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      Roger Stone slammed Ivanka Trump after not getting pardoned, video shows

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      Roger Stone slammed Ivanka Trump after not getting pardoned, video showsRepublican operative calls Trump an ‘abortionist bitch’ in video released by film-maker who provided footage to January 6 panel00:29In video released by a Danish film-maker who provided footage to the January 6 committee, Roger Stone, furious he will not be pardoned for his activities around the Capitol attack, is seen to call Ivanka Trump an “abortionist bitch”.Could Trump testify? Subpoena sets up prospect of dramatic political spectacleRead moreThe Republican operative also says Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump’s husband and like her an adviser to Donald Trump in the White House, “has an IQ of 70”.The video was shot by Christoffer Guldbrandsen, whose footage of Stone was shown in Thursday’s dramatic January 6 hearing. Then, Stone was shown saying: “I say fuck the voting, let’s get right to the violence.”The clip in which Stone rants about Ivanka and Kushner was selected but not shown by the committee. First reported by the Daily Beast, the clip shows Stone on the phone in the back of a car on a highway, visibly shaking with anger.“Jared Kushner has an IQ of 70,” he says. “He’s coming to Miami. We will eject him from Miami very quickly; he will be leaving very quickly. Very quickly.”Like Donald Trump, Kushner and Ivanka Trump moved to Florida after their time in Washington, rather than move back to New York.Stone continued: “He has 100 security guards. I will have 5,000 security guards. You want to fight. Let’s fight. Fuck you.”Stone added: “Fuck you and your abortionist bitch daughter.”Gulbrandsen, the Beast said, said there was “no doubt” who Stone was talking about.Stone is a strategist, author and self-confessed dirty trickster. He has long been associated with Donald Trump, through the businessman’s many flirtations with politics and since his election win in 2016.In 2019, Stone was indicted during the investigation of Russian election interference and links between Trump and Moscow.Stone was convicted on seven counts of lying to Congress, obstruction of justice and witness tampering. The charges related to his links to Trump’s campaign and to WikiLeaks, which released Democratic party emails obtained by Russian hackers on the same day Trump was shown to have bragged about assaulting women.Stone was sentenced to 40 months in prison. In December 2020, Trump granted him clemency.Gulbrandsen told the Beast the clip of Stone ranting on his phone was from 20 January 2021, the day of Joe Biden’s inauguration.Stone’s activities around the Capitol attack and links to the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys, far-right groups involved in the riot, have been scrutinised by the January 6 committee. Stone appeared in front of investigators but invoked his fifth-amendment right against self-incrimination.06:25Gulbrandsen told the Beast: “Roger Stone has been holding out for a pardon till the very last minute. He had first written up a memo … with a plan about encouraging Trump to pardon the lawmakers who had voted against certifying [Biden’s win], and Roger Stone, and some of his clients.”The film-maker said Stone reduced his wishlist to pardons for himself and Bernie Kerik, a close associate, but was “very upset” when no pardon came.Gulbrandsen said: “Aside from Donald Trump [Stone] also held Jared Kushner responsible as being the guy who was the point man on the pardon.”The Beast has also reported that Gulbrandsen recorded Matt Gaetz, the Republican congressman from Florida, telling Stone “the boss still has a very favorable view of you”.Stone said: “I’ll go down hard, though. I’ll fight it right to the bitter end.”Gaetz said: “Yeah, but I don’t think you’re going to go down at all at the end of the day.”Guldbrandsen’s documentary, A Storm Foretold, has been extensively trailed and examined – but not yet released.TopicsRoger StoneUS Capitol attackJanuary 6 hearingsIvanka TrumpJared KushnernewsReuse this content More

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      Confidence Man review: Maggie Haberman takes down Trump

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      Confidence Man review: Maggie Haberman takes down Trump The New York Times reporter presents a forensic account of the damage he has done to AmericaMaggie Haberman, the New York Times’ Trump whisperer, delivers. Her latest book is much more than 600 pages of context, scoop and drama. It is a political epic, tracing Donald Trump’s journey from the streets of Queens to Manhattan’s Upper East Side, from the White House to Mar-a-Lago, his Elba. There, the 45th president holds court – and broods and plots his return.Kushner camping tale one of many bizarre scenes in latest Trump bookRead moreHaberman gives Trump and those close to him plenty of voice – and rope. The result is a cacophonous symphony. Confidence Man informs and entertains but is simultaneously absolutely not funny. Trumpworld presents a reptilian tableau – reality TV does Lord of the Flies.For just one example, Mark Meadows, Trump’s last White House chief of staff, is depicted as erratic and detestable. Then there’s the family. Haberman reports how, after the 2016 election, Melania Trump won a renegotiated pre-nuptial agreement. Haberman also describes Trump repeatedly dumping on his son-in-law, Jared Kushner. If only he looked like Tom Brady and spoke in a deeper register. If only Ivanka had not converted to Judaism.The abuse gets absurd – even a kind of baroque. According to Haberman, at one 2020 campaign strategy meeting Trump implied Kushner might be brutally attacked, even raped, if he ever went camping: “Can you imagine Jared and his skinny ass camping? It’d be like something out of Deliverance.”The reader, however, should not weep for Jared. In Haberman’s telling, he is the kid who was born on third base and mistakes his good fortune with hitting a triple. For his part, Kushner is shown trashing Steve Bannon, the far-right ideologue who was campaign chair and chief White House strategist but was forced out within months.Haberman catches Kushner gleefully asking a White House visitor: “Did you see I cut Bannon’s balls off?”To quote Peter Navarro, like Bannon now a former Trump official under indictment, “nepotism and excrement roll downhill”.As it happens, Bannon’s testicles grew back. Like Charlie Kushner, Jared’s father, he received a Trump pardon. Bannon also helped propagate the big lie that Trump won the election, stoking the Capitol attack.These days, Bannon awaits sentencing, convicted of contempt of Congress. He also faces felony fraud charges arising from an alleged border-wall charity scam. In Trump’s universe, there is always a grift.For Confidence Man, Haberman interviewed Trump three times. He confesses that he is drawn to her, like a moth to a flame.“I love being with her,” he says. “She’s like my psychiatrist”.The daughter of Clyde Haberman, a legendary New York Times reporter, is not flattered or amused. She sees through her subject.“The reality is that he treats everyone like they are his psychiatrists,” Haberman writes. “All present a chance for him to vent or test reactions or gauge how his statements are playing or discover how he is feeling.”Also, Trump and Haberman have not always had a rapport. When he was president, she would interview him and he would attack her. In April 2018, Trump tweeted that Haberman was a Clinton “flunkie” he didn’t know or speak with, a “third-rate reporter” at that. He called her “Maggot Haberman” and even contemplated obtaining her phone records to identify her sources.Trump is 76 but he remains the envious boy from a New York outer borough, face pressed against the Midtown glass. Haberman is not the only Manhattan reporter he has courted and attacked. In 2018, he threatened Michael Wolff for writing Fire and Fury, the Trump book that started it all. Later, he welcomed Wolff to Mar-a-Lago.Haberman vividly captures Trump’s lack of couth. For just one example, according to Haberman the president chose to enrich his first meeting with a foreign leader, Theresa May, by asking the British prime minister to “imagine if some animals with tattoos raped your daughter and she got pregnant”.Each of Trump’s three supreme court justices voted to overturn Roe v Wade. One might wonder how the young woman in Trump’s hypothetical would feel about that.Haberman also pierces Trump’s refusal to release his tax returns. All that talk about an “audit” was a simple dodge, birthed on a campaign plane.In the run-up to Super Tuesday, the crucial day of primaries in March 2016, aides confronted Trump about his taxes. The candidate, Haberman writes, “thought for a second about how to ‘get myself out of this’, as he said. He leaned back, before snapping up to a sudden thought.01:13“‘Well, you know my taxes are under audit. I always get audited … So what I mean is, well I could just say, ‘I’ll release them when I’m no longer under audit. ‘Cause I’ll never not be under audit.’”These days, the Trump Organization faces criminal tax fraud charges. Together with Ivanka, Don Jr and Eric, his children from his first marriage, Trump is also being sued for fraud by Letitia James, the New York attorney general.As a younger reporter, Haberman did two stints at the New York Post, Rupert Murdoch’s flagship US tabloid. Murdoch’s succession plans – it’s Lachlan, he told Trump – appear in Confidence Man. So does Tucker Carlson, the headline-making Fox News host and kindred spirit to Vladimir Putin.Trump made up audit excuse for not releasing tax returns on the fly, new book saysRead moreAccording to Haberman, Carlson met Kushner and demanded Trump commute Roger Stone’s conviction for perjury.“What happened to Roger Stone should never happen to anyone in this country of any political party,” Carlson reportedly thundered, threatening to go public.Stone has since emerged as a central figure in the January 6 insurrection. Apparently, he has a thing for violence. For some Republicans, a commitment to “law and order” is elastic.When it comes to the attempt to overturn the election and the Capitol attack it fueled, Trump’s fate rests with prosecutors in Washington DC and Fulton county, Georgia.That old campaign chant from 2016, “Lock her up”? It carries its own irony.
      Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America is published in the US by Penguin Random House
      TopicsBooksDonald TrumpTrump administrationUS politicsRepublicansUS elections 2016US elections 2020reviewsReuse this content More

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      ‘He’s done’: how Donald Trump’s legal woes have just gotten a lot worse

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      ‘He’s done’: how Donald Trump’s legal woes have just gotten a lot worseNew York civil lawsuit accusing Trump family of ‘staggering’ fraud could derail presidential bid, experts say Donald Trump’s legal perils have become insurmountable and could snuff out the former US president’s hopes of an election-winning comeback, according to political analysts and legal experts.On Wednesday, Trump and three of his adult children were accused of lying to tax collectors, lenders and insurers in a “staggering” fraud scheme that routinely misstated the value of his properties to enrich themselves.The civil lawsuit, filed by New York’s attorney general, came as the FBI investigates Trump’s holding of sensitive government documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida and a special grand jury in Georgia considers whether he and others attempted to influence state election officials after his defeat there by Joe Biden.The former US president has repeatedly hinted that he intends to run for the White House again in 2024. But the cascade of criminal, civil and congressional investigations could yet derail that bid.01:13“He’s done,” said Allan Lichtman, a history professor at American University, in Washington, who has accurately predicted every presidential election since 1984. “He’s got too many burdens, too much baggage to be able to run again even presuming he escapes jail, he escapes bankruptcy. I’m not sure he’s going to escape jail.”Allen Weisselberg, Trump Organization financial chief, pleads guilty to tax fraudRead moreAfter a three-year investigation, Letitia James, the New York attorney general, alleged that Trump provided fraudulent statements of his net worth and false asset valuations to obtain and satisfy loans, get insurance benefits and pay lower taxes. Offspring Don Jr, Ivanka and Eric were also named as defendants.At a press conference, James riffed on the title of Trump’s 1987 memoir and business how-to book, The Art of the Deal.“This investigation revealed that Donald Trump engaged in years of illegal conduct to inflate his net worth, to deceive banks and the people of the great state of New York. Claiming you have money that you do not have does not amount to ‘the art of the deal’. It’s the art of the steal,” she said.Her office requested that the former president pay at least $250m in penalties and that his family be banned from running businesses in the state.James cannot bring criminal charges against Trump in this civil investigation but she said she was referring allegations of criminal fraud to federal prosecutors in Manhattan as well as the Internal Revenue Service.Trump repeated his go-to defence that the suit is “another witch hunt” against him and again referred to James, who is Black, as racist, via his Truth Social platform, also calling her “a fraud who campaigned on a ‘get Trump’ platform, despite the fact that the city is one of the crime and murder disasters of the world under her watch!”But critics said the suit strikes at the heart of Trump’s self-portrayal as a successful property developer who made billions, hosted the reality TV show The Apprentice and promised to apply that business acumen to the presidency.Laurence Tribe, a constitutional law professor at Harvard University, noted that the civil component “involves things of particular significance to Trump and his family and his organisation, namely their ability to defraud the public, to defraud banks, to defraud insurance companies, and to continue to subsist through corruption. Without all of that corruption, the entire Trump empire is involved in something like meltdown.”Tribe added: “Trump is probably more concerned with things of this kind than he is with having to wear an orange jumpsuit and maybe answer a criminal indictment … As a practical matter, this is probably going to cause more sleepless nights for Mr Trump than almost anything else.”No previous former president has faced investigations so numerous and so serious. Last month FBI agents searched Mar-a-Lago and seized official documents marked Top Secret, Secret and Confidential. Trump faces possible indictment for violating the Espionage Act, obstruction of a federal investigation or mishandling sensitive government records.As so often during his business career, Trump sought to throw sand in the legal gears. He bought time by persuading a court to appoint a judge, Raymond Dearie, as a special master to review the documents. But so far Dearie appears to be far from a yes-man. On Tuesday he warned Trump’s lawyers: “My view is you can’t have your cake and eat it too.”Special master in Trump case appears skeptical of declassification claimsRead moreThe ex-president also faces a state grand jury investigation in Georgia over efforts to subvert that state’s election result in 2020.The justice department is investigating his role in the deadly January 6 attack on the US Capitol by a mob of his supporters intent on preventing the certification of Biden’s election victory. Its efforts have been boosted by the parallel investigation by a House of Representatives committee, whose hearings are set to resume next week.In addition, the Trump Organization – which manages hotels, golf courses and other properties around the world – is set to go on trial next month in a criminal case alleging that it schemed to give untaxed perks to senior executives, including its longtime finance chief Allen Weisselberg, who alone took more than $1.7m in extras.In a further setback on Wednesday, arguably Trump’s worst-ever day of legal defeats, a federal appeals court permitted the justice department to resume its review of classified records seized from Mar-a-Lago as part of its criminal investigation.The former president, meanwhile, insisted that he did nothing wrong in retaining the documents. “There doesn’t have to be a process, as I understand it,” he told the Fox News host Sean Hannity. “If you’re the president of the United States, you can declassify just by saying: ‘It’s declassified’.”“Even by thinking about it, because you’re sending it to Mar-a-Lago or to wherever you’re sending it … There can be a process, but there doesn’t have to be.”Trump says you can declassify documents by just thinking about it pic.twitter.com/cFbQ1zclnq— Acyn (@Acyn) September 22, 2022
      Despite it all, Trump has been laying the groundwork for a potential comeback campaign and has accused Biden’s administration of targeting him to undermine his political prospects.Asked by a conservative radio host what would happen if he was indicted over the classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, Trump replied: “I think you’d have problems in this country the likes of which perhaps we’ve never seen before. I don’t think the people of the United States would stand for it.”Kurt Bardella, an adviser to the Democratic National Committee, said: “If the best defence you have for your conduct is: if you hold me accountable, there will be violence, that sounds like someone who has no business being either in public service or being outside of jail.”Bardella expressed hope that, at long last, Trump would be held to account. “Everything about Donald Trump has always been about the grift. It’s always been about the con. And now his unmasking is at hand.”TopicsDonald TrumpLaw (US)New YorkIvanka TrumpDonald Trump JrMar-a-LagoUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      New York attorney general announces civil lawsuit against Trump and family

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      New York attorney general announces civil lawsuit against Trump and familyMove by Letitia James comes after culmination of years-long investigation of financial practices at the Trump Organization01:13The attorney general of New York state has filed a civil fraud lawsuit against Donald Trump and three of his children involved in the family real-estate business, for falsely inflating his net worth by billions in order to enrich himself and secure favorable loans.Don’t cheer for the Espionage Act being used against Donald Trump. It will backfire | Trevor TimmRead moreAnnouncing the suit in New York on Wednesday, Letitia James also said referrals had been made to federal prosecutors and the Internal Revenue Service – a move sure to anger the former US president and increase consternation among his inner circle about the depth of his legal predicament.Trump, Donald Trump Jr, Ivanka Trump and Eric Trump were all deposed during the New York investigation, which began when Trump was president and lasted for three years.The lawsuit seeks to bar all four Trumps from serving as executives in New York, and to prohibit the Trump Organization from acquiring any commercial real estate or receiving loans from New York-based entities for five years.James added: “The complaint demonstrates that Donald Trump falsely inflated his net worth by billions of dollars to unjustly enrich himself and to cheat the system, thereby cheating all of us. He did this with the help of the other defendants.”James said her office uncovered evidence of federal criminal violations including issuing false statements to financial institutions and bank fraud, and had referred the matter to the southern district of New York and the IRS.The lawsuit states: “The number of grossly inflated asset values is staggering, affecting most if not all of the real estate holdings in any given year.”The suit also seeks to recover at least $250m and to bar the Trump Organization chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, and comptroller, Jeffrey McConney, from serving in top roles of any company in New York.In a separate criminal investigation, in New York, Weisselberg, 75, has pleaded guilty to tax fraud.Noting how Trump and Weisselberg cited fifth-amendment protections against self-incrimination when refusing to answer questions at deposition, James said: “For too long, powerful, wealthy people in this country have operated as if the rules do not apply to them.“Donald Trump stands out as among the most egregious examples. Trump thought he could get away with the art of the steal but today that conduct ends.”Though the New York suit is not a criminal prosecution, James’s referral to federal prosecutors at the southern district of New York threatens further serious legal peril for the former president and his three adult children.Trump has repeatedly suggested he will run again for president in 2024. But he faces legal threats including possible indictment over his retention of classified records and multiple investigations of his attempts to overturn the 2020 election.The former president and his attorneys have castigated the New York investigation as a politically motivated “witch-hunt” – his default position under scrutiny – and insisted that the Trump Organization did not operate illegally.But in the 214-page complaint, James outlined an extensive record of alleged wrongdoing, such as fraudulently inflating the value of 23 properties including the Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, Trump Tower in New York and what was previously the Trump International hotel in Washington DC.James alleged that the defendants made more than 200 false and misleading asset valuations in financial statements between 2011 and 2021, and revealed strategies she said Trump and his organization used to commit fraud.Mar-a-Lago, the suit says, was valued as high as $739m when it should have been closer to $75m.James also said the Trumps “received a series of bank ordered appraisals for the commercial property at 40 Wall Street in New York City that calculated the value of the property at $200m as of August 2010 and $220m as of November 2012.“Yet in his 2011 statement, Mr Trump listed 40 Wall Street with a value of $524m, which increased to $530m over the next two years, more than twice the value calculated by the professionals.“Even more egregious, the $500m-plus valuation was attributed to information from the appraiser who valued the building at just over $200m.”Regarding Trump Tower, on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, James said: “Mr Trump represented that his apartment spanned more than 30,000 sq ft, which was the basis for valuing the apartment. In reality, the apartment had an area of less than 11,000 sq ft, something Mr Trump was well aware of.“Based on that inflated square footage, the value of the apartment in 2015 and 2016 was $327m. To this date, no apartment in New York City has ever sold for close to that amount. Tripling the size of the apartment for purposes of the valuation was intentional and deliberate fraud. Not an honest mistake.”Trump has consistently accused James of being politically motivated. Before James’s announcement, Bloomberg News reported that “members of Trump’s inner circle” saw the suit as “a fundraising opportunity for James, a Democrat facing re-election in November”.Trump has also claimed that the attorney general, who is Black, is racist.As James spoke, Donald Trump Jr tweeted: “The bullshit Dem[ocratic] witch-hunt continues!”Trump lawyer Alina Habba said the lawsuit “is neither focused on the facts nor the law, rather it is solely focused on advancing the attorney general’s political agenda,” accusing James of abusing her authority “by prying into transactions where absolutely no wrongdoing has taken place”.Habba said the allegations in the lawsuit are “meritless”.Summing up on Wednesday morning, James said: “I want to be clear. White-collar financial crime is not a victimless crime.”Repeating her allusion to Trump’s most famous ghosted book, she added: “Claiming you have money that you do not have does not amount to the art of the deal. It’s the art of the steal.“There cannot be different rules for different people in this country or in this state … No one is above the law.”
      The Associated Press contributed reporting
      TopicsDonald TrumpNew YorkUS politicsDonald Trump JrIvanka TrumpnewsReuse this content More

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      'Trump falsely inflated his net worth': NY attorney general files lawsuit against Trump – video

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      Letitia James, attorney general of New York state, has filed a civil lawsuit against Donald Trump and members of his family for doctoring their finances in order to obtain favourable borrowing terms. 
      In a statement on Wednesday, James said: ‘The lawsuit alleges that Donald Trump, with the help of his children Donald Trump Jr, Ivanka Trump and Eric Trump, and senior executives of the Trump Organization, falsely inflated his net worth by billions of dollars to induce banks to lend money to the Trump Organization on more favorable terms.’
      Allen Weisselberg, a former chief financial officer for the Trump Organization, and Jeffrey McConney, a former controller, were also named in the suit.

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      Trump sued by NY attorney general for fraud – video

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      Letitia James, attorney general of New York state, has filed a civil lawsuit against Donald Trump and members of his family for doctoring their finances in order to obtain favourable borrowing terms. 
      In a statement on Wednesday, James said: ‘The lawsuit alleges that Donald Trump, with the help of his children Donald Trump Jr, Ivanka Trump and Eric Trump, and senior executives of the Trump Organization, falsely inflated his net worth by billions of dollars to induce banks to lend money to the Trump Organization on more favorable terms.’
      Allen Weisselberg, a former chief financial officer for the Trump Organization, and Jeffrey McConney, a former controller, were also named in the suit.

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      Ivana Trump funeral: Donald Trump and children attend ‘wonderful send-off’

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      Ivana Trump funeral: Donald Trump and children attend ‘wonderful send-off’Donald Jr, Ivanka and Eric – Ivana’s three children with her ex-husband – gather for memorial at Catholic church in Manhattan Ivana Trump, the businesswoman who helped her husband build an empire that launched him to the presidency, was celebrated at a funeral mass in New York City on Wednesday.Ivana Trump: a life in picturesRead moreAt St Vincent Ferrer Roman Catholic Church on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, Ivana’s three children with the former president Donald Trump – Donald Jr, Ivanka and Eric – arrived with family members just before 1.40pm, before the gold casket was taken into the church.Donald Trump, Melania, and their son, Barron, entered the church through the side door.Tiffany Trump, the daughter of the former president and Marla Maples, for whom Donald Trump divorced Ivana, also attended the service. So did family friends including the Fox News host Jeanine Pirro, and Charles Kushner, a real estate developer and the father of Ivanka Trump’s husband. The fashion designer Dennis Basso, a longtime friend of Ivana Trump, was also among the mourners.“It was an elegant and wonderful send-off for Ivana Trump,” said publicist R Couri Hay, an attendee. “The church was blanketed in red flowers, red roses – Ivana’s favorite flowers. It was majestic, it was sober.“I would say that the church was drenched in tears,” Hay also said.The Trump family announced last week that Ivana, who was 73, died at her Manhattan home. Authorities said the death was an accident, blunt impact injuries to the torso the cause.Ivana and Donald Trump were married from 1977 to 1992. In the 1980s they were a power couple and she became well known in her own right, instantly recognizable with her blond hair in an updo and glamorous look.Ivana Trump took part in her husband’s businesses, managing one of his Atlantic City casinos and picking out some of the design elements in New York City’s Trump Tower.Their divorce was ugly but in recent years they were friendly. Ivana Trump was an enthusiastic supporter of Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, and said they spoke on a regular basis.On Wednesday, press congregated across the street from the church, in the Lenox Hill section of the Upper East Side. Several secret service agents were positioned in front of the building. Police set up metal barricades.Some passersby paused to take in the activity. Marilyn Greeley, who lives nearby, said she had not known Ivana, but she saw her in a movie theater years ago.“It’s sad,” Greeley said. “Obviously, you think about how she died.”A woman who identified herself as Elaine was walking south on Lexington Avenue.“I think it’s very sad,” she said. “She fell down the stairs.”Marie-Noelle Levin, who said she met Ivana several times, came to a corner across from the church to pay her respects.“It’s very hard for me to cry, but here I am crying,” Levin said, wiping a tear.Michael Powers, a neighborhood resident, said: “I think it’s really sad that she died the way she did. She was beloved by New York City.”At about 3.30pm, Ivana’s casket was carried out of the church. Her three children, grandchildren, Donald Trump, Melania, Barron, as well as other relatives, exited the church. They left shortly thereafter.TopicsDonald TrumpNew YorkDonald Trump JrUS politicsIvanka TrumpnewsReuse this content More

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      Trump documentary exposes family divisions over Capitol attack

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      Trump documentary exposes family divisions over Capitol attackAlex Holder’s Unprecedented shows ex-president perpetuating big lie about voter fraud – but his children are much less forthcoming A documentary film scrutinised by the congressional January 6 committee exposes divisions between the former US president Donald Trump and his children over the deadly insurrection at the US Capitol.Released to the public on Sunday, Unprecedented portrays Trump’s 2020 election campaign as a family affair and features interviews with him and his inner circle before, during and after the vote.Trump lawyers feel heat as legal net tightens on plot to overturn electionRead moreBritish film-maker Alex Holder gives plenty of airtime to the ex-president and his offspring lavishing praise on one another – material that is not likely to interest the committee – but also asks their views on the fateful events of January 6.Trump reverts to his lies about widespread voter fraud: “Well, it was a sad day but it was a day where there was great anger in our country,” he says. “The people went to Washington primarily because they were angry with an election that they think was rigged.“A very small portion, as you know, went down to the Capitol and then a very small portion of them went in. But I will tell you, they were angry from the standpoint of what happened in the election and because they’re smart and they see and they saw what happened. And I believe that was a big part of what happened on January 6.”But when Holder then puts the same question to three of Trump’s children, they are less forthcoming. His son Eric says: “Yeah, let’s skip the 6th.” Son Don Jr and daughter Ivanka also decline to comment on the incendiary subject, as does vice-president Mike Pence.Ivanka’s silence is perhaps the least surprising. The film recalls how, at a campaign rally in Georgia on 4 January, Ivanka swerved past the election fraud conspiracy, allowing Don Jr to seize the opportunity to outflank her and impress his father. The January 6 committee has also heard Ivanka testify that she accepted attorney general William Barr’s assessment that the election was free and fair.Ivanka is less forthright in Unprecedented when she carefully states: “As the president has said, every single vote needs to be counted and needs to be heard. And he campaigned for the voiceless.”Author and journalist Philip Rucker comments in the film: “She was very uncomfortable with the president’s lie after the election but she would never utter anything herself to establish that disagreement.”Holder recently testified to the House of Representatives panel investigating the January 6 attack for around four hours behind closed doors about his approximately 100 hours of footage. He turned over segments of the footage demanded in a subpoena requiring his cooperation.The film-maker has also been subpoenaed to testify in a Georgia investigation into whether Trump and others illegally tried to influence the 2020 election in the state.Holder conducted three sit-down interviews with Trump, and the film is punctuated by out-takes of the president expressing concern about camera angles, lighting and objects spoiling the shot (“Can we get the orange out please? It’s very orangey”). Trump is also seen proudly watching videos of his children on the campaign trail.The interview with Pence – whom Trump pressured to overturn the election result, even though he had no such power – took place on 12 January.Pence is seen reacting to an email which the documentary says is a congressional draft resolution demanding that he invoke the 25th amendment of the constitution to remove Trump from office. Pence’s office has insisted it was in fact confirmation that his letter had been sent to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi rejecting her request to invoke the 25th amendment.During the interview, Pence says: “I’m always hopeful about America. I always believe that America’s best days are yet to come. I still believe that.”Earlier, the vice-president recalls happier times when he and his family were invited to Trump’s golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, to discuss becoming his running mate in 2016. “I did play golf,” he says. “Not the way he does.”By January 6 2021, Trump was assailing Pence via Twitter and, the House committee has heard, raising no objection to the notion of his deputy being hanged by the mob. The documentary features Trump saying: “I think I treat people well, unless they don’t treat me well, in which case you go to war.”It shows the Trump clan inside a bubble where they speak at huge rallies, are told by aides that the president is on course for re-election and come to think that defeat is unthinkable. At one point Ivanka remarks: “I’ve been in four states in the last two days and the energy and excitement for the president surpasses that in 2016.”Speaking to the Guardian earlier this month, Holder said he went into the interviews with Trump and his children with open-ended questions and a deferential approach to avoid the exchanges coming off as confrontational.At one point Holder asks Ivanka: “What’s your first memory of your father?” She replies: “He used to sing to me when I was little, and nobody knew this except me and him until my mom caught him on the baby monitor, which I cannot imagine him doing now.”Holder then asks Trump if he remembers that story. He replies: “I do, sure, I used to sing to all my kids a little bit. When I say sing, not sing with any ideas for myself to go to Carnegie Hall someday. Just, you know, I love my kids. I’ve been, I think, a very good father. It’s been very important to me.”In another segment, Ivanka comments: “Well, arguably, nobody takes more incoming than the president. I mean, most people would be under their desk in a fetal position sucking their thumb crying. And most politicians don’t have the strength or the conviction to withstand that pushback. This president does and I think our whole family does.”Her husband, Jared Kushner, also speaks in glowing terms about his father-in-law.But the three-part documentary, streaming on Discovery+, also contains raw footage of the Capitol attack recorded by Holder’s director of photography, Michael Crommett, and multiple critical voices from academics, authors and journalists.Princeton University’s Eddie Glaude, a professor of African American studies, comments about January 6: “If the kindling is just sitting there and no one throws the match on it, it’s just going to sit there. Trump threw the match so he’s responsible. All of the folks around him are responsible because they threw the damn match.”TopicsDonald TrumpUS politicsMike PenceIvanka TrumpJared KushnernewsReuse this content More