Presidential Election of 2020

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      How the Obama-Trump Presidential Transition Led to Chaos

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      On Jan. 5, the night before Congress met to certify Joe Biden’s victory in the presidential election, Michael Flynn — the retired three-star general, ousted national security adviser and pardoned felon — gave an interview to the prominent conspiracy theorist Alex Jones in which he assured the viewers of Infowars.com that Donald Trump would serve as president for another four years. It was a certainty, Flynn said. He referred to his experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan — “taking over countries, or running elections in countries” — and broke the present conflict down to the binary of “we” versus “they.” Flynn did not specify how, exactly, the intervention into the American election would work, though he alluded to “procedures” related to Trump’s authorities under a national emergency because of “foreign interference from multiple countries.”

      “They tried to silence you,” Jones said, referring to Flynn’s 2017 expulsion from the White House. “They failed. Now you’ve come through the fire as a phoenix.” Later that night, Flynn addressed a crowd of several thousand (Jones said there were a million) gathered in Washington. “We are the ones that will decide,” Flynn said. The following afternoon, as the electoral votes were being counted, a pro-Trump mob invaded the Capitol.

      Flynn’s re-emergence on the national stage was taking place almost four years to the date after the events that brought him down during the first days of Trump’s presidency — events that have since become the founding legend of a right-wing mythology. The crucial date was Jan. 24, 2017, when Flynn, the incoming national security adviser, sat down in his new West Wing office with two F.B.I. agents, who wanted to talk to him about a series of phone calls he had with the Russian ambassador. The battle that ensued over those phone calls cost Flynn his job, and later he would twice plead guilty to a felony for making false statements.

      Flynn’s dismissal was among the first public flash points in what would become an all-consuming political war over Trump’s relationship with Russia, a fight that would consume both his presidency and the country for years. Trump, for his part, never seemed interested in dispelling his opponents’ suspicions. During a campaign news conference, he asked the Russians to find a tranche of Hillary Clinton’s emails, a request that was directly followed by an actual Russian-backed email hacking attempt. Later, as president, he divulged classified information to Russian officials in the Oval Office, refused to accept his own government’s account of Russia’s role in the 2016 election and sided with Vladimir Putin on that question at a summit in Helsinki. “He just said it’s not Russia,” Trump said. “I don’t see any reason why it would be.” Just this past December, when news of a devastating cyberattack on the federal government was made public, almost everyone, including members of Trump’s cabinet and his former homeland security adviser, attributed the attack to Russia, but Trump pointedly did not. “Everything is well under control,” the president tweeted — before raising the possibility that China, not Russia, was the culprit.

      For many Trump critics, the Russia question still lingers. John Brennan, a former C.I.A. director, has noted Trump’s “strange obsequiousness” to Putin; Jim Comey, a former F.B.I. director, has acknowledged the possibility that the Russians “have leverage.” “I suspect they may have something on him either financial or personal, or both, but that’s just speculation,” James Clapper, a former director of national intelligence, wrote to me in an interview conducted by email in late 2020. “I don’t know, but it’s hard to come up with another plausible explanation for his inexplicable deference.” The worries about Trump’s loyalties extend into his own circle. Dan Coats, who served under Trump as director of national intelligence, harbored “deep suspicions” that Putin “had something” on Trump, according to a book by Bob Woodward. (Some Trump critics remain skeptical. I asked John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser, what he would say to those who claim that Trump is compromised by Russia. “I’d say the same thing to them that I’d say to the Trump campaign about the so-called fraud in the election,” he replied. “Where’s the evidence?”)

      Few Trump allies on Capitol Hill go as far as Flynn or Alex Jones, but many partake of the same grievance narrative, in which the Russia-related wounds inflicted on Trump’s legitimacy after the 2016 election somehow justify their refusal to accept the outcome of this one. “It bothers me greatly that they would be monitoring the incoming national security adviser,” Senator Lindsey Graham told me, referring to Flynn’s treatment by departing members of the Obama administration. “That is really damaging to the transition of power.” (Graham’s claim that Flynn was monitored is misleading. There is no evidence that Flynn’s communications were singled out for persistent surveillance; instead it was what he said and whom he said it to that caused some of his calls to surface later.)

      It took until Jan. 6 for Graham to formally recognize Biden as the legitimate president-elect; when we spoke in mid-December, he did not seem sure how best to refer to his former Senate colleague. “I am sure that the uh, the uh, Biden administration-in-waiting is talking to people all over the world right now,” he said, arguing that Flynn’s engagement with the Russians during the transition was normal. The Obama administration “had no business getting the transcripts” of Flynn’s calls, he said, because Flynn was “talking to the Russian ambassador as the national security adviser.”

      At the more vocal end of electoral deniers is Representative Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio. Without offering any evidence, Jordan alleged that the Obama administration concocted a “plot” to “take down Michael Flynn” because Flynn’s intelligence background meant he would “figure out what they did” to Trump. “We hear so much about this term ‘peaceful transfer of power,’” Jordan told me in mid-December. “They didn’t follow that. They were trying not to let him” — that is, Trump — “be president.”

      The crisis of Trump’s departure from Washington has exposed the degree to which factions in American political life now inhabit entirely separate realities. But to understand that divergence, which has taken increasingly dire forms as a new presidential transition concludes, it’s important to revisit the transition of four years ago: Trump’s own messy ascension to the presidency, with its murkiness surrounding his relationship with Russia and the debate over what to do about it. The questions that Obama’s national-security team had to come to grips with about its successors almost sound like the premise of an airport novel. Was the president-elect a Manchurian candidate? Was he secretly videotaped by the Russian security service? Was his national security adviser a Russian asset? In January 2017, with less than three weeks to go before Trump assumed power, it was up to them to decide how to continue the Russia investigation under a president who could easily wind up in its cross hairs.

      The earliest debates about how to deal with Trump have been recorded by congressional testimony, recently declassified documents, investigations by the Justice Department’s inspector general and a five-volume report by the Senate Intelligence Committee. In addition to existing sources, this account draws on interviews and correspondence with more than a dozen participants who experienced both sides of the transition firsthand. Looming over all of those events was the same, bracing question that America faces now, on the eve of a new transition: In our era of extreme polarization, can the presidency successfully pass from one party to the other without the entire political system threatening to fall apart? More

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      House Sets Impeachment Vote to Charge Trump With Incitement

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Trump ImpeachmentliveLatest UpdatesHouse Introduces ChargeHow Impeachment Might Work25th Amendment ExplainedAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyHouse Sets Impeachment Vote to Charge Trump With IncitementDemocrats are planning a Tuesday vote to formally call on the vice president to wrest power from President Trump and a Wednesday impeachment vote if he does not.Capitol Police officers standing guard on Monday outside the Speaker’s Lobby of the House chamber at the Capitol.Credit…Erin Schaff/The New York TimesJan. 11, 2021Updated 9:33 p.m. ETWASHINGTON — House Democrats introduced an article of impeachment against President Trump on Monday for his role in inflaming a mob that attacked the Capitol, scheduling a Wednesday vote to charge the president with “inciting violence against the government of the United States” if Vice President Mike Pence refused to strip him of power first.Moving with exceptional speed, top House leaders began summoning lawmakers still stunned by the attack back to Washington, promising the protection of National Guard troops and Federal Air Marshal escorts after last week’s stunning security failure. Their return set up a high-stakes 24-hour standoff between two branches of government.As the impeachment drive proceeded, federal law enforcement authorities accelerated efforts to fortify the Capitol ahead of President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s inauguration on Jan. 20. The authorities announced plans to deploy up to 15,000 National Guard troops and set up a multilayered buffer zone with checkpoints around the building by Wednesday, just as lawmakers are to debate and vote on impeaching Mr. Trump.Federal authorities also said they were bracing for a wave of armed protests in all 50 state capitals and Washington in the days leading up to the inauguration.“I’m not afraid of taking the oath outside,” Mr. Biden said Monday, referring to a swearing-in scheduled to take place on a platform on the west side of the Capitol, in the very spot where rioters marauded last week, beating police officers and vandalizing the building.Mr. Biden signaled more clearly than before that he would not stand in the way of the impeachment proceeding, telling reporters in Newark, Del., that his primary focus was trying to minimize the effect an all-consuming trial in the Senate might have on his first days in office.He said he had consulted with lawmakers about the possibility they could “bifurcate” the proceedings in the Senate, such that half of each day would be spent on the trial and half on the confirmation of his cabinet and other nominees.In the House, a vote was scheduled for Tuesday evening to first formally call on Mr. Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment. Republicans had objected on Monday to unanimously passing the resolution, which asked the vice president to declare “president Donald J. Trump incapable of executing the duties of his office and to immediately exercise powers as acting president.”The House is slated to begin debate on the impeachment resolution on Wednesday morning, marching toward a vote late in the day unless Mr. Pence intervenes beforehand.“The president’s threat to America is urgent, and so too will be our action,” Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California said, outlining a timetable that will most likely leave Mr. Trump impeached one week to the day after he encouraged his supporters to march to the Capitol as lawmakers met to formalize Mr. Biden’s victory.The vice president had already indicated that he was unlikely to act to force the president aside, and no one in either party expected Mr. Trump to step down. With that in mind, Democrats had already begun preparing a lengthier impeachment report documenting the president’s actions and the destruction that followed to accompany their charge.They were confident they had the votes to make Mr. Trump the first president ever to be impeached twice.The impeachment article invoked the 14th Amendment, the post-Civil War-era addition to the Constitution that prohibits anyone who “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the United States from holding future office. Lawmakers also cited specific language from Mr. Trump’s speech last Wednesday riling up the crowd, quoting him saying, “If you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”The Republican Party was fracturing over the coming debate, as some agreed with Democrats that Mr. Trump should be removed and many others were standing behind the president and his legions of loyal voters. They were also fighting among themselves, with many Republicans furious over what took place a week ago and blaming their own colleagues and leaders for having contributed to the combustible atmosphere that allowed a pro-Trump rally to morph into a deadly siege.Unlike Mr. Trump’s first impeachment, in 2019, few Republicans were willing to muster a defense of Mr. Trump’s actions, and Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the top House Republican, privately told his conference that the president deserved some blame for the violence, according to two people familiar with his remarks. Mr. McCarthy remained personally opposed to impeachment and tried to hold his conference together during a lengthy call on Monday afternoon.But as many as a dozen Republicans were said to be considering joining Democrats to impeach, including Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming, the No. 3 House Republican.“It’s something we’re strongly considering at this point,” said Representative Peter Meijer, a freshman Republican from Michigan, told a Fox affiliate in his home state. “I think what we saw on Wednesday left the president unfit for office.”Mr. Trump gave his party little direction or reason to rally around him. Ensconced at the White House and barred from Twitter, he offered no defense of himself or the armed assailants who overtook the Capitol, endangering the lives of congressional leaders, their staffs and his own vice president.Chad F. Wolf, the acting secretary of homeland security, became the latest cabinet official to resign in the aftermath of the Capitol riot, stepping down just nine days before he was expected to help coordinate the security at the inauguration.If Mr. Trump is impeached by the House, which now seems virtually certain, he would then face trial in the Senate, which requires all senators be in the chamber while the charges are being considered. Democrats had briefly considered trying to delay an impeachment trial until the spring, to buy Mr. Biden more time without the cloud of such a proceeding hanging over the start of his presidency, but by late Monday, most felt they could not justify such a swift impeachment and then justify a delay.Still, the timing of a trial remained unclear because the Senate was not currently in session. Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the top Democrat, was considering trying to use emergency procedures to force the chamber back before Jan. 20, a senior Democratic aide said, but doing so would take the consent of his Republican counterpart, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.House leaders said the timing and outcome of any Senate trial was secondary to their sense of urgency to charge Mr. Trump with crimes against the country.“Whether impeachment can pass the United States Senate is not the issue,” Representative Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, the majority leader, told reporters. “The issue is, we have a president who most of us believe participated in encouraging an insurrection and attack on this building, and on democracy and trying to subvert the counting of the presidential ballot.”Other accountability efforts were underway in the shadow of the drive to punish Mr. Trump. Law enforcement fanned out across the country to track down and arrest members of the mob and heavily fortified the Capitol, where National Guard troops clad in camouflage uniforms roamed the ornate corridors and patrolled the sidewalks outside.Representative Tim Ryan of Ohio said the Capitol Police were investigating roughly a dozen of their own officers and had suspended two for potentially aiding the insurrectionists. One took selfies with those laying waste to the Capitol; another donned a “Make America Great Again” cap and potentially gave them directions, Mr. Ryan said.“Any incidents of Capitol Police facilitating or being part of what happened, we need to know that,” he said.Progressive lawmakers called for investigations and possible expulsions of Republicans who had supported Mr. Trump’s attempt to overturn the election and helped stoke the violence. More moderate Democrats discussed plans to try to ostracize them going forward — including by refusing to sign onto their legislative efforts or routine requests — because they were likely to remain in Congress. Republicans stoking the bogus claims of election theft themselves were mostly unapologetic and insisted their actions had nothing to do with the violence done in Mr. Trump’s name.“There may well be a vote on impeachment on Wednesday,” Representative Steny H. Hoyer, Democrat of Maryland and the majority leader, told reporters.Credit…Anna Moneymaker for The New York TimesThe four-page impeachment article charges Mr. Trump with “inciting violence against the government of the United States” when he sowed false claims about election fraud and encouraged his supporters at a rally outside the White House to take extraordinary measures to stop the counting of electoral votes underway at the Capitol. A short time later, rioters mobbed the building, ransacking the seat of American government and killing a Capitol Police officer. (At least four others died as a result of injuries or medical emergencies on Capitol grounds.)“In all this, President Trump gravely endangered the security of the United States and its institutions of government,” the article read. “He threatened the integrity of the democratic system, interfered with the peaceful transition of power, and imperiled a coequal branch of government. He thereby betrayed his trust as president, to the manifest injury of the people of the United States.”Members of the Maryland National Guard next to a statue of President Abraham Lincoln in the Capitol’s crypt on Monday.Credit…Erin Schaff/The New York TimesModern presidential impeachments have been drawn-out affairs, allowing lawmakers to collect evidence, hone arguments and hear the president’s defense over the course of months. When the Democratic-led House impeached Mr. Trump the first time, it took nearly three months, conducting dozens of witness interviews, compiling hundreds of pages of documents and producing a detailed case in a written report running 300 pages.It appeared this time that the House planned to do so in less than a week, with little more evidence than the fast accumulating public record of cellphone videos, photographs, police and journalistic accounts, and the words of Mr. Trump himself.“To those who would say, ‘Why do it now, there are only nine days left the president’s term?’” said Joe Neguse of Colorado, who has been drafting messaging guidance for the party. “I would say, ‘There are nine days in the president’s term.’”Mr. Trump’s most outspoken defenders opposed impeachment, though most did not explicitly defend his conduct. Many of them who just last week backed his drive to overturn Mr. Biden’s victory and voted to toss out legitimate results from key battleground states, argued that to impeach the president now would only further divide the country.In a letter to colleagues, Mr. McCarthy wrote that impeachment would “have the opposite effect of bringing our country together when we need to get America back on a path towards unity and civility.” He tried to point Republicans toward possible alternatives, including censure, a bipartisan commission to investigate the attack, changing the law that governs the electoral counting process that rioters disrupted and electoral integrity legislation.“Please know I share your anger and your pain,” he wrote. “Zip ties were found on staff desks in my office. Windows were smashed in. Property was stolen. Those images will never leave us — and I thank our men and women in law enforcement who continue to protect us and are working to bring the sick individuals who perpetrated these attacks to justice.”Some moderate Democrats were growing uneasy about the implications of such fast and punitive action, fearful both of the consequences for Mr. Biden’s agenda during his first days in office and of further igniting violence across the country among Mr. Trump’s most extreme supporters. They tried to cobble together support for a bipartisan censure resolution instead, but it appeared it might be too late to stop the momentum in favor of impeachment.Ms. Pelosi shut the idea down during her private call with Democrats, saying that censure “would be an abdication of our responsibility,” according to an official familiar with her remarks.Reporting was contributed by More

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      How Republicans Fanned the Flames Before US Capitol Building Riot

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Capitol Riot FalloutliveLatest UpdatesInside the SiegeInauguration SecurityNotable ArrestsIncitement to Riot?AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyBefore Capitol Riot, Republican Lawmakers Fanned the FlamesA “1776 moment”: Several of the president’s closest allies in Congress used bellicose language to urge their supporters to attend the Jan. 6 rally that turned into a deadly riot.Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia with other Republican lawmakers at the Capitol on Jan. 4. Ms. Greene and other Trump allies met with the president in December to discuss their drive to overturn the election results.Credit…Anna Moneymaker for The New York TimesCatie Edmondson and Jan. 11, 2021Updated 8:35 p.m. ETWASHINGTON — Standing before a crowd of thousands of MAGA-clad protesters on the National Mall on Wednesday, Representative Mo Brooks roared out a message that he said members of Congress who dared to accept President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s victory needed to hear.“Today is the day American patriots start taking down names and kicking ass,” said Mr. Brooks, Republican of Alabama. “Are you willing to do what it takes to fight for America? Louder! Will you fight for America?”Hours later, urged on by President Trump at the same rally, rioters stormed the Capitol, where Congress was meeting to formalize Mr. Biden’s election, chanting “Hang Mike Pence,” threatening to shoot Speaker Nancy Pelosi and forcing lawmakers to evacuate the building in a scene of violence and mayhem. Afterward, police officers recovered long guns, Molotov cocktails, explosive devices and zip ties. At least five people, including a Capitol Police officer, died during the protests and the siege and in the immediate aftermath.Even after the tear gas cleared and the Capitol was secured, more than 135 House Republicans, including the party’s two top leaders, ultimately voted to throw out millions of lawfully cast votes, fulfilling the rioters’ demands and answering Mr. Trump’s call for Congress to subvert the election results in his favor.But a handful of Mr. Trump’s most loyal allies in the House had gone even further in the days and weeks before the riot, urging their supporters to come to Washington on Jan. 6 to make a defiant last stand to keep him in power. They linked arms with the organizers of the protest and used inflammatory, bellicose language to describe the stakes.Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Lauren Boebert of Colorado, first-term lawmakers who ran as outspoken defenders of Mr. Trump, referred to the day as Republicans’ “1776 moment.”Representative Paul Gosar of Arizona, who for weeks promoted the Jan. 6 protest and other “Stop the Steal” events across the country more than a dozen times, repeatedly referred to Mr. Biden as an “illegitimate usurper” and suggested that Mr. Trump was the victim of an attempted “coup.”“Be ready to defend the Constitution and the White House,” Mr. Gosar wrote in an op-ed titled “Are We Witnessing a Coup d’État?”As rioters laid siege to the Capitol, Mr. Gosar posted a message of calm on Twitter, telling his followers, “Let’s not get carried away here.” But he wrote a far more sympathetic message on Parler, using the same photo of people scaling the walls of the building: “Americans are upset.”Their comments have raised questions about the degree to which Republicans may have coordinated with protest organizers. In a since-deleted tweet, Representative Pete Sessions, Republican of Texas, wrote that he “had a great meeting today with the folks from Stop The Steal,” one of the leading groups that organized last week’s rally.And in a separate video, Ali Alexander, a far-right activist and conspiracy theorist who emerged as a leader of Stop the Steal, claimed that he, along with Mr. Brooks, Mr. Gosar and Representative Andy Biggs of Arizona, had set the Jan. 6 event in motion.“We four schemed up of putting maximum pressure on Congress while they were voting,” Mr. Alexander said in a since-deleted video, “so that who we couldn’t rally, we could change the hearts and the minds of Republicans who were in that body, hearing our loud roar from outside.”A spokesman for Mr. Biggs denied in a statement on Monday that the lawmaker had had any role in organizing the rally, and said he had focused his efforts on working “within the confines of the law and established precedent to restore integrity to our elections.”“Congressman Biggs is not aware of hearing of or meeting Mr. Alexander at any point — let alone working with him to organize some part of a planned protest on Jan. 6,” said the spokesman, Daniel Stefanski. “He did not have any contact with protesters or rioters, nor did he ever encourage or foster the rally or protests on Jan. 6.”But Mr. Gosar appeared to be on friendly terms with Mr. Alexander, frequently tagging him in Twitter posts. At a rally late last month outside the Arizona State Capitol at which Mr. Gosar spoke, Mr. Alexander called the congressman “the spirit animal of this movement.”“He’s helped out where he could,” Mr. Alexander said. “He’s offered to call donors. We actually had our first D.C. march because he called me and he said, ‘You need to go to the Supreme Court.’ I said, ‘All right, my captain.’ And that’s what started that.”“Are you willing to do what it takes to fight for America?” Representative Mo Brooks asked at the rally on Jan. 6. Credit…Jacquelyn Martin/Associated PressFor his part, Mr. Brooks has remained unapologetic about his role in encouraging the rioters.“I make no apology for doing my absolute best to inspire patriotic Americans to not give up on our country and to fight back against anti-Christian socialists in the 2022 and 2024 elections,” Mr. Brooks told a local newspaper. “I encourage EVERY citizen to watch my entire rally speech and decide for themselves what kind of America they want: One based on freedom and liberty or one based on godless dictatorial power.”Representative Tom Malinowski, Democrat of New Jersey, on Monday introduced a resolution to formally censure Mr. Brooks, asserting that he was responsible for inciting the crowd and “endangering the lives of his fellow members of Congress.”“We’re going to need to take a broader look at members of Congress who may have encouraged or even facilitated the attack on the Capitol,” Mr. Malinowski said in an interview. “People like Brooks literally endangered the lives of their fellow members,” he said.Other House Democrats were pushing to invoke Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, added after the Civil War, which disqualifies people who “have engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the United States from holding public office. The clause was originally enacted to limit the influence of former Confederates in the Reconstruction era.Representative Cori Bush, Democrat of Missouri, introduced a resolution on Monday with 47 co-sponsors that would initiate investigations for “removal of the members who attempted to overturn the results of the election and incited a white supremacist attempted coup.”“I can’t act like it didn’t affect me,” Ms. Bush said in an interview of being in the Capitol during the siege. “I felt in danger. My staff was in danger.”Ms. Bush said she did not know ultimately how many members of Congress should be expelled, but expected to learn the number from an investigation of the Ethics Committee.“Even if it’s just a few, we have to make sure the message is clear that you cannot be a sitting Congress member and incite an insurrection and work to overturn an election,” she said. For weeks before the rally, mimicking Mr. Trump’s tone, Republican operatives and lawmakers had used inflammatory language to describe the president’s effort to overturn Mr. Biden’s victory.At a Turning Point USA event in December, Representative Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina encouraged attendees to “call your congressman and feel free — you can lightly threaten them.”“Say: ‘If you don’t support election integrity, I’m coming after you. Madison Cawthorn’s coming after you. Everybody’s coming after you,’” Mr. Cawthorn said.Some of Mr. Trump’s closest allies in Congress, including Mr. Brooks, Mr. Gosar, Mr. Biggs and Ms. Greene, met with him at the White House in December to discuss their drive to overturn the election results. Lawmakers present described the meeting as a fairly dry one, centered on how the process would play out on the House and Senate floors.But Mr. Gosar cast the meeting to his followers as a call to action, pledging not to “accept disenfranchisement” of those who voted for Mr. Trump.“This sedition,” he wrote, “will be stopped.”Kevin Roose More

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      State Capitols ‘on High Alert,’ Fearing More Violence

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Capitol Riot FalloutliveLatest UpdatesInside the SiegeInauguration SecurityNotable ArrestsIncitement to Riot?AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyState Capitols ‘on High Alert,’ Fearing More ViolenceOfficials around the country are bracing for any spillover from last week’s violent assault on the U.S. Capitol. State legislatures already have become targets for protesters in recent days.A member of the Georgia State Patrol SWAT team looked on outside the Georgia State Capitol after the opening day of the legislative session on Monday in Atlanta.Credit…Brynn Anderson/Associated PressNeil MacFarquhar and Jan. 11, 2021Updated 8:22 p.m. ETIt was opening day of the 2021 legislative session, and the perimeter of the Georgia State Capitol on Monday was bristling with state police officers in full camouflage gear, most of them carrying tactical rifles.On the other side of the country, in Olympia, Wash., dozens of National Guard troops in riot gear and shields formed a phalanx behind a temporary fence. Facing them in the pouring rain was a small group of demonstrators, some also wearing military fatigues and carrying weapons. “Honor your oath!” they shouted. “Fight for freedom every day!”And in Idaho, Ammon Bundy, an antigovernment activist who once led his supporters in the occupation of a federal wildlife refuge in Oregon, showed up outside the statehouse in Boise with members of his organization carrying “wanted” posters for Gov. Brad Little and others on charges of “treason” and “sedition.”“At a time of uncertainty, we need our neighbors to stand next to and continue the war that is raging within this country,” Mr. Bundy’s group declared in a message to followers.State capitals across the country are bracing for a spillover from last week’s violent assault on the U.S. Capitol, with state legislatures already becoming targets for protesters in the tense days around the inauguration of the incoming president, Joseph R. Biden Jr.Gone is a large measure of the bonhomie that usually accompanies the annual start of the legislative season, replaced by marked unease over the possibility of armed attacks and gaps in security around statehouses that have long prided themselves on being open to constituents.“Between Covid and the idea that there are people who are armed and making threats and are serious, it was definitely not your normal beginning of session,” said Senator Jennifer A. Jordan, a Democratic legislator in Georgia who watched the police officers assembled outside the State Capitol in Atlanta on Monday from her office window. “Usually folks are happy, talking to each other, and it did not have that feel.”Dozens of state capitals will be on alert in the coming days, following calls among a mix of antigovernment organizations for actions in all 50 states on Jan. 17. Some of them come from far-right organizations that harbor a broad antigovernment agenda and have already been protesting state Covid-19 lockdowns since last spring. The F.B.I. this week sent a warning to local law enforcement agencies about the potential for armed protests in all 50 state capitals.In a video news conference on Monday, Gov. Gavin Newsom of California said that “everybody is on high alert” for protests in Sacramento in the days ahead.The National Guard would be deployed as needed, he said, and the California Highway Patrol, responsible for protecting the Capitol, was also on the lookout for any budding violence. “I can assure you we have a heightened, heightened level of security,” he said.In Michigan, the state police said they had beefed up their presence around the State Capitol in Lansing and would continue that way for weeks. The commission that oversees the Statehouse voted on Monday to ban the open carry of firearms inside the building, a move Democratic lawmakers had been demanding since last year, when armed protesters challenging government Covid-19 lockdowns stormed the building.Two of those involved in the protests were later arrested in what the authorities said was a plot to kidnap Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and put her on trial.Michigan’s attorney general, Dana Nessel, took to Twitter to warn the public away from the Statehouse, saying it was not safe.Images from the Wisconsin state legislature in Madison showed large sheets of plywood being readied to cover the ground-floor windows. In St. Paul, Minn., the Statehouse has been surrounded by a chicken-wire fence since early last summer, when social justice protests erupted over the killing of George Floyd in neighboring Minneapolis.Workers boarded up the Wisconsin State Capitol building in Madison on Monday.Credit…Todd Richmond/Associated PressPatricia Torres Ray, a Democratic state senator, said the barrier had served to protect the building and the legislators, but concerns remained about possible gaps, such as the system of underground tunnels that link many public buildings in Minnesota to allow people to avoid walking outdoors in the winter.Gov. Jay Inslee in Washington ordered extra security after an armed crowd of Trump supporters breached the fence at the governor’s mansion last week while he was at home. State troopers intervened to disperse the crowd.In Texas, Representative Briscoe Cain, a conservative Republican from the Houston suburb of Deer Park, said that the legislature in Austin was likely protected by the fact that so many lawmakers carry firearms.“I have a pistol on my hip as we speak,” Mr. Cain said in a telephone interview on Monday. “I hope they’re never necessary, but I think it’s why they will never be necessary.”The Texas Legislature, dominated by Republicans, meets every two years and was scheduled to begin its 140-day session at noon on Tuesday.There may be efforts to reduce the presence of guns in the Capitol, Mr. Cain said, but he predicted that they would be doomed to failure given widespread support for the Second Amendment.In Missouri, Dave Schatz, the Republican president of the State Senate, said hundreds of lawmakers had gathered on Monday on the Statehouse lawn in Jefferson City for the swearing-in of Gov. Mike Parson and other top officials. Although security was tight, with the roads around the building closed, the presence of police and other security officers was normal for the day, Mr. Schatz said, and no fellow legislators had buttonholed him so far about increased security.“We are far removed from the events that occurred in D.C.,” he said.In Nevada, a Republican leader in Nye County posted a letter on Friday that likened recent protests of the election results across the country to the American Revolution, declaring: “The next 12 days will be something to tell the grandchildren! It’s 1776 all over again!”The letter — written by Chris Zimmerman, the chairman of the Nye County Republican Central Committee — prompted a rebuke over the weekend from Representative Steven Horsford, a Democrat who represents the county.Gov. Mike Parson of Missouri and his wife, Teresa Parson, waved outside the State Capitol in Jefferson City, escorted by members of the Missouri Highway Patrol during the governor’s inauguration celebration.Credit…Jeff Roberson/Associated PressNext door in Clark County, Nev., which includes Las Vegas, Democratic officials sent out a public safety alert on Sunday about potential violence across the state, warning, “Over the past 48 hours, the online activity on social media has escalated to the point that we must take these threats seriously.”While most of the protests announced so far are expected to focus on state capitals, law enforcement and other officials in various cities have said they believe that other government buildings could also be targeted.Federal authorities said on Monday that they had arrested and charged one man, Cody Melby, with shooting several bullets into the federal courthouse in Portland, Ore., on Friday night. Mr. Melby had also been arrested a couple of days earlier when, the police said, he tried to enter the State Capitol in Salem with a firearm.Some of those protesting in Oregon and Washington said they were opposed to state lockdown rules that prevent the public from being present when government decisions are being made.James Harris, 22, who lives in eastern Washington State, said he went to the Capitol in Olympia on Monday to push for residents to be full participants in their state’s response to Covid-19. He said he was against being forced to wear masks and to social distance; the lockdowns are “hurting people,” he said.Mr. Harris is a truck driver, but he said the virus control measures had prevented him from being able to work since March.Georgia already has seen trouble in recent days. At the same time that protesters were swarming into the U.S. Capitol in Washington last week, armed Trump supporters appeared outside the statehouse in Georgia. Law enforcement officers escorted to safety the secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, who had refused President Trump’s attempts to depict the presidential election as fraudulent.Senator Jordan noted that many of the security measures being put in place, including the construction of a tall iron fence around the Capitol building, were actually decided on during last summer’s social justice demonstrations, when protesters surrounded many government buildings.Now, she said, the threat is coming from the other end of the political spectrum.“These people are clearly serious, they are armed, they are dangerous,” Ms. Jordan said, “and from what we saw last week, they really don’t care who they are trying to take out.”Contributing reporting were More

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      Why Republicans Can't Agree on a Way Back to Power

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Capitol Riot FalloutliveLatest UpdatesInside the SiegeInauguration SecurityNotable ArrestsIncitement to Riot?AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyNews AnalysisFractured by Trump, the G.O.P. Can’t Agree on a Way Back to PowerMany Republican leaders and strategists want to prepare the party for a post-Trump future. But the pro-Trump voter base has other ideas.President Trump spoke to supporters at a rally near the White House last week. Some Republican leaders fret that as of now they cannot win with Mr. Trump, and they cannot win without him.Credit…Pete Marovich for The New York TimesJan. 11, 2021, 7:36 p.m. ETThe Republican Party is entering a period of political powerlessness in Washington badly fractured from within, lacking a unifying message and set of principles and missing a clear bench of national leaders — a party with internal divisions and outside obstacles so significant that it may not easily weather the splintering underway.While all parties go through reckonings after losing power, the G.O.P. has lost the popular vote in seven of the last eight presidential elections and, for the first time since Herbert Hoover, ceded the White House, Senate and House in a single term. President Trump is staring down a second impeachment, members of his administration have resigned in protest of his actions, and senators from his party have called for him to do the same.What’s more, the party’s political messaging is likely to be inspected intensely by social media platforms that have already barred Mr. Trump and others on the far right. Business and corporate donors are threatening to cut off the party’s financial spigot, and tech companies are stifling Mr. Trump’s ability to raise money online, the lifeblood of his political operation.But the most acute danger for the health of the party, and its electoral prospects to retake the House and Senate in 2022, is the growing chasm between the pro-Trump voter base and the many Republican leaders and strategists who want to reorient for a post-Trump era.“Have you heard what some of these folks waving MAGA flags are saying about Republicans?” said Representative Peter Meijer, Republican of Michigan, whose first days in Congress this month were marked by evacuations to escape from a mob. “They don’t identify themselves as Republicans.”Mr. Meijer was among the Republicans who voted to affirm President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s Electoral College victory last week, in the proceedings that rioters incited by Mr. Trump interrupted. The vote set off another round of vitriol and threats.“Our expectation is that somebody will try to kill us,” said Mr. Meijer, an Iraq war veteran. “That is the scenario that many of us are preparing for.”Mike DuHaime, a Republican strategist who served as a top adviser for Chris Christie in his 2016 run for president, said the violence at the Capitol represented a breaking point for his party’s relationship with Mr. Trump. “Now the two camps are, who is a Trump sycophant and who is not,” Mr. DuHaime said. “That spells doom until we can get past Trump.”Mr. Trump won 74.2 million voters, a Republican record, even in defeat in 2020. Some party leaders fret that as of now, they cannot win with Mr. Trump, and they cannot win without him. Right-wing voters have signaled that they will abandon the party if it turns on Mr. Trump, and more traditional Republicans will sour if it sticks by him.Members of the Trump-supporting mob scaled walls outside the Capitol last week.Credit…Jason Andrew for The New York TimesThe twin losses last week in Georgia, where the Republican incumbents yoked themselves closely to Mr. Trump and his baseless accusations of election fraud, not only cost Republicans control of the Senate but also offered a warning sign for the future. The dynamics mirrored the 2018 midterm elections, when Mr. Trump’s divisive brand of politics was better at mobilizing Democrats than Republicans when he was not on the ballot himself.In the coming days, the specter of more violence is clear and present. The National Guard said Monday that it was planning to deploy up to 15,000 troops in the nation’s capital for the inauguration, and the F.B.I. warned in a bulletin about the potential for armed protests at all 50 state capitols between now and the inauguration.Mr. Trump is at the lowest point of his presidency, with 60 percent of Americans disapproving of him and a narrower majority wanting him removed from office, according to a new Quinnipiac University poll on Monday. His diminished approval is matched only by the depths of August 2017, when he equivocated after the white nationalist march in Charlottesville, Va., turned violent.And yet.A strong majority of Republican voters still approve of Mr. Trump — more than seven in 10 in the Quinnipiac survey — and similar numbers have bought into his baseless accusation that last year’s election was riddled with fraud. And Mr. Trump’s handpicked choice to lead the Republican National Committee for another term, Ronna McDaniel, won re-election virtually by acclamation last weekend.Some prominent party leaders, after years of supporting Mr. Trump and staying silent about so much of his divisive behavior, have begun to break with him. Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, called his vote to affirm the Electoral College victory of Mr. Biden the most important of his more than three decades on Capitol Hill. He warned that backing attempts to subvert the election would send American democracy into a “death spiral.”But a faction of Republicans rebelled, worsening the divisions within the party. Senator Josh Hawley, Republican of Missouri, was the first to say he would object to the Electoral College vote, and he has been shunned by his colleagues. Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas, who led another group of objectors, has faced rebukes from former close allies. Both are considered possible 2024 presidential candidates.Chad Sweet, who served as chairman of Mr. Cruz’s 2016 presidential campaign, wrote in a note on social media over the weekend that he was cutting off support for Mr. Cruz. “In moments like this, all freedom loving Americans must put the survival of our democracy above loyalty to any party or individual,” Mr. Sweet wrote.But the verdict has been very different in the House, where the chamber’s top Republican, Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, led a majority of his conference in voting against certifying Mr. Biden’s victory in two states.Senator Josh Hawley, Republican of Missouri, the first member of his party in the chamber to say he would object to the Electoral College vote, has been shunned by his colleagues.Credit…Anna Moneymaker for The New York TimesIn an ominous sign for the Republicans who want to move past Mr. Trump, many of those with future ambitions within the Republican Party left the president conspicuously absent from their condemnations of the riot last Wednesday, such as Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the former White House press secretary, who may run for governor of Arkansas in 2022.George P. Bush, the Texas lands commissioner and the son of a prominent Trump critic, Jeb Bush, made no mention of the president in his statement denouncing the attack. “There is absolutely no place for the violence we are seeing today in Washington,” he said.Allen West, the chairman of the G.O.P. in Texas, which remains firmly Trump country, made the case in an interview for “the way ahead” for the party: “It goes back to the grass-roots.”“We had 12 million new voters vote for the Republican ticket, and we want to make sure we maintain those new voters,” said Mr. West, whose appeals to the anger of grass-roots voters drew attention in December when he embraced secessionist language after Mr. Trump’s effort to overturn the election was rejected by the Supreme Court.Republicans have some reason for optimism about their political future. Opposition parties typically perform strongly in the first midterms of a new presidency. Democrats will enter 2022 with some of the slimmest margins possible: a 50-50 Senate and a razor-thin House majority. And Republicans have a structural advantage in the Senate, given that underpopulated conservative states get two Senate seats just as populous liberal states do, while gerrymandered districts have helped House Republicans after the G.O.P. landslide of 2010.But Republicans face a steep climb toward becoming a majority party nationwide after Mr. Trump lost to Mr. Biden by more than seven million votes. In a remarkable statement opposing the effort to overturn the 2020 results, seven House Republicans this month acknowledged the party’s lack of a path to a national majority in the popular vote, warning against “delegitimizing” an Electoral College system that “that could provide the only path to victory in 2024.”Hours before the Capitol riot, the divergent political approaches of Republican leaders were on display in comments by the departing head of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, Senator Todd Young of Indiana, and the incoming chairman, Senator Rick Scott of Florida.Surrounded by Trump supporters outside a Senate office building, an exasperated Mr. Young defended his decision to certify the election. “The law matters,” he said. “I took an oath under God. Under God — I took an oath. Do we still take that seriously in this country?”Around the same time, Mr. Scott announced that he planned to vote against the electors from Pennsylvania. The primary job of the N.R.S.C. chairman is to raise money, and the growing list of corporations that are pausing or reconsidering G.O.P. donations in the wake of the electoral objections has caused some Republican consternation.Representative Nancy Mace of South Carolina has spoken out against Mr. Trump since the riot.Credit…Mic Smith/Associated PressFor some House Republicans, the divisions in the party are hardly ones they expected even a few weeks ago.Representative Nancy Mace of South Carolina, who worked for Mr. Trump’s campaign in 2015 and 2016 and who had pledged to be a Trump “ally” during her own congressional race, began last week on an upbeat note: She brought her two children to Washington for her swearing-in. “How cool would it be to roam the halls of Congress and then do virtual school?” she recalled thinking.But Ms. Mace, who is the first woman to graduate from the Citadel, sent them home after one day. Alarmed by the boiling-hot language from her own party about fraud, she feared violence, and her fears were realized in Wednesday’s rampage.“There is no way we can go down that rabbit hole again,” said Ms. Mace, who voted to certify Mr. Biden’s victory and urged a break from Mr. Trump. “We have to rebuild our party. We are starting from scratch. And if we don’t recognize that now, we are going to be in denial for a very long time.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Impeach Trump Again

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storyOpinionSupported byContinue reading the main storyImpeach Trump AgainIt is a dark day for the nation when the president’s behavior forces Congress to hold him accountable.The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values. It is separate from the newsroom.Jan. 11, 2021, 7:03 p.m. ETCredit…Stefani Reynolds for The New York TimesPresident Trump’s efforts to remain in office in defiance of democracy cannot be allowed to go unanswered, lest they invite more lawlessness from this president or those who follow.The attack on the Capitol on Wednesday was not a spontaneous eruption of violence. It was the culmination of a campaign waged by the president of the United States and his allies in Congress and the right-wing media to overturn the results of a free and fair election that began even before the ballots began to be counted on Election Day.That campaign involved a barrage of lies about the integrity of the voting process from the president, his allies and other elected Republicans. It included farcical legal challenges that were laughed out of court even as they sowed doubt in the minds of a majority of Republicans about whether Joe Biden won fairly. It involved the president and his allies strong-arming state election officials to change the vote count outright. When it all failed, the president held a rally on the National Mall and sent the angry crowd to march on the Capitol and stop Congress from declaring Mr. Biden the winner of the presidency. The riot came at the cost of at least five lives and shook the confidence of the nation and the world in the stability of American democracy.Each of these efforts amounts to an unprecedented assault on the rule of law. Taken together, they constitute a crime so brazen that it demands the highest form of accountability that the legislature can deliver. As regrettable as this moment is for the nation, there is no other option but to vote to impeach the president for a second time.Mr. Trump began undermining November’s election before the first vote was cast. Throughout the spring and summer, as the pandemic forced states to be more flexible with mail and absentee voting, he claimed repeatedly and without evidence that mail-in balloting would be rife with fraud.Then, after it was clear Mr. Biden was the victor, and after weeks of public and private attempts to get states to change their vote totals and deliver him a second term, the president encouraged his supporters to converge on Washington on Jan. 6. (“Be there, will be wild!” he tweeted.) Tens of thousands of them, from all over the country, answered his call.Mr. Trump took to the stage and gave perhaps the most un-American speech ever uttered by a president.“We will not take it anymore,” Mr. Trump told the crowd. “We will stop the steal.”“States want to revote. The states got defrauded. They were given false information. They voted on it. Now they want to recertify,” Mr. Trump said to cheers. “They want it back. All Vice President Pence has to do is send it back to the states to recertify, and we become president.”“Fight for Trump!” the crowd bellowed.Mr. Trump said that he’d just spoken to the vice president, who was due to oversee the ceremonial counting of electoral votes. “I said: ‘Mike, that doesn’t take courage. What takes courage is to do nothing — that takes courage.’ And then we’re stuck with a president who lost the election by a lot, and we have to live with that for four more years. We’re just not going to let that happen.”“We’re going to walk down, and I’ll be there with you, we’re going to walk down, we’re going to walk down,” Mr. Trump said, “to the Capitol, and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and -women, and we’re probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them.” He continued: “Because you’ll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength, and you have to be strong. We have come to demand that Congress do the right thing and only count the electors who have been lawfully slated, lawfully slated.”“We fight. We fight like hell,” the president said. “If you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”With that, the crowd struck off and some of the president’s loyalists stormed the Capitol.The charges against Mr. Trump are clear: inciting an insurrection. The House could give him fair consideration without the lengthy hearings it required to impeach him in December 2019 after he strong-armed the Ukrainian president. The evidence now is not secondhand accounts of meetings and phone calls. The offenses occurred in public for weeks and then live on national television.Significant support from Republicans would be necessary to achieve the two-thirds majority in the Senate required for a conviction. But the deadly attack on Congress finally seems to have shaken some of them from their reflexive backing of the president who incited it. Senators were driven out of their own chamber, and into hiding, while they were in the middle of performing their constitutional duty of counting the electoral votes.Mr. Trump may not have called directly for this behavior, but there is no question that he encouraged it and then refused for hours to condemn it, even as the whole world watched in horror. When he finally asked for rioters to stop and go home, he continued to claim the election had been stolen.So far, among Republicans, only Senator Ben Sasse of Nebraska, who described the president’s behavior as “wicked,” has said he would consider impeachment. Others are said to be privately discussing voting for it. Senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania have called on the president to resign. If Republican senators refuse to convict Mr. Trump, they would go on the record — for their constituents to see and reconcile — defending a man who was happy to put their lives, and the nation’s democratic future, at risk for nothing but his own quest to hold on to power.The arguments against impeachment — that it could actually sow more division or further embolden Mr. Trump and his allies politically, that it could distract from Mr. Biden’s agenda in his first several weeks in office, that the Senate may ultimately fail to convict — are worth considering. There could be more unrest and even violence. In many ways, it would be easier to let Mr. Trump leave office and attempt to consign the storming of the Capitol to the past.But, ultimately, there can be no republic if leaders foment a violent overthrow of the government if they lose an election.Mr. Trump is not the only person at fault. Many Republican lawmakers riled up his supporters for weeks with false claims of election rigging and continued to object to the electoral vote even after the attack. The 14th Amendment bars from office any federal or state lawmaker who has “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” or given “aid or comfort” to those who have. Congressional leaders will need to reckon with which of their colleagues require censure for their actions, and perhaps even expulsion.Any and all rioters who broke laws on Wednesday need to be identified and prosecuted. Attempting insurrection is as serious a crime as there is in a self-governing republic. As more of the rioters are arrested, it will also be essential to get to the bottom of how they were allowed to wreak havoc and yet, for the most part, walk away unscathed. That will require investigations by both Congress and the Justice Department.Yet it can’t be lost that the violence on Wednesday was the nadir of a coordinated, relentless campaign to cast doubt on the strength of American democracy. In the end, the driving force behind the lies, the chaos and the bloodshed of the past few days and weeks is Mr. Trump. As long as he is not held fully to account, any future chief executive might feel equally unbound by a lawless precedent.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.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      U.S. Imposes Sanctions on Ukrainians Linked to Giuliani for Election Disinformation

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyU.S. Imposes Sanctions on Ukrainians Linked to Giuliani for Election DisinformationThe Treasury Department accused seven Ukrainians of working with a Russian agent “to spread misleading and unsubstantiated allegations” about President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.During the 2020 campaign, Rudolph W. Giuliani arranged meetings with Ukrainians claiming to have damaging information about the Bidens.Credit…Erin Schaff/The New York TimesKenneth P. Vogel and Jan. 11, 2021Updated 5:31 p.m. ETWASHINGTON — The Trump administration imposed sanctions on Monday against seven Ukrainians — including two who assisted President Trump’s personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani — for being part of what it called “a Russia-linked foreign influence network” that spread “fraudulent and unsubstantiated allegations” about President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. during the 2020 campaign.Mr. Giuliani relied on two of the Ukrainians who were penalized — Andrii Telizhenko and Kostiantyn H. Kulyk — as he sought to gather damaging information and force government investigations into Mr. Biden and his son, Hunter Biden, related to Ukraine. That effort, which had the president’s backing, led to Mr. Trump’s impeachment in 2019 by the House of Representatives.The sanctions announced on Monday stemmed from the Ukrainians’ work with Andriy Derkach, a member of the Ukrainian Parliament, who was the target of sanctions by the Treasury Department last year and was accused of being a Russian agent and spreading disinformation about Mr. Biden. Mr. Derkach had met with Mr. Giuliani in 2019.The Ukrainians penalized on Monday were accused in a statement released by the Treasury Department of helping Mr. Derkach “spread misleading and unsubstantiated allegations that current and former U.S. officials engaged in corruption, money laundering and unlawful political influence in Ukraine.”The targets of the sanctions also included four media companies that the Treasury Department said were affiliated with Mr. Derkach and were involved in his efforts to spread disinformation.The sanctions are the latest in a series of steps taken by the Treasury Department over the past few years to punish people and groups that it accused of involvement in Russia-linked election interference, even as Mr. Trump, an intended beneficiary of the interference, has continued to downplay Russia’s role.“Russian disinformation campaigns targeting American citizens are a threat to our democracy,” Steven T. Mnuchin, the Treasury secretary, said in the statement. “The United States will continue to aggressively defend the integrity of our election systems and processes.”Kostiantyn H. Kulyk was sanctioned by the Treasury Department on Monday.Credit…Viacheslav Ratynskyi/ReutersMr. Kulyk had worked in the office of Ukraine’s national prosecutor, where he helped lead an investigation into a Ukrainian oligarch who owned a gas company that had paid Hunter Biden as a board member when his father was serving as vice president and overseeing American relations with Ukraine. Mr. Kulyk discussed the subject with Mr. Giuliani, who was pushing the Ukrainian government to announce an investigation into the Bidens to damage the former vice president’s presidential campaign.Mr. Kulyk, who has since been fired from the prosecutors’ office, was accused by the Treasury Department on Monday of forming “an alliance with Derkach to spread false accusations of international corruption.”Mr. Telizhenko, a political consultant and former official in the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington, provided information to Senate Republicans for a report on the Bidens’ work in Ukraine, which was released weeks before Election Day in an apparent effort to damage the Biden campaign. The report found no evidence of improper influence or wrongdoing by the former vice president.Mr. Telizhenko assisted Mr. Giuliani during the 2020 campaign, arranging meetings with Ukrainians claiming to have damaging information about the Bidens. Mr. Telizhenko helped plan a trip for Mr. Giuliani to Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, in December 2019, during which Mr. Giuliani met with Mr. Derkach and recorded interviews with him and others that aired on Mr. Giuliani’s podcast and a special on the pro-Trump cable channel One America News Network.The Treasury Department seemed to allude to this trip in explaining its sanctions of Mr. Telizhenko, noting in its statement that he “orchestrated meetings between Derkach and U.S. persons to help propagate false claims concerning corruption in Ukraine.” The statement did not explicitly name Mr. Giuliani or the Bidens, but it asserted that the sanctioned Ukrainians “leveraged U.S. media, U.S.-based social media platforms and influential U.S. persons” in their efforts to spread damaging allegations.”I will continue to fight for the truth no matter what lies are spread against me, as God is where the truth is,” Mr. Telizhenko said in an emailed statement on Monday. “I stood and will stand with President Donald J. Trump.”Mr. Giuliani did not respond to a request for comment on Monday.After the sanctions against Mr. Derkach were announced in September, Mr. Giuliani said in an interview that he “didn’t do much investigation” of Mr. Derkach but had “no reason to believe he is a Russian agent.”Andrii Telizhenko and Mr. Giuliani, President Trump’s personal lawyer, posed for a photograph during a meeting in Ukraine in December 2019.Credit…Andrii Telizhenko/ReutersIn the interview, Mr. Giuliani said he knew Mr. Telizhenko “a lot better than I know Derkach,” adding he “looked into” Mr. Telizhenko “very carefully. I mean, look, I’m not a genius, but I would be shocked if he’s anything like a Russian agent.” He added: “I would vouch for very few Ukrainians. I’d come pretty close to vouching for him. I’m not sure I would completely vouch for him, but pretty close.”The sanctions against Mr. Derkach stemmed from his release of audio recordings of Mr. Biden talking to Petro O. Poroshenko, the former president of Ukraine. Mr. Trump promoted some of the material released by Mr. Derkach, who claimed the recordings revealed corruption, though the conversations were mostly unremarkable.Other Ukrainians targeted on Monday were accused of assisting in the efforts related to the recordings.Oleksandr Onyshchenko, a former Ukrainian lawmaker and ally of Mr. Poroshenko, was accused by the Treasury Department of providing the recordings to Mr. Derkach. Mr. Onyshchenko fled Ukraine in 2016 after being accused of fraud and money laundering.Oleksandr Dubinsky, a current member of the Ukrainian Parliament, was designated by the Treasury Department for joining Mr. Derkach in news conferences that highlighted the recordings. The Treasury Department said the news conferences were “designed to perpetuate” false narratives against “U.S. presidential candidates and their families.”Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement on Monday that the Ukrainian officials facing sanctions “have made repeated public statements advancing malicious narratives that U.S. government officials have engaged in corrupt dealings in Ukraine.” He added, “These efforts and narratives are consistent with or in support of Derkach’s objectives to influence the 2020 U.S. presidential election.”Two of the media companies that were punished — including NabuLeaks, which posted the recordings of Mr. Biden and Mr. Poroshenko — are owned or controlled by Mr. Derkach. The other two, Only News and Skeptik TOV, are owned by Mr. Derkach’s media manager Petro Zhuravel, who was also penalized by the Treasury Department on Monday.A number of Mr. Derkach’s allies were also targeted. They include Dmytro Kovalchuk, a member of his media team, and Anton Simonenko, a close associate who helped Mr. Derkach hide financial assets, according to the Treasury Department.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Citigroup, Goldman Sachs and others pause their political contributions.

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storyBanks Halt Political Donations After Pro-Trump Mob Storms Capitol: Live UpdatesCitigroup, Goldman Sachs and others pause their political contributions.Jan. 11, 2021, 8:49 a.m. ETJan. 11, 2021, 8:49 a.m. ETJPMorgan Chase is halting all political donations from its PAC for six months.Credit…Justin Lane/EPA, via ShutterstockBig businesses often donate to both political parties and say that their support is tied to narrow issues of specific interest to their industries. That became increasingly fraught last week, after a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol and some Republican lawmakers tried to overturn Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s win in the presidential election.A flurry of companies have since reviewed political giving via their corporate political action committees, according to the DealBook newsletter.Some big banks are pausing all political donations:Goldman Sachs is freezing donations through its PAC and will conduct “a thorough assessment of how people acted during this period,” a spokesman, Jake Siewert, told DealBook.JPMorgan Chase is halting donations through its PAC for six months. “There will be plenty of time for campaigning later,” said Peter Scher, the bank’s head of corporate responsibility.Citigroup is postponing all campaign contributions for a quarter. “We want you to be assured that we will not support candidates who do not respect the rule of law,” Candi Wolff, the bank’s head of government affairs, wrote in an internal memo.Other banks, including Bank of America and Wells Fargo, said they would review their corporate contribution strategy.Some companies are pausing donations to specific politicians. Marriott said it would pause donations from its PAC “to those who voted against certification of the election,” a spokeswoman told DealBook. She did not say how long the break would last or how the bank would decide when to resume.Blue Cross Blue Shield, Boston Scientific and Commerce Bancshares are taking a similar, targeted approach to donation freezes. The newsletter Popular Information is tracking the responses of these and other companies that donated to lawmakers who challenged the election result.The suspensions coincide with the first quarter after a presidential election, which is typically light on fund-raising anyway. Efforts by some companies to pause PAC donations to all lawmakers — those who voted to uphold the election as well as those who sought to overturn it — are raising eyebrows. And companies can still give to “dark money” groups that don’t disclose their donors but often raise far more money than corporate PACs.In other fallout, the P.G.A. of America said it would no longer hold its signature championship at the Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J.; the social app Parler, popular among conservatives as an alternative to Twitter, went dark this morning after Amazon cut it off from computing services; the payment processor Stripe banned the Trump campaign from using its services; YouTube blocked Steve Bannon’s podcast channel; and the debate continues over tech giants’ influence over public speech.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More