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      Your Thursday Briefing: Russia’s ‘Partial Mobilization’

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      Plus protests in Iran intensify and New York State sues Donald Trump for fraud.President Biden addressed the U.N. General Assembly yesterday.Doug Mills/The New York TimesPutin signals a coming escalationVladimir Putin accelerated his war effort in Ukraine yesterday and announced a new campaign that would call up roughly 300,000 additional Russian troops. Here are live updates of the war.In a rare address to the nation, the Russian president made a veiled threat of using nuclear weapons. “If the territorial integrity of our country is threatened, we will certainly use all the means at our disposal to protect Russia and our people,” Putin said. “This is not a bluff.”His comments appeared to be a shift in his domestic strategy to the war. Ukraine said Putin’s remarks reflected his desperation: Russia’s military has suffered humiliating setbacks this month. (Here’s a map of Ukraine’s advances.)It also seemed to be an effort to startle the U.S. and its Western allies into dropping their support. But at the U.N. General Assembly in New York, Western leaders looked undeterred. President Biden said the U.S. and its allies would “stand in solidarity” against Russia and accused Moscow of violating the U.N. charter.Reaction: Protests erupted across Russia in response to the “partial mobilization,” and at least 1,252 people have been detained. Russians also rushed to buy one-way flights out of the country.Analysis: Experts say Russia currently has 200,000 troops, or fewer, in Ukraine. Putin’s campaign would more than double that, but those called up need training and weapons.Other updates:Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, is expected to address the U.N. shortly after this newsletter sends. Here are live updates of the General Assembly.Ten prisoners of war, including two U.S. military veterans, have been transferred to Saudi Arabia as part of a Russia-Ukraine exchange, Saudi Arabia said.Protesters rallied outside the U.N. to protest Iran’s president, Ebrahim Raisi.Stephanie Keith/Getty ImagesProtests in Iran escalateAntigovernment protests in Iran over the death of a 22-year-old woman in police custody are intensifying. The unrest has spread to dozens of cities, and at least seven people have been killed in her home province, Kurdistan.The protests appear to be one of the largest displays of defiance of the Islamic Republic’s rule in years. Women risked arrest by removing and burning their hijabs in public. Protesters have called for an end to the Islamic Republic with chants of “Mullahs get lost,” “Death to the supreme leader” and “Life, liberty and women.”The State of the WarRaising the Stakes: Kremlin-backed officials in four partially occupied regions announced referendums on joining Russia and President Vladimir V. Putin called up roughly 300,000 reservists to join the fight in Ukraine, indicating a possible escalation of the war.Ukraine’s Counteroffensive: As Ukrainian troops try to inch forward in the east and south without losing control of territory, they face Russian forces that have been bolstered by inmates-turned-fighters and Iranian drones.In Izium: Following Russia’s retreat, Ukrainian investigators have begun documenting the toll of Russian occupation on the northeastern city. They have already found several burial sites, including one that could hold the remains of more than 400 people.A Near Miss: A powerful Russian missile exploded less than 900 feet from the reactors of a Ukrainian nuclear plant far from the front lines, according to Ukrainian officials. The strike was a reminder that despite its recent retreat, Russia can still threaten Ukraine’s nuclear sites.The government responded by unleashing security forces, including riot police officers and the plainclothes Basij militia, to crack down on the protesters. Internet and cell service have been disrupted in neighborhoods where there were protests. Access to Instagram, which has been widely used by the protesters, was also restricted.Background: Mahsa Amini died last week after the morality police arrested her on an accusation of violating the law on head scarves.Context: Ebrahim Raisi, Iran’s president, made his first appearance at the U.N. yesterday. He made no mention of the protests, even as demonstrators gathered outside the building to protest Amini’s death. Raisi also did not address the health concerns about Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, 83, who recently canceled all meetings and public appearances because of illness.Letitia James’s lawsuit strikes at the foundation of Donald Trump’s public image and his sense of self.Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesNew York sues Trumps claiming fraudDonald Trump and his family business fraudulently overvalued his assets by billions of dollars in a sprawling scheme, according to a lawsuit filed yesterday by the New York attorney general, Letitia James.James said Trump inflated his net worth by billions, doing so with the help of three of his children: Eric, Donald Jr. and Ivanka. She said that the defendants repeatedly manipulated the value of assets to receive favorable loans and assist with their tax burden.James concluded that Trump and his family business violated several state criminal laws and “plausibly” broke federal criminal laws as well. She is seeking to bar the Trumps from ever running a business In New York State again, but her case could be difficult to prove.Details: In one example cited in the lawsuit, the company listed a group of rent-stabilized apartments in its building on Park Avenue as worth $292 million, multiplying by six the figure that appraisers had assigned.Context: Trump faces six separate investigations. Here is where each stands.THE LATEST NEWSAsia PacificMany of the whales are dying as they lie stranded on a beach in Tasmania.Agence France-Presse, via Department of Natural Resources /AFP via Getty ImagesAround 230 pilot whales are stranded on a Tasmanian beach where 470 whales were beached in 2020. Half have already died. European corporate investment in China has fallen steeply. It is now limited to a handful of multinationals.China’s “zero Covid” policy means that Hong Kong is no longer considered a global aviation hub, Al Jazeera reports.In an effort to counter China’s growing influence in the Pacific, the U.S., the U.K., Australia and New Zealand are conducting joint military exercises with Fiji, The Associated Press reports.World NewsThe U.S. Federal Reserve made its third straight supersize rate increase yesterday: three-quarters of a point. Here are live updates.The French leftist politician Jean-Luc Mélenchon defended a lawmaker who admitted to slapping his wife, renewing debates over the left wing’s dedication to feminism.U.S. medical experts recommended that doctors screen all patients under 65 for anxiety.The Times looked at the Republican Party’s chances in the U.S. House of Representatives. New congressional maps offer them a huge advantage.What Else Is HappeningJames Manning/Press Association, via Associated PressRoger Federer will play his last match tomorrow, a doubles appearance in which he is expected to team up with Rafael Nadal.New York City is fighting about the fate of its carriage horses again.Bar-tailed godwits fly from Alaska to New Zealand and Australia without stopping to eat, drink or rest. Researchers believe the feat is so extraordinary that it should change the study of ornithology itself.A Morning ReadLoretta Sipagan, 87, spent more than two months in prison after working as a community organizer.Jes Aznar for The New York TimesFifty years ago this week, Ferdinand Marcos placed the Philippines under military rule. Now, Marcos’s son is in power, after spending years trying to rehabilitate his father’s name. Victims who survived the crackdown fear their stories will be lost. “What happened before was true,” a community organizer told The Times. “They can try to change history, but they can’t.”Lives lived: Jack Charles, one of Australia’s leading Indigenous actors, had a charismatic personality and a troubled personal life. He died this month at 79.ARTS AND IDEAS‘We’re on That Bus, Too’A quarantine bus crashed in China on Sunday, killing at least 27 people. The accident has become a flash point for online protest at the government’s “zero Covid” policy.Some shared an old headline on social media: “Evil is prevalent because we obey unconditionally.” An editor lamented on his WeChat Timeline: “Just because an extremely small number of people may die from Covid infections, a whole nation of 1.3 billion Chinese are held hostage.”“We’re on that bus, too” has been one of the most shared comments since the crash.“The bus itself was a symbol of their collective ‘zero Covid’ destiny: the country’s 1.4 billion people heading to an unknown destination,” my colleague Li Yuan writes in an analysis of the outrage. “They felt they have lost control of their lives as the government pursues its policy relentlessly, even as the virus has become much milder and much of the world is eager to declare the end of the pandemic.”PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookDavid Malosh for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Greg Lofts.Warm spices flavor this Hungarian honey cake.What to Watch“See How They Run,” a witty whodunit, riffs on Agatha Christie.TravelIn Istanbul, the elegant summer palaces known as kasir offer a glimpse of Ottoman life.Now Time to PlayPlay today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: large beer mug (five letters).Here are today’s Wordle and today’s Spelling Bee.You can find all our puzzles here.That’s it for today’s briefing. See you next time. — AmeliaP.S. “We announce the establishment of the People’s Republic of China,” Mao Zedong said 73 years ago yesterday.The latest episode of “The Daily” is on migrants in the U.S.You can reach Amelia and the team at briefing@nytimes.com. More

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      ¿Cuáles son las seis investigaciones que enfrenta Trump?

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      Sin el poder de la presidencia, el exmandatario enfrenta a una multitud de fiscales y abogados que lo investigan a él y a sus asociados.WASHINGTON — La oficina que el expresidente Donald Trump instaló en el segundo piso de su propiedad de Mar-a-Lago, en Florida, en parte es una réplica del Despacho Oval y también es un homenaje a su paso por la verdadera Casa Blanca.Durante una visita el año pasado, sobre la pared se veían seis de sus fotografías favoritas, incluidas aquellas donde aparece con la reina Isabel II y Kim Jong-un. También se podían ver algunas monedas de membresía, una placa conmemorativa de su muro fronterizo y un retrato del expresidente hecho con casquillos de bala, regalo de Jair Bolsonaro, a quien llaman el Trump de Brasil.Esa oficina se ha convertido en la fortaleza de Trump en el exilio y en su sala de guerra, el cuartel general del extenso conflicto con las investigaciones que ha llegado a consumir la etapa posterior a su presidencia. Se trata de una guerra en varios frentes, con campos de batalla en Nueva York, Georgia y la capital del país, con una lista cambiante de abogados y una ventisca de acusaciones de irregularidades que son difíciles de seguir.Nunca antes un expresidente se había enfrentado a un conjunto de investigaciones federales, estatales y del Congreso tan amplio como el de Trump, quizá son las consecuencias de una carrera empresarial y, al final, política que ha vivido al límite o tal vez por encima de cualquier límite. Ya sea en relación con sus prácticas empresariales engañosas, sus esfuerzos por anular unas elecciones democráticas o su negativa a entregar documentos gubernamentales confidenciales que no le pertenecían, los diversos problemas jurídicos de Trump se derivan de la misma sensación de que las normas que los demás deben cumplir no aplican para él.El relato de cómo llegó a este punto es único en la historia y bastante predecible. Desde hace medio siglo, Trump ha evadido investigaciones y problemas legales, desde que el Departamento de Justicia demandó a su empresa familiar por discriminación racial y a través de las innumerables investigaciones que le siguieron a lo largo de los años. Cuenta con un notable historial de esquivar los peores resultados, pero es posible que ahora esté enfrentando tantas investigaciones que la salida sea incierta.Su visión del sistema legal siempre ha sido transaccional: es un arma para ser utilizada, ya sea por él o en su contra, y rara vez se ha sentido intimidado por las citaciones y declaraciones juradas que conmocionarían a cualquier persona menos acostumbrada a los litigios. En el aspecto civil, ha estado involucrado en miles de juicios con socios comerciales, proveedores y otros, muchos de los cuales lo demandaron porque se negó a pagar sus cuentas.Mientras era presidente, una vez explicó su visión del sistema legal a algunos colaboradores, diciendo que acudiría a los tribunales para intimidar a los adversarios porque solo amenazar con demandar no era suficiente.“Cuando amenazas con demandar, no hacen nada”, le dijo Trump a sus asistentes. “Dicen: ‘¡Psshh!’. Y siguen haciendo lo que quieren”, afirmó mientras agitaba su mano en el aire. “Pero, cuando los demandas, dicen: ‘¡Oooh!’, y se conforman. Es tan fácil como eso”, dijo con una mueca.Cuando, siendo presidente, comenzó a perder batallas jurídicas con regularidad arremetió contra el sistema de justicia. En un momento dado, cuando el Tribunal de Apelaciones del 9º Circuito, un tribunal liberal por tradición con sede en California, falló en contra de una de sus políticas, exigió a sus asesores que se deshicieran del tribunal. “Cancelémoslo”, dijo, como si se tratara de un acto de campaña y no de un sistema judicial establecido por ley. Si para ello es necesario redactar una legislación, que se haga un proyecto de ley para “deshacernos” de los jueces, dijo, utilizando un improperio.Pero sus asistentes lo ignoraron y ahora que no tiene el poder de la presidencia debe enfrentarse a una serie de fiscales y abogados que lo tienen a él, y a sus socios, en la mira. Algunas de las cuestiones son añejas, pero muchas de las semillas de su actual peligro jurídico se plantaron en los frenéticos últimos días que pasó en el cargo, cuando trató de anular la voluntad de los electores y aferrarse al poder mediante una serie de mentiras sobre un fraude electoral inexistente.Es bastante comprensible que muchos estadounidenses hayan perdido el hilo de todas las investigaciones en medio del torbellino de mociones, audiencias y sentencias de las últimas semanas. Pero, en esencia, son estas.Estado de Nueva YorkMucho antes de llegar a la presidencia, se puede decir que Trump, en muchos sentidos, se tomaba a la ligera sus negocios. La pregunta es si violó la ley de alguna manera. Durante años, según sus propios socios, infló el valor de varias propiedades para obtener préstamos.Durante más de tres años, Letitia James, la fiscala general del estado de Nueva York, ha analizado sus prácticas comerciales para determinar si constituyeron fraude. Cuando citó a Trump para que testificara, él invocó más de 400 veces el derecho que otorga la Quinta Enmienda para no responder preguntas con base en que sus respuestas podrían incriminarlo.Trump ha atacado a James con el argumento de que es una demócrata partidista que lo persigue por motivos políticos. Durante su candidatura de 2018, ella criticó a Trump sin rodeos, dijo que era un “presidente ilegítimo” y sugirió que los gobiernos extranjeros canalizaron dinero a las propiedades inmobiliarias de su familia, lo que caracterizó como un “patrón y práctica de lavado de dinero”.Hace poco, los abogados de Trump trataron de llegar a un acuerdo en el caso, lo que podría indicar la preocupación que sienten por su riesgo jurídico, pero James rechazó su oferta. Debido a que su investigación es civil, y no penal, ella tendría que decidir si sus hallazgos justifican una demanda en la que se acuse de fraude al expresidente.ManhattanLa fiscalía de distrito de Manhattan, ahora a cargo de Alvin L. Bragg, se ha ocupado de algunos de esos asuntos como parte de una investigación penal y está a punto de llevar a juicio a partir del 24 de octubre a la Organización Trump, la empresa familiar del expresidente, por cargos de fraude y evasión fiscal.Allen H. Weisselberg, el director de finanzas de toda la vida de la Organización Trump, se declaró culpable de 15 delitos graves y admitió que se asoció ilegalmente con la empresa para implementar un plan con la finalidad de evadir impuestos sobre lujosas prebendas. Como parte de su acuerdo de culpabilidad, Weisselberg está obligado a testificar en el próximo juicio. Pero Trump no es acusado en ese juicio y Weisselberg se negó a cooperar con la investigación más extensa.Allen Weisselberg, quien durante mucho tiempo fue el director financiero de la Organización Trump, se declaró culpable de 15 delitos graves relacionados con su trabajo en la empresa.Jefferson Siegel para The New York TimesPero después de que Bragg asumió el cargo en enero, le dijo al equipo que trabajaba en la investigación que estaba escéptico ante la posibilidad de que tuvieran pruebas suficientes para condenar al propio Trump. Eso hizo que los dos fiscales que dirigían la investigación renunciaran, y uno dijo en su carta de renuncia que el expresidente era “culpable de numerosos delitos graves” y que era “una grave falta de justicia” no hacerlo responsable.GeorgiaEl 2 de enero de 2021, Trump se puso en un posible riesgo jurídico en el estado de Georgia cuando llamó a Brad Raffensperger, el secretario de Estado, y le exigió “encontrar 11.780 votos”, los suficientes para cambiar el resultado y arrebatarle el estado a Joe Biden. Durante la llamada, Trump le advirtió a Raffensperger, quien es republicano, que enfrentaba un “gran riesgo” si no lograba encontrar esos votos, una amenaza implícita que el georgiano desafió.Los aliados de Trump también intentaron presionar a los funcionarios estatales para que cambiaran los resultados y, como hicieron en otros estados clave que ganó su opositor, trataron de armar una lista de electores falsos para enviarlos a Washington para que votaran en el Colegio Electoral a favor del presidente derrotado en lugar de Biden, que ganó el voto popular en Georgia.Fani T. Willis, la fiscala de distrito del condado de Fulton, inició una amplia investigación y presionó para obtener la declaración del senador republicano de Carolina del Sur Lindsey Graham e informó a Rudy Giuliani, el abogado del expresidente, que también es parte de su investigación.Willis parece estar construyendo un posible caso de asociación delictiva para cometer fraude electoral o chantaje mediante un esfuerzo coordinado para socavar las elecciones. Además de Giuliani, se ha informado a múltiples aliados del expresidente que también se les investiga, incluido el presidente del partido estatal y los miembros de la lista de electores falsos.Trump ha subestimado a Willis, una demócrata que fue elegida en la misma votación de 2020 en la que él perdió, diciendo que su investigación es, en palabras de un portavoz el año pasado, “simplemente el último intento de los demócratas para sumar puntos políticos al continuar con su cacería de brujas contra el presidente Trump”.CongresoLa Comisión de la Cámara de Representantes que investiga el ataque al Capitolio del 6 de enero de 2021, compuesta por siete demócratas y dos republicanos, ha hecho más por exponer un posible caso penal contra Trump en el espacio público que cualquiera de las personas que investigan al expresidente.En su serie de audiencias celebradas a lo largo del verano, que podrían reanudarse el 28 de septiembre, los asesores de Trump rindieron testimonio e indicaron que se le informó en varias ocasiones que las elecciones de 2020 no habían sido robadas, que lo que estaba diciendo a la opinión pública no era cierto, que no había fundamentos para impugnar el resultado e incluso que la multitud que convocó el 6 de enero incluía a algunas personas armadas.La comisión documentó los amplios esfuerzos de Trump para aferrarse al poder: cómo presionó no solo a Raffensperger, sino a funcionarios en varios estados para que cambiaran los resultados, cómo contempló declarar la ley marcial y apoderarse de máquinas electorales, cómo trató de obligar al Departamento de Justicia para que interviniera aun cuando se le dijo que no había motivos, cómo conspiró con aliados del Congreso para llevar electores falsos a la votación del Colegio Electoral y en última instancia cómo trató de obligar a su propio vicepresidente a bloquear la victoria de Biden.La comisión no tiene facultades para iniciar un proceso judicial, pero acudió a los tribunales para hacer cumplir citatorios para testificar e hizo que el Departamento de Justicia emitiera cargos por desacato al Congreso en contra de Steve Bannon y Peter Navarro, dos exaliados de Trump. Bannon fue condenado y espera su sentencia; Navarro solicitó al tribunal que desestimara su caso.Sin embargo, aunque los legisladores no pueden acusar a Trump, están debatiendo si deben recomendar al Departamento de Justicia que lo haga. Eso tiene poco significado sustantivo, pero incrementaría la importancia del fiscal general Merrick Garland.Fani T. Willis, la fiscala de distrito del condado de Fulton, ha hecho una amplia investigación.Nicole Craine para The New York TimesStephen Bannon, exasesor de Trump, fue declarado culpable de desacato al Congreso.Jefferson Siegel para The New York TimesEl 6 de eneroEn muchos sentidos, Garland sigue siendo el mayor misterio a medida que Trump busca obstaculizar a los investigadores. Garland, un exfiscal y juez de apelación ecuánime y bastante respetado, no ha dicho mucho para dar pistas, pero es evidente que su departamento está siguiendo múltiples líneas en su investigación sobre lo que ocurrió antes del 6 de enero y ese día.El departamento ha entrevistado o llevado ante un gran jurado a exasistentes de la Casa Blanca, como Pat A. Cipollone y Marc Short; también incautó los teléfonos o dispositivos electrónicos de aliados de Trump como John Eastman, Jeffrey Clark y Mike Lindell y hasta de un miembro del Congreso y en fechas recientes envió cerca de 40 citatorios a exasesores de la Casa Blanca, entre los cuales se encuentran Stephen Miller y Dan Scavino, además de otros personajes cercanos al expresidente.Tras pasar buena parte de los últimos 18 meses procesando a cientos de seguidores de Trump que ingresaron por la fuerza al Capitolio, parece que el equipo de Garland está analizando varios ángulos, incluido el plan de los electores falsos, la operación de recaudación de fondos de Trump mientras promovía afirmaciones falsas sobre el fraude electoral y la intervención del presidente mismo para tratar de anular las elecciones.Lo que no está claro es si Garland ya tiene una teoría del caso. Si bien las citaciones indicaban que los investigadores estaban analizando, entre otras cosas, los intentos de “obstruir, influir, impedir o retrasar” la certificación de las elecciones presidenciales, el departamento aún tiene que acusar a las personas cercanas a Trump y, por lo tanto, no ha presentado ninguna conclusión legal sobre las acciones tomadas por su oficina.Una persona que aún no sabe si será citada es el mismo Trump, pero sigue siendo una posibilidad. Con el fin de prepararse para el día en que los investigadores se presenten en su puerta, Trump ha estado buscando abogados que lo representen, ya que muchos de sus abogados anteriores ya no quieren involucrarse con él o tienen que enfrentar sus propios problemas legales.Los documentos clasificadosComo si Trump ya no estuviese expuesto a suficientes problemas jurídicos por los sucesos acaecidos durante sus últimos días en el cargo, al irse de la Casa Blanca tomó decisiones que también le han causado problemas.La última amenaza para el expresidente se deriva de su insistencia en llevarse a casa miles de documentos propiedad del gobierno, incluidos cientos que están marcados con varias designaciones de clasificado, además no los devolvió todos cuando se lo pidieron.El equipo de Garland ha indicado en documentos judiciales que no solo está analizando los cargos penales relacionados con el mal manejo de documentos clasificados, sino, además, la obstrucción de la justicia. Un abogado de Trump firmó un documento que afirmaba que su cliente había devuelto todos los documentos clasificados en su poder, lo cual se comprobó que era falso cuando los agentes del FBI allanaron Mar-a-Lago y encontraron cajas de esos documentos. Los investigadores indicaron que los archivos tal vez fueron escondidos y los cambiaron de ubicación en vez de entregarlos.En el caso de los documentos, la estrategia jurídica de Trump se parece al método que ha empleado a lo largo de los años: encontrar maneras de retrasar y despistar a sus adversarios. Al convencer a una jueza federal, a la que confirmó en el puesto durante los últimos días de su presidencia, para que impidiera que los investigadores usaran los documentos recuperados mientras los analiza un inspector especial, les ató las manos a los fiscales por el momento.Pero eso puede no durar para siempre. La semana pasada dijo que “no me puedo imaginar ser acusado”, pero admitió que “siempre es una posibilidad” porque los fiscales están “simplemente enfermos y trastornados”. Y afirmó que desclasificó los papeles que tomó, aunque no hay registro de eso.Pero su estrategia real es clara: esta es una batalla tanto política como legal, y advirtió sombríamente que habría “grandes problemas” si lo acusaban porque sus partidarios, “simplemente no lo soportarían”.Cuando el locutor de radio Hugh Hewitt le dijo que sus críticos interpretarían eso como incitar a la violencia, Trump dijo: “Eso no es incitar. Solo digo mi opinión. No creo que la gente de este país lo toleraría”.Peter Baker es el corresponsal jefe de la Casa Blanca y ha cubierto a los últimos cinco presidentes para el Times y The Washington Post. Es autor de siete libros, el más reciente The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021, coescrito con Susan Glasser, que se publicará en septiembre. @peterbakernyt • Facebook More

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      Videos Show Trump Allies Handling Georgia Voting Equipment

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      The footage raises new questions about efforts by Trump affiliates in a number of swing states to gain access to and copy sensitive voting software after the 2020 election.Newly released videos show allies of former President Donald J. Trump and contractors who were working on his behalf handling sensitive voting equipment in a rural Georgia county weeks after the 2020 election.The footage, which was made public as part of long-running litigation over Georgia’s voting system, raises new questions about efforts by Trump affiliates in a number of swing states to gain access to and copy sensitive election software, with the help of friendly local election administrators. One such incident took place on Jan. 7 of last year, the day after supporters of Mr. Trump stormed the Capitol, when a small team traveled to rural Coffee County, Ga.The group included members of an Atlanta-based firm called SullivanStrickler, which had been hired by Sidney Powell, a lawyer advising Mr. Trump who is also a conspiracy theorist.“We are on our way to Coffee County, Ga., to collect what we can from the election/voting machines and systems,” one of the company’s executives, Paul Maggio, wrote Ms. Powell on that January morning. Weeks later, Scott Hall, an Atlanta-area Trump supporter and bail bondsman who also traveled to Coffee County, said “we scanned every freaking ballot” in a recorded phone conversation.Mr. Hall said the team had the blessing of the local elections board and “scanned all the equipment, imaged all the hard drives and scanned every single ballot.”A nonprofit group that is suing over perceived security vulnerabilities in Georgia’s voting system released the new videos after obtaining them in its litigation.Coffee County Elections OfficeThe new videos show members of the team inside an office handling the county’s poll pads, which contain sensitive voter data. (The cases holding the equipment in the footage are labeled with the words “POLL PAD.”) In a court hearing on Sept. 9, David D. Cross, a lawyer for a nonprofit group that is suing over perceived security vulnerabilities in Georgia’s voting system — and that released the new videos after obtaining them in its litigation — told a judge that his group suspected that the “personally identifiable information” of roughly seven million Georgia voters may have been copied.Charles Tonnie Adams, the elections supervisor of Heard County, Ga., said in an email that “poll pads contain every registered voter on the state list.” It was not immediately clear what specific personal information about voters was on the poll pads, or what, if anything, was done with the data.Mike Hassinger, a spokesman for Brad Raffensperger, Georgia’s secretary of state, said a poll pad “does have voter information but it’s not accessible because it’s scrambled behind security protocols.” He added that there were no driver’s license numbers or Social Security numbers on poll pads at the time.The new videos also show that some of the Trump allies who visited Coffee County were given access to a storage room, and that various people affiliated with Mr. Trump’s campaign, or his allies, had access to the building over several days.The new footage also shows Cathy Latham, then the head of the county’s Republican Party, with members of the Trump team, standing together in an office where the county’s poll pads were laid out on a table. Ms. Latham is among the targets of a criminal investigation in Atlanta, related to her participation as one of an alternate slate of electors who tried to overturn Mr. Trump’s loss in Georgia. That investigation, which is being led by Fani T. Willis, the district attorney of Fulton County, has also touched on what took place in Coffee County.In a court filing late Monday evening, the plaintiffs in the civil case assailed what they called “the persistent refusal of Latham and her counsel to be straight with this court about the facts.” They accused her of downplaying her involvement with the Trump team when “she literally directed them on what to collect in the office.”Robert D. Cheeley, a lawyer for Ms. Latham, declined to speak on the record on Monday. This month, he told CNN that his client “would not and has not knowingly been involved in any impropriety in any election.”Investigators from Mr. Raffensperger’s office also appear in the new videos, raising questions about what they knew. Along with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, Mr. Raffensperger’s office is investigating what took place in Coffee County, 200 miles southeast of Atlanta, but voting rights advocates involved in the litigation have questioned why Mr. Raffensperger, the defendant in the civil case, did not move more aggressively.Mr. Hassinger said the secretary of state’s office had “no idea” why its investigators were at the elections office in Coffee County in early January.“We are looking into it,” he said. “Again, we take this very seriously. This investigation is a joint effort between the secretary of state’s office and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, and if it’s determined that people have committed a crime, they’re going to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”The storage room at the Coffee County elections office.Coffee County Elections OfficeMr. Hassinger added that at that time, the secretary of state’s office was looking at “vote-counting procedures when Coffee County was unable to certify the results of their election by the time of the deadline.”Lawyers for SullivanStrickler did not respond to requests for comment. The company’s lawyers have previously said it was “categorically false” that it was part of an effort that “illegally ‘breached’ servers” or other voting equipment, but that “with the benefit of hindsight, and knowing everything they know now, they would not take on any further work of this kind.”Reached by phone on Monday, Rachel Ann Roberts, the current election supervisor for Coffee County, said she could not comment on the matter of the poll pads because she had started the job after the visit took place.“I’m not certain about any of that,” she said. “I wasn’t here at the time.”Georgia is hardly the only state where such activity occurred. In Michigan, a special prosecutor is investigating efforts by Trump allies, including the Republican candidate for attorney general, Matthew DePerno, to gain access to voting machines. And in Colorado, the secretary of state’s office estimated that taxpayers faced a bill of at least $1 million to replace voting equipment in Mesa County after a pro-Trump elections supervisor was indicted on charges that she tampered with the county’s voting equipment after the 2020 election. More

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      Where 6 Investigations Into Donald Trump Stand

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      The former president finds himself without the power of the presidency, staring at a host of prosecutors and lawyers who have him and his associates in their sights.WASHINGTON — Former President Donald J. Trump has set up his office on the second floor of his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida as part replica of the Oval Office and part homage to his time in the real White House.On the wall during a visit last year were six favorite photographs, including ones with Queen Elizabeth II and Kim Jong-un. On display were challenge coins, a plaque commemorating his border wall and a portrait of the former president fashioned out of bullet casings, a present from Jair Bolsonaro, the so-called Trump of Brazil.This has become Mr. Trump’s fortress in exile and his war room, the headquarters for the wide-ranging and rapidly escalating conflict with investigators that has come to consume his post-presidency. It is a multifront war, with battlefields in New York, Georgia and the nation’s capital, featuring a shifting roster of lawyers and a blizzard of allegations of wrongdoing that are hard to keep straight.Never before has a former president faced an array of federal, state and congressional investigations as extensive as Mr. Trump has, the cumulative consequences of a career in business and eventually politics lived on the edge, or perhaps over the edge. Whether it be his misleading business practices or his efforts to overturn a democratic election or his refusal to hand over sensitive government documents that did not belong to him, Mr. Trump’s disparate legal troubles stem from the same sense that rules constraining others did not apply to him.The story of how he got to this point is both historically unique and eminently predictable. Mr. Trump has been fending off investigators and legal troubles for a half century, since the Justice Department sued his family business for racial discrimination and through the myriad inquiries that would follow over the years. He has a remarkable track record of sidestepping the worst outcomes, but even he may now find so many inquiries pointing in his direction that escape is uncertain.His view of the legal system has always been transactional; it is a weapon to be used, either by him or against him, and he has rarely been intimidated by the kinds of subpoenas and affidavits that would chill a less litigious character. On the civil side, he has been involved in thousands of lawsuits with business partners, vendors and others, many of them suing him because he refused to pay his bills.While president, he once explained his view of the legal system to some aides, saying that he would go to court to intimidate adversaries because just threatening to sue was not enough.“When you threaten to sue, they don’t do anything,” Mr. Trump told aides. “They say, ‘Psshh!’” — he waved his hand in the air — “and keep doing what they want. But when you sue them, they go, ‘Oooh!’” — here he made a cringing face — “and they settle. It’s as easy as that.”When he began losing legal battles as president with regularity, he lashed out. At one point when the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, a traditionally liberal bench based in California, ruled against one of his policies, he demanded that aides get rid of the court altogether. “Let’s just cancel it,” he said, as if it were a campaign event, not a court system established under law. If it required legislation, then draft a bill to “get rid” of the judges, he said, using an expletive.But his aides ignored him and now he finds himself without the power of the presidency, staring at a host of prosecutors and lawyers who have him and his associates in their sights. Some of the issues at hand go back years, but many of the seeds for his current legal jeopardy were planted in those frenetic final days in office when he sought to overturn the will of the voters and hold onto power through a series of lies about election fraud that did not exist.What to Know About the Trump InvestigationsCard 1 of 6Numerous inquiries. More

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      For Trump’s Lawyers, Legal Exposure Comes With the Job

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      The many lawyers who have helped the former president avoid removal from office and indictment have drawn legal problems of their own.A dark joke has begun circulating among lawyers following the many legal travails of former President Donald J. Trump: MAGA actually stands for “making attorneys get attorneys.”Over six years and nine major investigations by Congress, the Justice Department and local prosecutors, as Mr. Trump has managed to avoid removal from the presidency and indictment, it has become clear that serving as one of his lawyers is a remarkably risky job — and one that can involve considerable legal exposure. Time after time, his attorneys have been asked to testify as witnesses to potential crimes — or come under scrutiny as possible criminal conspirators themselves.While the consequences his lawyers faced were extraordinary when Mr. Trump was in the White House, the dangers have only intensified since he left office and have become increasingly acute in recent weeks, as the former president has come under scrutiny in two different Justice Department investigations and has been forced yet again to find lawyers willing to represent him.Last week, a Justice Department filing revealed that Mr. Trump’s lawyers had misled federal investigators about whether he had handed over to the Justice Department all the classified documents he took from the White House when he left office. That raised questions about whether the lawyers, M. Evan Corcoran and Christina Bobb, could be prosecuted themselves and might ultimately be forced to become witnesses against their client. (Ms. Bobb recently retained a lawyer, according to a person familiar with the situation.)The revelation capped a summer in which a team of lawyers that had been advising Mr. Trump as he tried to overturn the 2020 election faced a range of repercussions across the country from federal investigators, local prosecutors, state bar associations and government accountability groups.One of Mr. Trump’s highest-profile lawyers, Rudolph W. Giuliani, was named as a target in a state criminal investigation in Georgia. The conservative lawyer John Eastman, who came up with what he conceded privately was an unlawful strategy to help Mr. Trump overturn the election, said he believed he was a target in that same investigation and declined to answer questions while being deposed before a grand jury. Mr. Giuliani and Mr. Eastman have also been named as subjects of interest in a flurry of federal grand jury subpoenas seeking evidence about attempts by Mr. Trump’s allies to create fake slates of electors to help keep him in office.Two others who worked for Mr. Trump in the White House — the White House counsel Pat A. Cipollone and his deputy Patrick F. Philbin — were subpoenaed to appear before a federal grand jury in Washington investigating the efforts to overturn the 2020 election, including the roles that Mr. Giuliani and Mr. Eastman had played in helping Mr. Trump.Mr. Cipollone, Mr. Philbin and at least nine other lawyers who worked for Mr. Trump have testified before the congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack. Earlier this year, Mr. Cipollone and Mr. Philbin also were interviewed by the F.B.I. as part of its investigation into the classified documents investigation.A video clip of John Eastman, left, invoking the Fifth Amendment during a deposition for the House Jan. 6 committee was shown in a hearing this summer.Doug Mills/The New York TimesAnd 17 mostly lesser-known lawyers who represented Mr. Trump in battleground states as he tried to overturn the election are facing ethics complaints, putting them at risk of being disciplined or disbarred by bar associations or the courts.Vigorously defending the client — even one known for unscrupulous behavior or accused of an egregious crime — is part of a lawyer’s basic job description. But attorneys are bound by a code of professional conduct that forbids them from crossing certain lines, including knowingly making false claims, filing frivolous lawsuits or motions, and doing anything to further a crime.The adage for lawyers representing clients accused of criminality, said Fritz Scheller, a longtime Florida defense lawyer, is that at the end of the day, no matter how bad it may have been for the client, the lawyer still gets to walk out the front door of the courthouse without any personal legal issues.“That bad day for the criminal defense attorney becomes his worst day when he leaves through the courthouse door used for defendants on their way to jail,” Mr. Scheller said.What to Know About the Trump InvestigationsCard 1 of 6Numerous inquiries. More

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      Brian Kemp Must Testify in Trump Inquiry After Election

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      ATLANTA — A judge ruled on Monday that Gov. Brian P. Kemp of Georgia must appear before a special grand jury investigating election interference by former President Donald J. Trump, but will not be compelled to do so until after the Nov. 8 election.Mr. Kemp, who is running for a second term this year, is one of a number of high-profile Republicans who have been fighting subpoenas that call upon them to testify in the sprawling case. Unlike many of those other Republicans, Mr. Kemp does not appear to have been involved in efforts after the November 2020 election to overturn Mr. Trump’s election loss in Georgia.Indeed, Mr. Kemp resisted a personal entreaty from Mr. Trump, in December 2020, to convene the state Legislature in order to appoint pro-Trump electors from Georgia, even though Joseph R. Biden, a Democrat, had won the popular vote in the state.Nevertheless, Mr. Kemp’s lawyers in recent days have tried to persuade Judge Robert C.I. McBurney of Fulton County Superior Court that under Georgia law, the sitting governor should not be subject to subpoenas. They argued, among other things, that the governor was protected by the doctrine of sovereign immunity, and that the subpoena had been issued “for improper political purposes” because his presence was being demanded before the November 2022 election. The investigation is being overseen by a Democrat, District Attorney Fani T. Willis of Fulton County, which encompasses most of Atlanta.In a prepared statement on Monday, a spokesperson for Mr. Kemp said the court had “correctly paused” his testimony until after the election, saying the governor’s office would work “to ensure a full accounting of the governor’s limited role in the issues being investigated is available to the special grand jury.”Understand Georgia’s Trump Election InvestigationCard 1 of 5Understand Georgia’s Trump Election InvestigationAn immediate legal threat to Trump. More

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      Sean Hannity and Other Fox Stars Face Depositions in Defamation Suit

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      The depositions are one of the clearest indications yet of how aggressively Dominion Voting Systems is moving forward with its suit against the media company.Some of the biggest names at Fox News have been questioned, or are scheduled to be questioned in the coming days, by lawyers representing Dominion Voting Systems in its $1.6 billion defamation suit against the network, as the election technology company presses ahead with a case that First Amendment scholars say is extraordinary in its scope and significance.Sean Hannity became the latest Fox star to be called for a deposition by Dominion’s legal team, according to a new filing in Delaware Superior Court. He is scheduled to appear on Wednesday.Tucker Carlson is set to face questioning on Friday. Lou Dobbs, whose Fox Business show was canceled last year, is scheduled to appear on Tuesday. Others who have been deposed recently include Jeanine Pirro, Steve Doocy and a number of high-level Fox producers, court records show.People with knowledge of the case, who would speak only anonymously, said they expected that the chief executive of Fox News Media, Suzanne Scott, could be one of the next to be deposed, along with the president of Fox News, Jay Wallace. Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch, whose family owns Fox, could follow in the coming weeks.The depositions are among the clearest indications yet of how aggressively Dominion is moving forward with its suit, which is set to go to trial early next year, and of the legal pressure building on the nation’s most powerful conservative media company. There have been no moves from either side to discuss a possible settlement, people with knowledge of the case have said.More Coverage of Fox News‘American Nationalist’: Tucker Carlson stoked white fear to conquer cable news. In the process, the TV host transformed Fox News and became former President Donald J. Trump’s heir.Empire of Influence: ​​A Times investigation looked at how the Murdochs, the family behind a global media empire that includes Fox News, have destabilized democracy on three continents.Defamation Case: ​​Legal scholars say that the $1.6 billion lawsuit filed by Dominion Voting Systems against the network could be one of the most consequential First Amendment cases in a generation.How Russia Uses Fox News: The network has appeared in Russian media as a way to bolster the Kremlin’s narrative about the Ukraine war.It is common for large media companies like Fox to settle such cases well before they reach the point where journalists or senior executives are forced to sit for questioning by lawyers from the opposing side. But both Dominion and Fox appear to be preparing for the likelihood that the case will end up in front of a jury.The suit accuses Fox of pushing false and far-fetched claims of voter fraud to lure back viewers who had defected to other right-wing news sources. In its initial complaint, Dominion’s lawyers framed their lawsuit as a matter of profound civic importance. “The truth matters,” they said, adding, “Lies have consequences.”The judge overseeing the case allowed Dominion in late June to expand the suit to include the cable news network’s parent company, Fox Corporation, potentially broadening the legal exposure of both Murdochs. Shortly after, Fox replaced its outside counsel on the case and hired one of the nation’s most prominent trial lawyers, Dan Webb.A spokesman for Fox Corporation has said that the First Amendment protected the company from the suit, and that any attempt by Dominion lawyers to put the Murdochs at the center of their case would be a “fruitless fishing expedition.”Both Dominion and Fox appear to be preparing for the case to go before a jury.Michael M. Santiago/Getty ImagesThe network is “confident we will prevail as freedom of the press is foundational to our democracy and must be protected,” a Fox News spokeswoman said in a statement. She added that the $1.6 billion in damages that Dominion is seeking are “outrageous, unsupported and not rooted in sound financial analysis.” According to court filings, Dominion estimates business losses at hundreds of millions of dollars and values the company at around $1 billion.Dominion’s legal complaint lays out how Fox repeatedly aired conspiracy theories about the company’s purported role in a plot to steal votes from former President Donald J. Trump, and argues that its business has suffered considerably as a result. Those falsehoods — including that Dominion was a pawn of the Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez and that its machines were designed with a feature that allowed votes to be flipped from one candidate to another — aired night after night as Fox hosts like Mr. Hannity and Mr. Dobbs allowed guests to make them on their shows, and in some cases vouched for them.Legal experts say the case is one of the most potentially consequential libel suits brought against an American media company in more than a generation, with the potential to deliver a judgment on a falsehood that has damaged the integrity of the country’s democratic system and remains an article of faith among many Trump supporters.Defamation is extremely difficult to prove in a case like this because of the broad constitutional protections that cover the news media. A company like Dominion has to prove either that a media outlet knew what it was publishing or broadcasting was false, or that it acted so hastily it overlooked facts proving that falsity, a legal standard known as demonstrating a “reckless disregard for the truth.”Dominion’s legal strategy, which it has detailed in court filings, hinges on getting testimony and unearthing private communications between Fox employees that prove either such recklessness or knowledge that the statements were false.The case has stirred considerable unease inside Fox all summer, as employees have had to turn over months of emails and text messages to Dominion lawyers and prepare for depositions. Other current and former Fox personalities who have been deposed include Dana Perino, Shepard Smith and Chris Stirewalt, who was part of the team that made the election night projection that Mr. Trump would lose Arizona, and the presidency as a result.This is not the first time that Mr. Hannity has been in the middle of a high-profile defamation suit. In 2018, Fox was sued by the parents of Seth Rich, a former Democratic National Committee staff member whom Mr. Hannity and others at Fox falsely linked to a hacking that resulted in committee emails being published by WikiLeaks. Mr. Rich was murdered in an apparent botched robbery in 2017, though conspiracy theorists tried to blame his death on Democratic operatives. Fox News later retracted some of its reporting on the story, saying it did not meet the network’s editorial standards.Fox settled the Rich case in the fall of 2020, before Mr. Hannity could be deposed. More

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      How a Corporate Law Firm Led a Political Revolution

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      On a balmy Saturday night in June, Traci Lovitt hosted a 50th birthday party for her husband, Ara, at their 9,800-square-foot Westchester mansion overlooking Long Island Sound. The couple met while clerking for Supreme Court justices: Traci for Sandra Day O’Connor, Ara for Antonin Scalia. These days, Ara worked in finance. Traci was a top partner at — and a contender to one day run — the international law firm of Jones Day, best known for representing Donald Trump’s presidential campaigns. To serve as M.C. for the event, the Lovitts flew in Richard Blade, the veteran disc jockey Ara listened to while growing up in Southern California. But Blade wasn’t the party’s biggest star. That distinction belonged to Justice Amy Coney Barrett.One day earlier, Barrett and four of her colleagues on the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, ending the constitutional right to abortion. Now she was wearing a pink dress and sitting at a flower-bedecked table under a tent on the Lovitts’ lush lawn. Barrett clerked for Scalia in the same session as Ara, in 1998 and 1999, and also became friends with Traci, jogging together around the National Mall after work. (When Trump nominated Barrett to the Supreme Court in 2020, Traci wrote to senators, praising the judge’s fair-mindedness and commitment to the rule of law.) But the connection to the court ran deeper than that. Scalia had spent years at Jones Day in the 1960s. And Traci ran an elite practice inside the firm that was focused in part on arguing cases before Barrett and her colleagues. Guests at the Lovitts’ estate danced to Blade’s beats until 1 a.m. At one point, an attendee spotted Barrett chatting with Noel Francisco, another Jones Day partner, who had himself clerked for Scalia the year before Lovitt and Barrett. Francisco left the firm in 2017 to become Trump’s solicitor general, responsible for representing the government before the Supreme Court, and returned in 2020, eventually taking over Jones Day’s enormous Washington office. Now his and Lovitt’s underlings were appearing regularly before the court. In one recent case brought by Jones Day, the court killed the Biden administration’s moratorium on home evictions during the pandemic. Less than a week after the Lovitts’ party, in another case Jones Day worked on, the court would severely limit the Environmental Protection Agency’s regulation of power-plant emissions.For much of its history, Jones Day was a juggernaut in the field of corporate litigation. A global goliath with more than 40 offices and about 2,500 lawyers, it raked in billions a year in fees from tobacco, opioid, gun and oil companies, among many other giant corporations in need of a state-of-the-art defense. More than most of its competitors, the firm had an army of litigators who had perfected the art of exploiting tiny legal wrinkles, of burying outmatched opponents in paperwork and venue changes and procedural minutiae. But over the past two decades, Jones Day has been building a different kind of legal practice, one dedicated not just to helping Republicans win elections but to helping them achieve their political aims once in office. Chief among those aims was dismantling what Don McGahn — the Jones Day partner who helped run Trump’s campaign and then became his White House counsel — disparagingly referred to as the “administrative state.” To do that, the firm was bringing all the ruthless energy and creativity of corporate law to the political realm.Jones Day lured dozens of young Supreme Court clerks, mostly from conservative justices, with six-figure signing bonuses and the opportunity to work on favored causes, including legal challenges to gun control and Obamacare. The firm allotted countless pro bono hours to aiding the needy — and also to assisting deep-pocketed right-wing groups as they fought against early voting and a federal corporate-oversight body.Representing Trump’s 2016 campaign, Jones Day helped him solidify Republican support by pledging to pick federal judges from a list that was vetted in advance by the law firm and the Federalist Society. When Trump won, a large fleet of Jones Day lawyers sailed into his White House, the Justice Department and other parts of his administration. But the biggest impact was on the judiciary. Trump delegated the task of selecting federal judges to McGahn, who — working closely with Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader — placed well over 100 conservatives on the federal courts, including several who had recently worked at Jones Day. Even after rejoining Jones Day in 2019, McGahn continued to advise Senate Republicans on judicial strategy.It is not uncommon for partners at corporate law firms to dabble in politics. Nor is it rare for a firm itself to throw its weight behind causes on the left or the right. One of the country’s richest firms, Paul, Weiss, for example, has long staked out liberal stances on the public issues of the day (even as it rakes in fees from companies that undercut those ideals). What sets Jones Day apart is the degree to which it penetrated the federal government under Trump and is now taking advantage of a judicial revolution that it helped set in motion.The power of that revolution, which is spreading to courtrooms and statehouses around the country, is now on vivid display. Even with Democrats controlling the White House and Congress, the Supreme Court has been on a rightward tear. In its most recent term, Trump’s three appointees — the first two handpicked by McGahn and the third, Barrett, plucked by him out of academia for the federal bench — helped erase the constitutional right to abortion, erode the separation of church and state, undermine states’ power to control guns and constrain the authority of federal regulators. Jones Day had a hand in some of those cases, and the firm has telegraphed that it is eyeing additional legal challenges in line with its leaders’ ideology.Jones Day’s influence seems poised to grow. This year, it has been collecting fees from a remarkable assortment of prominent Republican players: a Trump political-action committee; moderates like Senator Susan Collins; Trump allies like Dr. Mehmet Oz; hard-liners like Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the House minority leader, and Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin — not to mention an assortment of super PACs supporting fringe candidates like Herschel Walker, the former N.F.L. star who is running for a Senate seat in Georgia. Francisco recently represented former Attorney General Bill Barr before the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. McGahn recently began representing Senator Lindsey Graham as he fights a grand jury subpoena to testify about Trump’s efforts to overturn the election results in Georgia. The chief of staff to Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida is a recent Jones Day alum. The next Republican presidential administration — whether it belongs to Trump, DeSantis or someone else — will most likely be stocked with Jones Day lawyers.Founded in Cleveland in 1893, Jones Day was at the vanguard of an era of breakneck expansion in the legal industry. In the 1970s and ’80s, it was one of the first law firms to open multiple offices in the United States and then overseas. It was a tireless, and extremely successful, defender of some of America’s worst corporate actors. The firm helped R.J. Reynolds sow doubts about the dangers of cigarettes. It helped Charles Keating’s fraud-infested savings-and-loan association fend off regulators. It helped Purdue Pharma protect its patents for OxyContin. But it didn’t become a conservative machine until Stephen Brogan took over as managing partner in 2003.Brogan, the son of a New York City police officer, joined Jones Day straight out of the University of Notre Dame’s law school in 1977 and, aside from a two-year stint in the Reagan Justice Department, has worked there ever since. A number of Brogan’s allies said the key to understanding him and his politics was through his faith. “Brogan is extremely conservative, hard-core Catholic, and that is the bedrock of who he is,” one of his Jones Day confidants told me. Brogan brought on a series of high-profile devotees of the Federalist Society — including leading Reagan and Bush administration lawyers like Michael Carvin and Noel Francisco — to work in the firm’s issues-and-appeals practice, which became a sort of in-house conservative think tank. Even as most of the firm’s lawyers remained focused on bread-and-butter work for big companies, Jones Day took on a growing list of ideologically charged cases and causes, including efforts by the ultraconservative Buckeye Institute to prevent the expansion of early voting in Ohio and challenge the legitimacy of the Obama administration’s newly inaugurated Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. By 2014, when a trio of Republican lawyers at Patton Boggs, a Washington law firm that was in financial trouble, began looking for a new home, Jones Day was a natural fit. It was huge, it had a thriving Washington office and its leaders were conservative. Plus, the Patton Boggs crew — McGahn, Ben Ginsberg and William McGinley — would fill a void. While Jones Day had built up a formidable practice advising companies on how to navigate the federal bureaucracy, the firm didn’t have a practice advising politicians on how to navigate election and campaign-finance laws. And without the relationships that came from helping people win office, it was harder for Jones Day to wield influence on Capitol Hill and in the White House. It helped that Ginsberg, who had been the top lawyer on presidential campaigns by George W. Bush and Mitt Romney, had known Francisco and Carvin for years. During the interview process, Ginsberg told Francisco that he recognized that Jones Day, despite its conservative reputation, probably employed a lot of Democrats. Would it be a problem to bring in a team that would represent polarizing Republicans? It would not, Francisco assured him. Indeed, promoting conservative principles was becoming part of the firm’s marketing pitch. “The government’s tentacles invade virtually every aspect of what our clients do,” Francisco said in a Jones Day promotional video in 2015. “The job of a lawyer and the job of courts is to ensure that the federal government lives within the limits that our Constitution sets, and I love making sure that those lines are enforced.” Ginsberg and McGahn were well known throughout the Republican establishment, and several would-be presidents soon came to them seeking counsel; Govs. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, Rick Perry of Texas and Chris Christie of New Jersey would become clients. McGahn — who had recently served on the Federal Election Commission, watering down campaign-finance rules and slowing the agency’s decision-making in what he said was an effort to make it more responsive to the people and groups it regulated — also represented a who’s who of other G.O.P. power players: the Republican National Committee, the National Rifle Association, the billionaire Koch brothers.There was at least one other key client: Citizens United. The group, famous for its successful Supreme Court challenge of campaign spending restrictions, was run by Dave Bossie, an influential right-wing activist. One day in late 2014, Bossie and McGahn were on the phone, batting around ideas about which presidential campaigns the Jones Day lawyers should work for.The Trump InvestigationsCard 1 of 6The Trump InvestigationsNumerous inquiries. More