating. “If you have various overt acts for an illegal purpose, I think you can — you may — get there,” she said.The Trump InvestigationsCard 1 of 8Numerous inquiries. More

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      Giuliani Ordered to Testify in Georgia Criminal Investigation

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      After Rudolph W. Giuliani failed to show for a hearing in Manhattan, a Georgia judge ordered him to testify as part of an investigation into election interference in the state.A Georgia judge ordered Rudolph W. Giuliani to testify in Atlanta next month in an ongoing criminal investigation into election interference by former President Donald J. Trump and his advisers and allies, according to court filings released on Wednesday.Some out-of-state witnesses in the case have gone to court to challenge subpoenas or other legal filings seeking to compel their testimony. But after Mr. Giuliani failed to show for a hearing last week in Manhattan, where the matter was to have been adjudicated, Judge Robert C. I. McBurney of the Superior Court of Fulton County ordered him to appear before a special grand jury in Atlanta on Aug. 9.Mr. Giuliani, who spearheaded efforts to keep Mr. Trump in power as his personal lawyer, has emerged as a central figure in the Georgia criminal investigation into efforts to overturn Mr. Trump’s 2020 electoral loss in the state. Fani T. Willis, the prosecutor in Fulton County leading the investigation, has indicated that she is considering conspiracy or racketeering charges, which could take in a broad spectrum of people engaged in multiple efforts to sway the election results.Her office worked with the office of Alvin Bragg, the district attorney in Manhattan, to secure Mr. Giuliani’s testimony, and she said in a statement that she was “grateful to the prosecutors and investigators” in Mr. Bragg’s office for their assistance.Mr. Giuliani’s lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.A special grand jury has been meeting regularly in Atlanta to hear testimony and review documents and videos that may shed light on the multipronged effort to put Georgia in Mr. Trump’s win column. Among the acts under consideration are an infamous postelection phone call that Mr. Trump made to Brad Raffensperger, the Georgia secretary of state, asking to “find” enough votes to secure his victory.Mr. Giuliani appears to be of interest for a number of reasons, including his participation in a scheme to create slates of pro-Trump presidential electors in numerous states including Georgia. In court filings this week, it was revealed that all 16 pro-Trump electors in Georgia had been informed by the Fulton County District Attorney’s office that they could face charges.Mr. Giuliani also appeared in person before two Georgia state legislative committees in December 2020, where he spent hours peddling false conspiracy theories about secret suitcases of Democratic ballots and corrupted voting machines. He told state legislators, “You cannot possibly certify Georgia in good faith.”Legal experts have said the Georgia investigation may prove to be particularly perilous for Mr. Trump and his allies. Though the grand jury proceedings are secret, a number of details have emerged in recent days that hint at the scope of the investigation. Among the pro-Trump electors who learned they could be indicted are David Shafer, the chair of the state Republican Party, and State Senator Burt Jones, the party’s nominee for lieutenant governor. Another Republican state senator, Brandon Beach, was also informed that he is a potential target.Prosecutors are seeking testimony from Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a Trump ally who also called Mr. Raffensperger, and Representative Jody Hice, a hard-right Georgia Republican who has embraced false narratives about election fraud in Georgia and who helped lead efforts in Congress to help keep Mr. Trump in power.William K. Rashbaum More

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      Trump Electors Targeted in Georgia Criminal Inquiry

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      A prosecutor in Atlanta is investigating interference in the 2020 presidential election, an inquiry that has engulfed Donald J. Trump and many of his allies.Prosecutors in Atlanta have informed 16 Trump supporters who formed an alternate slate of 2020 presidential electors from Georgia that they could face charges in an ongoing criminal investigation into election interference, underscoring the risk of criminal charges that Donald J. Trump and many of his allies may be facing in the state.The revelations were included in court filings released on Tuesday in an investigation being led by Fani T. Willis, the district attorney of Fulton County. They showed that while much attention has been focused on the House hearings in Washington into the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, and the extent to which the Justice Department will investigate, it is a local prosecutor in Atlanta who may put Mr. Trump and his circle of allies in the most immediate legal peril.“This is a sign of a dramatic acceleration of her work,” said Norman Eisen, who served as special counsel to the House Judiciary Committee during the first Trump impeachment. He added that prosecutors typically work their way “up the food chain, so usually the first wave of target letters is not the last.”A special grand jury is looking into a range of potential issues, including the creation of a slate of 16 pro-Trump electors in the weeks after the election in an attempt to circumvent President Biden’s victory in the state. The district attorney is seeking testimony from a number of Mr. Trump’s lawyers and allies, including Rudolph W. Giuliani, who has emerged as a central figure in the case, and Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, whose lawyers agreed on Tuesday to have their objections heard in a court in Georgia instead of South Carolina or Washington.Some legal observers have argued that Mr. Trump’s actions put him at risk of being indicted on charges of violating relatively straightforward Georgia criminal statutes, including criminal solicitation to commit election fraud — most notably his postelection phone calls to Georgia officials like Brad Raffensperger, the secretary of state, whom he pressured “to find 11,780 votes,” enough to reverse the election results. A 114-page Brookings Institution analysis of the case, co-authored by Mr. Eisen, found Mr. Trump “at substantial risk of possible state charges predicated on multiple crimes.”Ms. Willis, in court filings, has indicated that a number of other charges are being considered, including racketeering and conspiracy, which could take in a broad roster of Trump associates both inside and outside of Georgia. Ms. Willis is also weighing whether to subpoena Mr. Trump himself and seek his testimony, according to a person familiar with the inquiry, as she has recently sought the testimony of seven of his allies and advisers before the special grand jury.Lawyers for 11 of the electors reacted strongly to the designation of their clients as targets, saying that a local prosecutor had no jurisdiction to determine which federal electors were fake and which were real. The lawyers, Holly A. Pierson and Kimberly Bourroughs Debrow, accused Ms. Willis of “misusing the grand jury process to harass, embarrass, and attempt to intimidate the nominee electors, not to investigate their conduct.”Ms. Willis’s office did not immediately comment, but she has said that “anything that is relevant to attempts to interfere with the Georgia election will be subject to review.”President Biden won Georgia and all 16 of its electoral votes. But after the election, some of Mr. Trump’s outside advisers came up with a plan to create slates of alternate electors in swings states like Georgia, falsely claiming that widespread fraud had disrupted the election in those states. Many of Mr. Trump’s White House advisers rejected the plan — and efforts to get Vice President Mike Pence to block the certification of electoral votes on Jan. 6 — and viewed it as dangerous and illegal, testimony in the House hearings have shown.Two of the Georgia electors had already been identified as targets of Ms. Willis’s investigation: David Shafer, a Trump ally who chairs the state Republican Party, and Burt Jones, a Georgia state lawmaker who is running for lieutenant governor.David Shafer, the chairman of the Georgia Republican Party.Bob Andres/Atlanta Journal-Constitution, via Associated PressState Senator Burt Jones, a candidate for lieutenant governor.Pool photo by Brynn AndersonThe lawyers for 11 of the electors, including Mr. Shafer, accused Ms. Willis of politicizing the investigation and said that many “of the nominee electors are prominent figures in the Georgia G.O.P.” The electors include Mark Amick, who serves on the board of the Georgia Republican Foundation, a group of the party’s large donors; Vikki Consiglio, the party’s assistant treasurer; Shawn Still, who won a primary for a State Senate seat earlier this year; Brad Carver, an Atlanta lawyer; and Kay Godwin, the co-founder of a group called Georgia Conservatives in Action.Most of the electors were supposed to testify before the special grand jury next week. But in late June, Ms. Pierson and Ms. Debrow wrote in their filing that they were told by a special prosecutor that their 11 clients were considered targets — not just witnesses — in the investigation, after new evidence had come to light.“There is no legal or factual basis to label the nominee electors as targets of this or any grand jury,” the lawyers said. “Nonetheless, the D.A. has rashly elevated them from witnesses to targets, and the nominee electors have informed her of their intention to follow our legal counsel to invoke their state and federal constitutional and statutory rights not to provide substantive testimony.”“It’s bizarre,” said Clark D. Cunningham, a law professor at Georgia State University in Atlanta. “They’re arguing their case now, even though none of their clients have been indicted. The purpose of this motion appears to be to ask a judge to decide in advance of a grand jury decision that a grand jury can’t even indict them.”But the lawyers asserted that “states (and their local governments) have no authority to interfere (through attempted criminalization or otherwise) with the process of sending potential elector slates to Congress for it to adjudicate.” They also pointed to the 1960 presidential election in Hawaii, where both the Nixon and Kennedy campaigns submitted electors, in asserting that there was precedent for more than one slate of electors.Mr. Jones, in a motion earlier this week, called for Ms. Willis to recuse herself, because she has headlined fund-raisers for Charlie Bailey, a Democrat who is running against Mr. Jones.Ms. Willis rejected that idea in a filing on Tuesday.“The subject of the grand jury investigation that has ensnared Jones has no factual connection to the ongoing campaign for lieutenant governor,” she wrote, adding that “support for a political opponent” is “not among the extremely rare instances where a prosecutor is shown to have a personal interest in a prosecution.”The filing also said that Mr. Jones had “been treated identically to each of the 15 other unofficial ‘electors’ who represented themselves as properly certified electors for the 2020 presidential election and who received similar target status notification.”The potential legal exposure of the Republican officials could complicate Georgia’s November elections, starting with the lieutenant governor’s race. Last week, Mr. Bailey accused Mr. Jones of being “anti-American and unpatriotic” for taking part in a “failed attempted overthrow of the American government.”The investigation has also highlighted divisions within Republican ranks. Mr. Shafer has been a stalwart supporter of Mr. Trump and his baseless claims of a stolen election, which have put him at odds with Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican, as well as Mr. Raffensperger. Both Mr. Kemp and Mr. Raffensperger easily defeated Trump-backed primary challengers this year.Representative Jody Hice, who lost in a May primary to Mr. Raffensperger, revealed this week that he had been subpoenaed in the investigation. A loyal Trump ally, he led a January 2021 challenge in the House of Representatives to the certification of Georgia’s electors. He is seeking to challenge the subpoena in federal court.The biggest question looming over the investigation, of course, is the potential exposure of Mr. Trump himself.“She’s made clear that she has a sharp eye on Trump,” Mr. Eisen said of Ms. Willis, adding that there were indications “that this first salvo of target letters will be followed by additional possible targets, culminating in the former president himself.” More