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US Capitol attackFar-right militia group membership surged after Capitol attack, hack showsHundreds of people joined Oath Keepers or renewed membership after many of group’s members participated in riot Jason Wilson@ More
US Capitol attackOlympic gold medalist Klete Keller pleads guilty to 6 January riot felonyKeller wore his Team USA jacket when he entered the Capitol building where he shouted vulgarities at Democratic party leaders R More
US Capitol attackCapitol attack committee issues fresh subpoenas over pre-riot Trump rally Eleven people connected to Women for America First subpoenaed, including Trump 2016 campaign spokesperson Katrina Pierson Hugo Lowell in WashingtonWed 29 Sep 2021 18.40 EDTLast modified on Wed 29 Sep 2021 19.03 EDTThe House select committee investigating the Capitol attack on Wednesday issued a second tranche of subpoenas to individuals connected to the rally immediately preceding the 6 January riot, where Donald Trump incited his supporters to commit insurrection.The new subpoenas for people involved in the march and rally reflects the select committee’s far-reaching mandate to examine whether the attack on the Capitol was planned in advance, according to a source familiar with the matter.Trump plans to sue to keep White House records on Capitol attack secretRead moreHouse select committee investigators in total subpoenaed 11 individuals connected to the Trump-supporting organization Women for America First that organized the rally at the Ellipse, including its two co-founders, Amy Kremer and her daughter Kylie Jane Kremer.“The investigation has revealed credible evidence of your involvement in events within the scope of the select committee’s inquiry,” the chairman of the select committee, Bennie Thompson, said in the subpoena letters.“Accordingly, the select committee seeks both documents and your deposition testimony regarding these and other matters that are within the scope of the select committee’s inquiry,” Thompson said.The select committee also subpoenaed other individuals linked to Women for America First: Caroline Wren, Cynthia Lee Chafian, Hannah Salem Stone, Justin Caporale, Katrina Pierson, Lyndon Brentnall, Maggie Mulvaney, Megan Powers, and Tim Unes.House select committee investigators are specifically questioning Pierson – a spokesperson for Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign – about a 4 January encounter with Trump where the former president asked about a separate event featuring Roger Stone and Ali Alexander.The select committee, in subpoenaing Pierson and investigating an additional event on the day before the Capitol attack organized by Chafian, is examining connections between the rally leaders and Trump, who helped drive attendance by elevating 6 January as a “wild” protest.House select committee investigators said in the subpoenas that they believed the 11 people assisted in organizing the rally in support of Trump and his lies about a stolen 2020 election, which incited his supporters to storm the Capitol in his name.But in a notable addition, the select committee added in the subpoenas that they had been identified as potential witnesses because they communicated with former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows – as well as Trump himself.The select committee is expected in the coming weeks to authorize still further subpoenas to Trump officials and other individuals connected to the Capitol attack, which could ultimately number in the hundreds, according to a source familiar with internal deliberations.But it was not immediately clear whether the latest subpoena targets would comply with the orders that compelled them to produce documents by 13 October and appear for depositions in October and November before a select committee that has plainly enraged Trump.The Guardian first reported on Wednesday that Trump and his advisers are planning to sue to block the release of White House records from his presidency to House investigators over executive privilege claims, according to a source familiar with his planning.Trump also expects the four aides subpoenaed in the first tranche of orders last week – Meadows, deputy chief Dan Scavino, strategist Steve Bannon and department defense aide Kash Patel – to defy the orders, the source said.The former president’s efforts to resist the select committee on every front by claiming executive privilege faces steep obstacles, in part because the justice department declined to assert protection over prior testimony related to 6 January.But the plan to mount legal challenges could ensure the most sensitive Trump White House records are tied up in court for months, delaying the select committee as it aims to produce a final report before the 2022 midterms to shield it from accusations of partisanship.TopicsUS Capitol attackUS politicsnewsReuse this content More
Donald TrumpTrump plans to sue to keep White House records on Capitol attack secretLegal strategy could delay and possibly stymie efforts by House select committee into Capitol attacks to see key documents Hugo LowellWed 29 Sep 2021 02.00 EDTLast modified on Wed 29 Sep 2021 02.02 EDTDonald Trump is preparing to sue to block the release of White House records from his administration to the House select committee scrutinizing the 6 January attack on the Capitol by claiming executive privilege, potentially touching off an extended legal battle over disclosure.The former president also expects top aides – former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, deputy chief of staff Dan Scavino, strategist Steve Bannon and defense department aide Kash Patel – to defy select committee subpoenas for records and testimony.Trump’s moves to try to resist the select committee, informed by a source familiar with his planning, are likely to lead to constitutional clashes in court that would test the power of Congress’s oversight authority over the executive branch.The former president said in recent days that he would cite executive privilege to thwart House select committee investigators seeking to compel his top aides to testify about 6 January and what he knew of plans to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election win.But the sharpening contours of Trump’s intention to stonewall the select committee mark a new turning point as he seeks to keep a grip on the rapidly escalating investigation into the events of 6 January that left five dead and about 140 others injured.The plan to prevent House select committee investigators from receiving Trump White House records revolves around exploiting the procedure by which the National Archives allows both the Biden administration and Trump to review materials for executive privilege claims.After the National Archives identifies and transmits to Biden and Trump the records requested by the select committee, Trump has 30 days to review the materials and ask the administration to assert executive privilege over any to stop their release.The records are being delivered to Biden and Trump hundreds or thousands of pages at a time on a rolling basis, and the first tranche of documents was sent by the National Archives on 31 August, according to a source familiar with the matter.As president, Biden retains the final authority over whether to assert the protection for specific documents, meaning that he can instruct the White House counsel, Dana Remus, to allow their release even over Trump’s objections after an additional 60 days has passed.The former president, however, can then file lawsuits to block their release – a legal strategy that Trump and his advisers are preparing to pursue insofar as it could tie up the records in court for months and stymie evidence-gathering by the select committee.It was not immediately clear how Trump would approach such legal challenges, and whether it would, for instance, involve individual suits against the release of specific records. A spokesperson for the former president did not respond to a request for comment.Trump is not guaranteed to win such cases over executive privilege given he is no longer president and the White House office of legal counsel previously declined to assert the protection for previous 6 January-related testimony by Trump justice department officials.But the plan could delay, and therefore hamper, House select committee investigators as they aim to produce a final report before the 2022 midterm elections in order to shield their work from accusations of partisanship as the nation returns to the polls.The select committee at the very latest is probably facing a hard deadline of January 2023 by which to complete its report, since Republicans will not vote to reauthorize a panel investigating Trump and his allies should they, as expected, retake control of the House.As for the subpoenas issued to his top aides, Trump has said in recent days that he would invoke executive privilege to prevent Meadows, Scavino, Bannon and Patel from testifying to the select committee, repeating a tactic successfully used during his first impeachment.In a freewheeling statement after the select committee announced the subpoenas – deliberations first reported by the Guardian – the former president lashed out at the select committee’s inquiry as a partisan exercise and criticized their zeal to target his closest advisers.“We will fight the subpoenas on executive privilege and other grounds for the good of our country, while we wait to find out whether or not subpoenas will be sent out to Antifa and BLM for the death and destruction they have caused,” Trump said.The former president signaled his intentions to threaten a prolonged legal fight over White House records from his administration after the select committee first made its documents requests to the National Archives at the end of August.“Executive privilege will be defended, not just on behalf of my administration and the patriots who worked beside me, but on behalf of the office of the president of the United States and the future of our nation,” Trump said in a statement.The justice department has typically fought to keep private, executive-branch discussions between presidents and top advisers secret, to avoid setting a precedent that could prevent officials from having candid conversations for fear that they might later become public.But with the former acting attorney general Jeff Rosen and his deputy, Richard Donoghue, the White House office of legal counsel cleared them to provide “unrestricted testimony” to Congress about Trump’s efforts to reinstall himself in office because of the gravity of the matter.TopicsDonald TrumpUS Capitol attackUS politicsHouse of RepresentativesBiden administrationnewsReuse this content More
US Capitol attackHouse committee on Capitol attack subpoenas Trump’s ex-chief of staff and other top aidesMark Meadows, Steve Bannon and Dan Scavino among advisers called to testify over president’s connection to 6 January events Hugo Lowell in Washington DCThu 23 Sep 2021 19.48 EDTLast modified on Thu 23 Sep 2021 20.30 EDTThe House select committee scrutinizing the Capitol attack on Thursday sent subpoenas to Trump’s White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and a cadre of top Trump aides, demanding their testimony to shed light on the former president’s connection to the 6 January riot.The subpoenas and demands for depositions marked the most aggressive investigative actions the select committee has taken since it made records demands and records preservation requests that formed the groundwork of the inquiry into potential White House involvement.House select committee investigators targeted four of the closest aides to the former president: deputy White House chief of staff Dan Scavino, former Trump campaign manager Steve Bannon, and the former acting defense secretary’s chief of staff Kash Patel as well as Meadows.“The select committee has reason to believe that you have information relevant to understanding important activities that led to and informed events at the Capitol on January 6,” the chairman of the select committee, Bennie Thompson, said in the subpoena letters.“Accordingly, the select committee seeks both documents and your deposition testimony regarding these and other matters that are within the scope of the select committee’s inquiry,” Thompson said.The select committee is expected to authorize further subpoenas and schedule closed-door interviews with key witnesses – as well as the inquiry’s second public hearing – in the coming weeks, according to two sources familiar with internal deliberations.The Trump aides compelled to cooperate with the select committee have some of the most intimate knowledge of what the former president was doing and thinking during the insurrection – and what he knew in advance of plans to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election win.Several administration officials, such as Meadows and Scavino, remained by Trump’s side for most of the day on 6 January, while campaign aides such as Bannon strategized how to subvert the results of the 2020 election and reinstall Trump in the Oval Office.Meadows also accompanied Trump back to the White House after the conclusion of the “Stop the Steal” rally that swiftly descended into the Capitol attack, from where Trump told Republican senator Ben Sasse he was “delighted” at seeing the images of the insurrection.Patel, who was nearly appointed CIA director in the final weeks of the Trump administration four years after emerging from obscurity as a Hill staffer, may also hold the key to unlocking the full picture of the Capitol attack as one of the former president’s top lieutenants.The subpoena authorizations came after the Guardian first reported on Tuesday that House select committee investigators were considering issuing the orders to Meadows and other Trump aides as the panel ramps up the pace of its investigation.There is no guarantee that the subpoena targets will comply. Trump has suggested he will demand that the Biden administration invoke executive privilege over Trump-era executive branch records requested by the select committee and try to block damaging witness testimony.But it appears unlikely that the White House Office of Legal Counsel would assert the protection in the case of 6 January materials, given it previously allowed Trump DOJ officials to testify to Congress and the protection does not extend to an individual’s private interests.TopicsUS Capitol attackTrump administrationHouse of RepresentativesUS CongressSteve BannonUS politicsDonald TrumpnewsReuse this content More
US Capitol attackCapitol attack panel said to be considering subpoenas to Trump White House aidesMark Meadows, Dan Scavino and former campaign manager Brad Parscale are among those being targeted Hugo Lowell in Washington DCWed 22 Sep 2021 02.00 EDTLast modified on Wed 22 Sep 2021 02.02 EDTThe House select committee investigating the 6 January attack on the US Capitol is considering issuing a blitz of subpoenas for top Trump White House aides including the former chief and deputy chief of staff, according to a source familiar with the matter.The subpoenas – which are expected to be authorized as early as this week – would place House select committee investigators inside the White House and Trump campaign war rooms at the time of the insurrection as the panel prepares to ramp up the pace of its inquiry.Republicans in crosshairs of 6 January panel begin campaign of intimidationRead moreHouse select committee investigators are considering subpoenas for call detail records or testimony of key aides including former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, deputy chief of staff Dan Scavino and former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale, the source said.The scope and subjects of the subpoenas are not yet finalized and discussions about who to include in the first tranche are still ongoing, the source said, although the three Trump officials are presently considered likely targets.Taken together, the developing move from the select committee marks perhaps the most aggressive investigative actions since the panel made an array of records demands and records preservation requests for Trump officials last month.It is also likely to further inflame tensions with Trump, already furious at the select committee for opening a line of inquiry into what he knew in advance of plans to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election win, as well as Republicans under scrutiny over 6 January.Trump officials such as Meadows, Scavino and Parscale played a major part in advancing baseless and disproven lies about a stolen 2020 election that precipitated the ‘Stop the Steal’ rally which descended into the insurrection as Trump supporters stormed the Capitol.The former White House chief of staff, who remained by Trump’s side as the violence unfolded, is among several aides who may hold the key to unlock inside information pertaining to the Capitol attack that left five dead and nearly 140 injured.But House select committee investigators are also taking a special interest in the role played by Scavino, the source said, since he held the additional role of being the director of social media – Trump’s preferred messaging platform.Subpoenas for call detail records, testimony or other material from those Trump officials and other individuals involved in the 6 January attack would cast a close net around the former president’s inner circle while simultaneously putting them at the center of the probe.House select committee investigators first signaled their intention to pursue a close inquiry into the potential role played by the Trump White House and House Republicans when they asked 35 telecom and social media companies to preserve records in case of later subpoenas.In the records preservation requests, the select committee instructed the companies to avoid destroying the records of several hundred people, including House minority leader Kevin McCarthy and, as the Guardian reported, the White House chief of staff Meadows.Much of the investigative work by the select committee has so far been focused on gathering evidence, as a prosecutor might, to build a case backstopped by empirical data that would safeguard its final report from criticism of partisanship or built-in bias.To that end, the select committee is also in the process of scheduling closed-door depositions with key persons of interest included in and beyond the subpoenas, the source said, though the agenda and potential subjects of the interviews were not immediately clear.A spokesperson for the select committee declined to comment about subpoena discussions for Trump administration and campaign officials. But the panel’s chairman, Bennie Thompson, previously told the Guardian he would investigate 6 January conversations involving Trump.House select committee investigators are showing a new urgency to jolt the investigation into higher gear after the panel held its first hearing before members departed Washington for an extended summer recess. The full select committee – members, counsel and advisors – met for the first time on Monday for more than five hours in the Capitol, taking only short breaks to vote, grab dinner and make an occasional dash to the toilet.Members and staff for the select committee say they remain in discussions about when and on what topic to schedule a second hearing. At least two members told the Guardian they now expect the next public hearing will be delayed until October, though plans remain fluid.Congressman Jamie Raskin, a member of the select committee, told reporters after the meeting that new facts about the Capitol attack were surfacing every day and that he expected the panel to ultimately receive all the records and testimony it sought.Raskin added that he was pushing to secure testimony under oath from anyone with relevant information. “We should see it as an honor and a privilege to be able to provide evidence to Congress about this violent insurrection,” he said.House select committee investigators are expected to present the subpoenas as non-negotiable, and 6 January select committee member Adam Schiff told reporters that subpoenas were imminent for individuals expected to resist requests for testimony.“In some cases, we’re making requests we think will be complied with,” said Schiff. “In other cases, we’re going straight to subpoenas where we think we’re dealing with recalcitrant witnesses.”Schiff, a former Trump impeachment manager from the 2019 trial and the chairman of the House intelligence committee, said he hoped the justice department would also help the select committee hold subpoena defiers in contempt of Congress.Trump has threatened in recent weeks to mount challenges to the select committee’s work, enraged at the prospect of his embarrassing private efforts to subvert the 2020 election results and reinstall himself in office being made public.“Executive privilege will be defended, not just on behalf of my administration and the patriots who worked beside me, but on behalf of the office of the president of the United States and the future of our nation,” Trump said in a statement.It was not clear whether his claims of executive privilege carried weight. The justice department has declined to assert the protection over Capitol attack testimony after the White House office of legal counsel determined it did not exist to benefit private interests.TopicsUS Capitol attackUS politicsDonald TrumpTrump administrationnewsReuse this content More
US Capitol attackWashington DC police preparing for rally in support of 6 January rioters Some leading Republicans in Congress are distancing themselves from the event and Proud Boys are avoiding it as well Chris McGreal in WashingtonSat 18 Sep 2021 02.00 EDTLast modified on Sat 18 Sep 2021 10.57 EDTWashington DC has prepared for Saturday’s rally in support of those arrested for storming the Capitol on 6 January by mounting the kind of security operation it failed to put in place before the attempted coup.Peril review: Bob Woodward Trump trilogy ends on note of dire warningRead moreThe city has surrounded congressional buildings with reinforced fencing, called up large numbers of police officers and put the national guard on standby to prepare for the “Justice for J6” protest near the Capitol building.But even amid warnings from the Department of Homeland Security about threats of violence, there were signs the demonstration may fall short of the impact its organisers hope for, as mainstream Republican politicians and some ardent pro-Trump groups distanced themselves from the rally.The protest was called to demand the release of about 650 people charged with offences after thousands of Trump supporters smashed their way into the Capitol in an attempt to prevent members of Congress certifying the 2021 presidential election.Four people died during the riot, including a woman shot by a police officer as she tried to get on to the floor of the House of Representatives. Brian Sicknick, a Capitol police officer attacked by the protesters, died the next day.Nearly 60 people have pleaded guilty, mostly to relatively minor crimes including obstruction of official proceedings and illegally demonstrating in the Capitol.Supporters have characterised them as “political prisoners” who were lawfully protesting at the urging of Donald Trump, who held a rally nearby at which he urged supporters to “fight like hell” to defend his claim to have won the 2020 election.The organisers, Look Ahead America, said Saturday’s rally was not intended to demonstrate support for Trump and appealed for those attending not to wear political paraphernalia.The group’s director, Matt Braynard, a former Trump campaign operative, told CNN it would be “a completely peaceful protest”.Look Ahead America applied for a permit for 700 people to attend the protest. It remains to be seen if it will attract even that number after the demonstration was disparaged by some pro-Trump groups and mainstream Republicans who have spent the past few days distancing themselves from the protest.Senator Lindsey Graham called on police to take a “firm line” with demonstrators.“If anybody gets out of line, they need to whack ’em,” he told the New York Times.Far-right groups tell supporters planned Washington rally is a government ‘trap’Read moreThe Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers militia, whose members are among those facing some of the most serious charges over the 6 January attack, appear to be avoiding the event. A Proud Boys social media channel said the protest “sounds like bait” subject to government surveillance and warned members not to go.Trump, who was impeached for inciting the riot but acquitted at trial in the Senate, has condemned prosecutions over 6 January.“Our hearts and minds are with the people being persecuted so unfairly relating to the 6 January protest concerning the Rigged Presidential Election,” he said in a written statement.Trump then declared: “In the end, however, JUSTICE WILL PREVAIL!”The former president will not be attending the rally. He is scheduled to spend the day at a golf tournament in New Jersey.TopicsUS Capitol attackDonald TrumpUS policingnewsReuse this content More
BooksPeril review: Bob Woodward Trump trilogy ends on note of dire warning Behind the headlines about Gen Milley, China and the threat of nuclear war lies a sobering read about democracy in dangerLloyd GreenSat 18 Sep 2021 01.00 EDTLast modified on Sat 18 Sep 2021 01.02 EDTDonald Trump is out of a job but far from gone and forgotten. The 45th president stokes the lie of a rigged election while his rallies pack more wallop than a Sunday sermon and a bottle of Jack Daniel’s.Melania Trump like Marie Antoinette, says former aide in hotly awaited bookRead more“We won the election twice!” Trump shouts. His base has come to believe. They see themselves in him and are ready to die for him – literally. Covid vaccines? Let the liberals take them.Deep red Mississippi leads in Covid deaths per capita. Florida’s death toll has risen above 50,000. This week alone, the Sunshine State lost more than 2,500. Then again, a century and a half ago, about 258,000 men died for the Confederacy rather than end slavery. “Freedom?” Whatever.One thing is certain: against this carnage-filled backdrop Bob Woodward’s latest book is aptly titled indeed.Written with Robert Costa, another Washington Post reporter, Peril caps a Trump trilogy by one half of the team that took down Richard Nixon. As was the case with Fear and Rage, Peril is meticulously researched. Quotes fly off the page. The prose, however, stays dry.This is a curated narrative of events and people but it comes with a point of view. The authors recall Trump’s admission that “real power [is] fear”, and that he evokes “rage”.Peril quotes Brad Parscale, a discarded campaign manager, about Trump’s return to the stage after his ejection from the White House.“I don’t think he sees it as a comeback,” Parscale says. “He sees it as vengeance.”Parscale knows of whom and what he speaks. His words are chilling and sobering both.The pages of Peril are replete with the voices of Gen Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Bill Barr, Trump’s second attorney general. Each seeks to salvage a tarnished reputation, Milley’s somewhat, Barr’s badly.In June 2020, wearing combat fatigues, Milley marched with Trump across Lafayette Square, a historic space outside the White House which had been forcibly cleared of anti-racism protesters so the president could stage a photo op at a church. The general regrets the episode. Others, less so.In an earlier Trump book, I Alone Can Fix It, Carol Leonnig and Phil Rucker, also of the Post, captured Milley telling aides just days before the attack on the Capitol on 6 January, “This is a Reichstag moment.” This week, in the aftermath of reports based on Peril of Milley’s contacts with China in the waning days of the Trump administration, seeking to reassure an uncertain adversary, Joe Biden came to the general’s defense.As for Barr, for 20 months he bent the justice department to the president’s will. Fortunately, he refused in the end to break it. Overturning the election was a far greater ask than pouring dirt over the special counsel’s report on Trump and Russia or running interference for Paul Manafort, Trump’s convicted-then-pardoned campaign manager. Barr, it seems, wants back into the establishment – having smashed his fist in its eye.Woodward and Costa recount Barr’s Senate confirmation hearing, in which he promised to allow Robert Mueller to complete the Russia investigation, Trump’s enraged reaction and an intervention by his wife, Melania. According to the author, Barr may have owed his job to her.Emmett Flood, then counsel to Trump, conveyed to Barr his mood.“The president’s going crazy,” he said. “You said nice things about Bob Mueller.”Melania was having none of it, reportedly scolding her husband: “Are you crazy?”In a vintagely Trumpian moment, she also said Barr was “right out of central casting”.In another intriguing bit of pure political dish, Mitch McConnell is seen in the Senate cloakroom, joking at Trump’s expense.“Do you know why [former secretary of state Rex] Tillerson was able to say he didn’t call the president a ‘moron’?” the Senate Republican leader asks.“Because he called him a ‘fucking moron’.”By contrast, McConnell has kind words for Biden – a man he is dedicated to rendering a one-term president. America’s cold civil war goes on. Some, sometimes, still send messages across no man’s land.Woodward and Costa show Kellyanne Conway, Trump’s 2016 campaign manager, the goddess of alternative facts, reminding Trump that he turned voters off in his second election. In 2020, Trump underperformed among white voters without a college degree and ran behind congressional Republicans.“Get back to basics,” Conway tells him. Stop with the grievances and obsessing over the election. From the looks of things, Trump has discounted her advice. Conway has a book of her own due out in 2022. Score-settling awaits.Ending somewhere near the political present, Woodward and Costa shed light on the withdrawal from Afghanistan and Senator Lindsey Graham with it.In office, Trump affixed his signature to a document titled “Memorandum for the Acting Secretary of Defense: Withdrawal from Somalia and Afghanistan”. It declared: “I hereby direct you to withdraw all US forces from the Federal Republic of Somalia no later than 31 December 2020 and from the Islamic Republican of Afghanistan no later than 15 January 2021.”Steve Bannon prepped Jeffrey Epstein for CBS interview, Michael Wolff claimsRead moreApparatchiks were baffled as to where the memo had come from. Then they blocked it. Trump folded when confronted.As for Graham, the South Carolina Republican and presidential golfing buddy expresses “hate” for both Trump and Biden over Afghanistan.Graham and Biden were friends once. As Graham has repeatedly trashed Hunter Biden, expect the fissure between him and the new president to prove to be long lasting. As for Graham and Trump, it’s a question of who needs whom more at any given moment. With John McCain gone, it’s a good bet Graham will latch on to an alpha dog again.Fittingly, in their closing sentence, Woodward and Costa ponder the fate of the American experiment itself.“Could Trump work his will again? Were there any limits to what he and his supporters might do to put him back in power?“Peril remains.”TopicsBooksBob WoodwardPolitics booksUS politicsRepublicansDemocratsUS CongressreviewsReuse this content More
