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      House January 6 panel asks lawyer for Alex Jones’s accidentally leaked texts

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      House January 6 panel asks lawyer for Alex Jones’s accidentally leaked textsTwo years of messages were inadvertently sent by Infowars host’s attorney to lawyer for Sandy Hook victim’s family The House January 6 committee has asked the attorney for a family suing Alex Jones for defamation to turn over up to two years’ worth of text messages from the far-right conspiracy theorist’s phone that he inadvertently received from the defense ahead of the trial.The request from the select committee – and another from federal law enforcement – was confirmed in an Austin, Texas, courtroom on Thursday by Mark Bankston, the lawyer for the parents of a child killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting, which Jones has falsely claimed was a hoax.Damaging Alex Jones texts mistakenly sent to Sandy Hook family’s lawyersRead moreNotably, Bankston said he had identified texts between Jones and Roger Stone, a far-right political operative and adviser to former president Donald Trump thought to be connected to the Capitol attack. He also said he intended to comply with the requests unless a court order instructed him not to.The inadvertent transfer of the texts to Bankston, as well as his readiness to turn them over, could mark an extraordinary stroke of luck for the January 6 panel after Jones invoked his constitutional right against self-incrimination in a deposition earlier in the committee’s investigation.Bankston has said in court that Jones’s texts cover a roughly two-year period dating back to 2019, which if true would include his communications from the weeks after the 2020 election that Trump lost to Joe Biden and leading up to the Capitol attack the defeated president’s supporters carried out in early 2021.But the Infowars host disputed that the texts to which Bankston has referred would contain anything of interest to the January 6 committee, saying on his show on Thursday that they actually covered a six-month period from 2019 to early 2020.The texts are potentially significant because Jones has claimed that on 3 January 2020 he was asked by the Trump White House and the Secret Service to lead a march from the Ellipse to the Capitol three days later. Just such an action by Trump supporters on 6 January disrupted the congressional certification of Biden’s presidential victory. The texts could shed light on the extent – if any – of that coordination.Jones’s claim that he was asked asked to lead that march is striking because the panel has heard that Trump later told an adviser he was unaware about such plans, according to a source familiar with the matter.Details about that supposed request from the Trump White House have been scarce. The committee has struggled to verify the Infowars host’s claims through records from the Secret Service after agents’ texts from January 6 were unlawfully erased.A committee spokesperson declined to comment on Jones’s texts.The confirmation from Bankston on Thursday that he was prepared to turn over the text messages was the latest twist in a bizarre saga that could have far-reaching consequences for Jones, particularly as the justice department steps up its criminal investigation into January 6.Bankston revealed he was in possession of the texts a day earlier, when he told Jones – while he was on the witness stand – that his legal team had “messed up” and provided “an entire digital copy of your entire cellphone with every text message” from the past two years.Those messages included texts that contradicted claims made under oath that Jones had nothing on his phone pertaining to the Sandy Hook shooting.Bankston said he immediately alerted Jones’s attorneys to the apparent error but they never took steps to keep the communications out of court by labeling them as privileged.Jones’s attorney, Andino Reynal, requested a mistrial on Thursday, over the purportedly accidental leak. The attorney argued that he feared the text message leak was introduced in court simply to create more press coverage, the Associated Press earlier reported.The emergency motion from Reynal sought the return and destruction of the documents, saying the defence had told Bankston to disregard the link to the files with the text messages, which also included messages from Robert Barnes, Jones’s other lawyer with ties to Stone.But the trial judge, Maya Guerra Gamble of Travis county, denied the motion.Reynal also asked Guerra Gamble to block the release of materials on Jones’s phone to anyone, including the January 6 committee. Guerra Gamble said she would let Reynal indicate what he wants to keep confidential, and then she would review that request, adding that she wasn’t sure she could block a subpoena, according to the Austin American-Statesman newspaper.Jurors in the defamation case brought against Jones by Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis – the father and mother of Jesse Lewis, a six-year-old murdered in the Sandy Hook shooting – began deliberations late on Wednesday afternoon.They resumed on Thursday, the ninth day of a trial which saw Jones apologize and admit that the 2012 shooting at the elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, was “100% real”.Jones previously spent years claiming that the 20 children and six adults murdered at Sandy Hook were not killed and instead – along with their grieving loved ones – were “crisis actors” carrying out an elaborate ruse to force gun control reform.Heslin and Lewis sued Jones for defamation and inflicting emotional stress, saying they suffered mental distress, death threats and harassment. They have demanded at least $150m, saying an apology would not be enough.Jones lost on the merits of the case by default, because he failed to provide any documents in response to the lawsuit. The jury is deciding how much he owes Lewis and Heslin in compensation. In a later phase, it will determine whether he should pay punitive damages.TopicsUS newsUS politicsUS Capitol attackNewtown shootingnewsReuse this content More

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      Arizona Republican who defied Trump and lost primary: ‘I’d do it again in a heartbeat’

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      Arizona Republican who defied Trump and lost primary: ‘I’d do it again in a heartbeat’Rusty Bowers, who refused to help overturn Trump election loss, says he has no regrets despite losing bid for state senate seat Rusty Bowers, the Arizona Republican who defied Donald Trump’s attempt to overturn his defeat in the state then testified to the House January 6 committee, has no regrets despite losing his bid for a state senate seat.“I would do it again in a heartbeat,” he told the Associated Press. “I’d do it 50 times in a row.”On the chopping block? Ron Johnson denies threatening social securityRead moreTerm limits meant Bowers could not mount another house run. On Tuesday he was trounced in a primary by David Farnsworth, a Trump-endorsed former state senator.Trump was the first Republican to lose a presidential race in Arizona since Bill Clinton won there in 1996. Clinton was re-elected anyway. Trump wasn’t.Bowers refused to help efforts to overturn Trump’s defeat in Arizona – including a partisan audit which ended with Joe Biden’s margin of victory slightly increased.Bowers also angered Trump and his supporters by testifying in June before the US House committee investigating the deadly attack on Congress.Bowers told the panel how his faith motivated his defiance of the attempt to subvert democracy, and described threats from Trump supporters while his daughter lay mortally ill.Censured by the state party, Bowers was given a Profile in Courage award by the John F Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Boston.He initially said he would vote for Trump if he ran for president in 2024.“If he is the nominee,” Bowers told the Associated Press, “if he was up against Biden, I’d vote for him again. Simply because what he did the first time, before Covid, was so good for the country. In my view it was great.”But Bowers seemed to change his mind, telling the Deseret News: “I don’t want the choice of having to look at [Trump] again. And if it comes, I’ll be hard pressed. I don’t know what I’ll do.“But I’m not inclined to support him. Because he doesn’t represent my party. He doesn’t represent the morals and the platform of my party … That guy is just – he’s his own party. It’s a party of intimidation and I don’t like it.”He also told Business Insider: “Much of what [Trump] has done has been tyrannical, especially of late.”After his own defeat, Bowers said Trump had soiled the Republican party.“President Trump is a dividing force that has thrashed our party,” he told the AP. “And it’s not enough to disagree. You have to disagree and then stomp on people and ruin their reputations and chase them down and thrash them and you just keep beating them up. That’s the Trump model.”He said the Arizona Republican party now had a similar “bully mentality … and I think you’re going to find out as all these people leave this party, that someday there’s going to be a hard reckoning. And I have a feeling it can be later this year.”Farnsworth won the state senate seat, since no Democrats entered the primary.Trump backers did very well up and down the Arizona ballot, with his candidate for governor leading and endorsees for US Senate, attorney general and secretary of state winning. Trump-backed candidates succeeded in several other Arizona races.TopicsUS Capitol attackUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      Time is running out. The justice department must indict Trump | Laurence H Tribe and Dennis Aftergut

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      Time is running out. The Department of Justice must indict and convict TrumpLaurence H Tribe and Dennis AftergutIf Trump or any of the likely Republican nominees win in 2024, they will immediately move to protect those who attempted to overturn the 2020 election On Tuesday CNN reported that key January 6 texts have been erased by officials of Donald Trump’s defense department in addition to homeland security and the Secret Service. Not even a clueless Hamlet could avoid smelling “something rotten in the state of Denmark”.With the growing list of deletions, there is a whole new criminal conspiracy to investigate: one to destroy evidence of the grave federal crimes already under investigation. Nothing so focuses the prosecutorial mind or underscores the need to accelerate a criminal investigation as evidence that the investigation’s target may have plotted to erase the proof of his wrongdoing that is needed to hold him accountable.Trump’s attempted coup continues – even after January 6 hearings are over for now | Robert ReichRead moreThe attorney general, Merrick Garland, knows that the fish always rots from the head. On 26 July, the Washington Post broke news that the justice department’s investigation is focused on Donald Trump himself. Time is of the essence in bringing his case to indictment.Indeed, a moving target who gives every indication that he plans to strike again must trigger a different cost-benefit calculus in the inevitable debates both within and outside the justice department about when enough proof has been gathered to indict responsibly – and when it would be a dereliction of duty to delay further.The former president’s insistence that he has nothing to be remorseful about (other than not marching to the Capitol) makes that debate seem academic. And the steps being taken at his behest even now in battleground states to replace 2020’s failure with 2024’s success redouble the urgency. Shakespeare’s Brutus had it right when he said, in Julius Caesar: “We must take the current when it serves, or lose our ventures.”In these circumstances, prudence counsels running the clock backwards to set clear benchmarks for moving forward. Any calculation of how to proceed must start with two pessimistic premises. First, that Trump will run in 2024 and could win. Second, that if any of the likely Republican nominees wins, the next administration will be one that is eager to scrap any prosecution of the last.Hence, the goal must be to secure a conviction before November 2024, and in any event, no later than 20 January 2025, when the next presidential term begins. It is already too late for all appeals from any such conviction to be exhausted by that date, but the key to holding the chief conspirator accountable is a jury verdict of guilt.Consider this: the trial of insurrectionist Guy Reffitt occurred 13 months after his original indictment. That trial, and its delaying pre-trial motions, were incalculably less complex than Trump’s would be. One can easily anticipate motions that, if denied, might go far up the appellate chain.It is not hard to imagine a majority of supreme court justices in no great hurry to resolve motions upon which the start of trial could depend. One can easily conceive a 20-month or longer period with the former president indicted but not yet tried. If Trump is not formally charged until January 2023, that would imply a multi-month trial starting in September or October. Should he run for president and win in November, we would have a president-elect in the middle of a criminal trial.Part of why a lengthy post-indictment/pre-verdict period is foreseeable is that federal district courts are bound to protect an accused’s rights to full airing of pre-trial claims and the time needed to file and argue them. Trump will have many pre-trial claims, setting out his serial and inexhaustible list of grievances, the imagined violation of his rights, his purported immunity from prosecution as a former president and the overriding unfairness of it all.Some district court judges more than others will balance protections for the accused with accountability’s pragmatic need for speed. Importantly, even the four Trump-appointed district court judges in DC have often shown little sympathy for those charged with perpetrating the events of January 6 or resisting their investigation. On 1 August, Judge Dabney Friedrich sentenced Reffitt to more than seven years in prison, the longest sentence to date.Judge Tim Kelly refused to dismiss indictments against Proud Boy leaders who were part of the January 6 siege. Judge Carl Nichols brooked no nonsense in Steve Bannon’s July trial, deliberately preventing it from becoming the “political circus” Bannon sought to make it.On the other hand, among eight judges who have considered defendants’ motions to dismiss federal charges of obstructing an official government proceeding – Congress’s January 6 election certification session – Nichols was the lone outlier who dismissed the count. That is one of the main charges that observers believe federal prosecutors could bring against Trump.The point is that if Trump were to be indicted, the Department of Justice cannot count on a favorable judge putting it on a jet stream to an actual trial. So what does that mean for precisely when Trump must be formally indicted?Thankfully, it doesn’t imply the impossible. The Department of Justice could pull an experienced prosecutor or two from every US attorney’s office and put them together on the case.With all stops pulled, prosecutors still have time to do what is needed before year end. The tasks include talking to witnesses that the January 6 House committee interviewed and deposed, which is well under way. Cassidy Hutchinson, principal aide to Trump’s chief of staff Mark Meadows, and Vice-President Mike Pence’s top aides, Marc Short and Greg Jacobs, are now working with the Department of Justice or appearing before its grand jury.Cooperation is already reported to have begun among the lawyer-enablers of Trump’s coup plotting. With the investigation’s accelerating aim at Trump, every potential target’s defense counsel has surely discussed with the target the advantages of an early offer to plead guilty and cooperate. Early birds get better worms.On 2 August, the federal grand jury investigating the lead-up to the January 6 insurrection subpoenaed the former White House counsel Pat Cipollone. Department of Justice prosecutors are reported to be preparing to go to court to secure his testimony about his conversations with Trump if Cipollone again declines to disclose them on grounds of executive privilege.The task ahead is massive, but if attacked with supreme urgency, it can get done. The building blocks for a trial of Donald Trump must be put into place with alacrity. In no case more than this one, the perfect cannot be the enemy of the good. The clock is ticking.
      Laurence H Tribe is the Carl M Loeb University professor and professor of constitutional law emeritus at Harvard Law School
      Dennis Aftergut is a former federal prosecutor, currently of counsel to Lawyers Defending American Democracy
      TopicsUS politicsOpinionDonald TrumpUS Capitol attackJanuary 6 hearingsRepublicansMerrick GarlandcommentReuse this content More

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      Justice department urged to investigate deletion of January 6 texts by Pentagon

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      Justice department urged to investigate deletion of January 6 texts by PentagonWatchdog group calls on Merrick Garland asked to investigate deleted phone messages from senior Trump officials The US attorney general, Merrick Garland, has been asked to investigate yet another deletion of text messages and other communications by senior officials on 6 January 2021, this time by the Pentagon.House panels: DHS officials interfered in effort to get lost Secret Service textsRead moreAmerican Oversight, a non-partisan watchdog group, revealed the shock deletion on Tuesday, having discovered it through freedom of information requests to the Department of Defense.The DoD and the army admitted in court filings to American Oversight that the phone messages of senior Trump officials were wiped after the administration handover, including text messages from January 6, the day of the deadly attack on Congress by supporters of Donald Trump.Similar deletions of communications around January 6 by the Department of Homeland Security and the Secret Service were already the subject of considerable controversy.The Department of Justice and the House January 6 committee continue to investigate Trump’s attempt to overturn his election defeat.In an open letter to Garland, American Oversight said: “We urge you to investigate DoD’s failure to preserve the text messages of several high-ranking officials on or surrounding the day of the January 6 attack.”In its Freedom of Information request, American Oversight sought the release of communications between senior officials and Trump, his vice-president, Mike Pence, his chief of staff, Mark Meadows, “or anyone communicating on their behalf on January 6”.Among officials whose communications are at issue are the former acting defense secretary Chris Miller; former army secretary Ryan McCarthy; Kash Patel, who was Miller’s chief of staff; Paul Ney, formerly Pentagon general counsel; and James E McPherson, formerly general counsel of the army.The Pentagon’s sluggish response to the Capitol attack remains the subject of widespread speculation and investigation.As the New York Times put it last month, “the mobilisation and deployment of national guard troops from an armory just two miles away from the Capitol was hung up by confusion, communications breakdowns and concern over the wisdom of dispatching armed soldiers to quell the riot”.Messages between senior DoD officials and the White House could shed light on what happened.On Tuesday, Ney told CNN he turned in a phone when he left the Department of Defense on 20 January 2021, the day of Joe Biden’s inauguration.“I did not wipe the phone before I turned it in (or ever that I can recall),” Ney said. “When I turned the phone in, I did not know what was going to be done with that device nor do I know what actually was done with that device after I turned it in.“If DoD represented in litigation that the device was wiped after I left DoD on inauguration day, I believe that is very likely what happened and when it happened, but I do not know why.”On January 6, a mob Trump told to “fight like hell” attacked Congress in an attempt to stop certification of Biden’s election victory. Nine deaths have been linked to the riot, including suicides among law enforcement officers.In a series of dramatic public hearings, the House January 6 committee has demonstrated Trump’s role in election subversion efforts and in stoking the attack on the Capitol.Garland is under increasing pressure over investigations surrounding January 6 and Trump’s election subversion. He has promised to “pursue justice without fear or favor”.Heather Sawyer, executive director of American Oversight, told CNN: “It’s just astounding to believe that [the Pentagon] did not understand the importance of preserving its records – particularly [with regards] to the top officials that might have captured what they were doing, when they were doing it, why they were doing it on that day.”The deletion of such records, she said, “reveals a widespread lack of taking seriously the obligation to preserve records, to ensure accountability, to ensure accountability to their partners in the legislative branch and to the American people”.TopicsUS Capitol attackTrump administrationnewsReuse this content More

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      House panels: DHS officials interfered in effort to get lost Secret Service texts

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      House panels: DHS officials interfered in effort to get lost Secret Service textsAfter the inspector general’s office requested the Secret Service’s January 6 communications, the effort was shut down Top officials at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) inspector general’s office interfered with efforts to recover erased Secret Service texts from the time of the US Capitol attack and attempted to cover up their actions, two House committees said in a letter on Monday.Taken together, the new revelations appear to show that the chief watchdog for the Secret Service and the DHS took deliberate steps to stop the retrieval of texts it knew were missing, and then sought to hide the fact that it had decided not to pursue that evidence.The inspector general’s office had initially sought to retrieve the lost texts from across the DHS – spanning both the Secret Service as well as the former DHS secretary Chad Wolf and his deputy, Ken Cuccinelli – as part of its internal review into January 6.But six weeks after the inspector general’s office first requested Secret Service communications from the time of the Capitol attack, that effort was shut down by Thomas Kait, the deputy inspector general for inspections and evaluations, the House committees said.“Use this email as a reference to our conversation where I said we no longer request phone records and text messages from the USSS relating to the events on January 6th,” Kait wrote in a July 2021 email to a senior DHS liaison official, Jim Crumpacker, that was obtained by Congress.The House committees also disclosed they had learned that Kait and other senior officials manipulated a memo, authored on 4 February 2022, that originally criticized the DHS for refusing to cooperate with its investigation and emphasized the need to review certain texts.By the time that Kait and other senior officials had finished with the memo, the House committee said, mentions about the erased texts from the Secret Service or the DHS secretary had been removed and instead praised the agency for its response to the internal review.The memo went from being a stinging rebuke that said “most DHS components have not provided the requested information” to saying “we received a timely and consolidated response from each component”, the House committees said.Appearing to acknowledge the removal of the damaging findings in the memo, Kait asked colleagues around that time: “Am I setting us up for anything by adding what I did? I spoke with Kristen late last week and she was ok with acknowledging the DAL’s efforts.”The disclosures alarmed the House oversight committee chair, Carolyn Maloney, and House homeland security committee chair, Bennie Thompson – who also chairs the House January 6 committee – enough to demand that top DHS officials appear for transcribed interviews.In the four-page letter, the two House committees again called for the recusal of the DHS inspector general, Joseph Cuffari, and demanded communications inside the inspector general’s office about not collecting or recovering texts from the agency relating to the Capitol attack.The deepening investigation has also revealed that Cuffari’s office was notified in February 2022 that texts from Wolf and Cuccinelli could not be accessed and that Cuccinelli had been using a personal phone – yet never told Congress.Kait has a history of removing damaging findings from reports. In a DHS report on domestic violence and sexual misconduct, Kait directed staff to remove a section that found officers accused of sexual offenses were charged with generic offenses, the New York Times reported.The controversy over the missing texts erupted several weeks ago after Cuffari first informed Congress in mid-July that his department could not turn over Secret Service texts from the time of the Capitol attack because they had been erased as part of a device replacement program.That prompted Thompson, through the House January 6 select committee, to issue a subpoena to the Secret Service for texts from the day before and the day of the Capitol attack as it examined how the agency intended to move Donald Trump and Mike Pence on January 6.But the Secret Service provided only one text exchange to the select committee, the Guardian has previously reported, telling investigators that every other message had been wiped after personnel failed to back up data from the devices when they were swapped out.TopicsSecret ServiceUS Capitol attackJanuary 6 hearingsUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      US Capitol attack: militia member gets longest prison sentence yet

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      US Capitol attack: militia member gets longest prison sentence yetMan with ties to Three Percenters, who said he planned to violently drag Pelosi from building, sentenced to seven years An associate of the far-right Three Percenters militia group has been sentenced to more than seven years in prison for his role in storming the US Capitol on 6 January 2021.It is the longest sentence imposed so far among hundreds of cases related to the insurrection by extremist supporters of Donald Trump who sought to stop the official congressional certification of Joe Biden’s election victory over his Republican rival.Prosecutors said Guy Reffitt had told fellow members of the Texas Three Percenters militia group that he planned to drag the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi out of the Capitol building by her ankles “with her head hitting every step on the way down”, according to a court filing.Reffitt was sentenced in Washington DC on Monday after being convicted by a jury in March of obstructing Congress’ joint session, of interfering with police officers outside the Capitol and of threatening his two teenage children if they reported him to law enforcement.Justice department prosecutors recommended a 15-year prison sentence for Reffitt, with the duration warranted “for terrorism”.The longest sentence before Reffitt’s 7.25-year term was handed down was five years and three months, for two men who admitted assaulting police officers at the Capitol.Reffitt’s defense had asked for no more than two years in prison.Videos captured the confrontation between outnumbered US Capitol police officers and a mob of people, including Reffitt, who approached them on the west side of the building that afternoon, shortly after Trump had held a rally calling on the crowd to go to the Capitol and urging supporters to “fight like hell” to keep him in power.Garland promises ‘justice without fear or favor’ as DoJ digs into Trump’s January 6 roleRead moreReffitt was armed with a Smith & Wesson pistol in a holster on his waist, carried zip-tie handcuffs and was wearing body armor and a helmet equipped with a video camera when he advanced on officers, according to prosecutors.He retreated after an officer pepper-sprayed him in the face, but he waved on other rioters who ultimately breached the building, prosecutors said.Reffitt’s 19-year-old son, Jackson, testified that his father had told him and his sister, then 16, that they would be traitors if they reported him to authorities and warned them that “traitors get shot”.The Three Percenters movement refers to the myth that only 3% of Americans fought in the revolutionary war against the British.Reffitt lived with his wife and children in Wylie, Texas, a Dallas suburb. He drove to Washington with Rocky Hardie, a fellow member of the militia group.Hardie testified that both of them attended Trump’s rally.More than 840 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the riot. More than 340 of them have pleaded guilty and more than 220 have been sentenced, with nearly half of them receiving terms of imprisonment. Approximately 150 others have trial dates stretching into 2023.Reffitt is one of seven Capitol riot defendants to get a jury trial so far. Jurors have convicted all seven on all counts.The Department of Justice has not ruled out Trump and members of his cohort from its widening criminal investigation into events surrounding January 6 as well as the insurrection itself.The attorney general, Merrick Garland, last week pledged “to bring to justice everybody who is criminally responsible for interfering with the peaceful transfer of power” and to pursue wrongdoing “without fear or favor”.Separately, a bipartisan House select committee is investigating events leading up to, on and immediately after January 6 and has held a series of public hearings that are expected to resume in the fall, that also examine Trump’s role.TopicsUS Capitol attackThe far rightnewsReuse this content More

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      The Big Lie review: Jonathan Lemire laments what Trump hath wrought

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      The Big Lie review: Jonathan Lemire laments what Trump hath wrought The Politico reporter and MSNBC host’s book is an indictment of the former president but also his Republican partyJoe Biden sits in the Oval Office but Donald Trump occupies prime space in America’s psyche. Mike Pence’s most senior aides have testified before a federal grand jury. An investigation by prosecutors in Georgia proceeds apace. In a high-stakes game of chicken, the message from the Department of Justice grows more ominous. Trump’s actions are reportedly under the microscope at the DoJ. He teases a re-election bid. Season two of the January 6 committee hearings beckons.Thank You For Your Servitude review – disappointing tale of Trump’s townRead moreInto this cauldron of distrust and loathing leaps Jonathan Lemire, with The Big Lie. He is Politico’s White House bureau chief and the 5am warm-up to MSNBC’s Morning Joe. He has done his homework. He lays out facts. His book is a mixture of narrative and lament.Lemire contends that Trump birthed the “big lie” in his 2016 campaign, as an excuse in the event of defeat by either Senator Ted Cruz in the primary or Hillary Clinton in the general election. Trump held both opponents in contempt.In the primary, Trump lost Iowa – then falsely claimed Cruz stole it.“Based on the fraud committed by Senator Ted Cruz during the Iowa Caucus, either a new election should take place or Cruz results nullified,” Trump tweeted.In the general, a half-year later, he dropped another bomb.“I’m afraid the election is going to be rigged. I have to be honest.”In the final presidential debate he upped the ante, refusing to say he would accept the electorate’s verdict.“I will look at it at the time,” Trump said. “I will keep you in suspense.”He definitely warned us. Lemire’s first book is aptly subtitled: “Election Chaos, Political Opportunism, and the State of American Politics After 2020.”Then and now, Trump posited that only fraud could derail him. After he beat Clinton in the electoral college, he claimed he actually won the popular vote too. In Trump’s mind, he was the victim of ballots cast by illegal aliens.“In addition to winning the electoral college in a landslide, I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally,” Trump tweeted.To those within earshot, he said people who didn’t “look like they should be allowed to vote”, did.To soothe his ego, he appointed a commission headed by Kris Kobach, a nativist Kansas secretary of state, to vindicate his claims. It found nothing.In a blend of fiction and wish-fulfillment, Sean Spicer, Trump’s first White House press secretary, and Kellyanne Conway, a senior adviser, embarked on flights of fantasy. Spicer declared that Trump’s inaugural crowd was larger than that for Barack Obama. Conway introduced us to alternative facts.Lemire’s indictment goes way beyond that offered by Clinton, who called Trump voters deplorable. He casts the issue as systemic – and punches up. He is angered but does not condescend. The Big Lie is also about elite conservative lawyers, Ivy League-educated senators, Republican House leadership and Mike Lindell, the My Pillow guy.Like Gollum in Tolkien’s Rings trilogy, the House Republican leader, Kevin McCarthy, wants to get his hands on the speaker’s gavel that badly. Peter Navarro, Trump’s trade adviser and author of the ill-fated “Green Bay Sweep” plan to overturn the election, faces charges of criminal contempt. Such acolytes know exactly what they do.Extremists in Congress like Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert are vocal totems, empowered by an enraged ex-president and a vengeance-filled base. In such a world it seems no surprise cries of “hang Mike Pence”, makeshift gallows and Confederate battle flags in the halls of the Capitol came to supplant “fuck your feelings”, the mantra of Trump 2016.As expected, Steve Bannon appears in The Big Lie. He loves dishing to the press. It is in his DNA. The former Trump campaign guru and White House aide, now convicted of contempt of Congress, trashes his former boss as a reflexive liar.According to Lemire, Bannon said: “Trump would say anything, he would lie about anything.” On cue, a Bannon spokesperson disputed Lemire’s sources, telling the Guardian they were inaccurate.In Jeremy Peters’ book, Insurgency, Bannon mused that Trump would “end up going down in history as one of the two or three worst presidents ever”. In Michael Wolff’s Fire and Fury, he described the Trump Tower meeting between Don Jr and a group of Russians amid the 2016 election campaign as “treasonous” and “unpatriotic”.And yet Bannon’s role in Trump’s bid to stay in power remains of central interest to the January 6 committee. On 5 January 2021, Bannon announced on-air that “all hell is going to break loose tomorrow”. He spoke to Trump that morning.Despite his thoroughness, Lemire does omit the role of one group of Republicans in giving the big lie added heft. In May 2021, the Washington Post reported on the efforts of Texas Republicans led by Russell Ramsland, a businessman with a Harvard MBA.After the 2018 midterms, Ramsland and colleagues pressed convoluted theories concerning “voting-machine audit logs – lines of codes and time stamps that document the machines’ activities”. Pete Sessions, a defeated congressman, didn’t buy what Ramsland was selling. Trump did.For Trump’s minions, this remains a war over lost place and status.“Republicans need to prove to the American people that we are the party of … Christian nationalism,” says Greene, a first-term congresswoman from Georgia.Like a toxic weed, the big lie has taken root.“It is now part of the Republican party’s core belief,” Lemire writes. Violence and insurrection have become legitimate. “The Big Lie was who they were.”Our cold civil war grows hotter.
      The Big Lie: Election Chaos, Political Opportunism, and the State of American Politics After 2020 is published in the US by Macmillan
      TopicsBooksPolitics booksUS politicsDonald TrumpTrump administrationUS elections 2020US midterm elections 2022reviewsReuse this content More

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      DoJ reportedly preparing court fight to get Trump insiders to testify – as it happened

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      Prosecutors at the justice department are gearing up for a courtroom battle to force the testimony of Donald Trump’s former White House officials, as they pursue their criminal inquiry into his insurrection, a report published Friday by CNN says.The former president is expected to try to invoke executive privilege to prevent his closest associates telling what they know about his conduct and actions following his 2020 election defeat, and efforts to prevent Joe Biden taking office, according to the network.But the department, which has taken a much more aggressive stance in recent weeks, is readying for that fight, CNN says, “the clearest sign yet” that the inquiry has become more narrowly focused on Trump’s conversations and interactions.This week attorney general Merrick Garland promised “justice without fear or favor” for anyone caught up in insurrection efforts and would not rule out charging Trump criminally if that’s where the evidence led.He told NBC’s Lester Holt:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}We intend to hold everyone, anyone who was criminally responsible for events surrounding January 6, or any attempt to interfere with the lawful transfer of power from one administration to another, accountable.
      That’s what we do. We don’t pay any attention to other issues with respect to that.CNN’s story suggests that prosecutors are acutely aware that Trumpworld insiders who are initially reluctant to testify will be more inclined to do so with a judge’s order compelling it.The network also says Trump’s attempt to maintain secrecy came up over recent federal grand jury testimony of two of former vice-president Mike Pence’s aides, Marc Short and Greg Jacob.Questioning reportedly skirted around issues likely to be covered by executive privilege, with prosecutors having an expectation they could return to those subjects at a later date, CNN’s sources said.The development is set to add more legal pressure on Trump following the announcement of an evidence-sharing “partnership” between the justice department and the parallel House January 6 inquiry, in which transcripts of testimony from at least 20 witnesses are passing to Garland’s investigation.We’re closing the blog now at the end of a momentous week in US politics, with the landmark climate bill, the Inflation Reduction Act set to become a big win for Joe Biden ahead of the midterm elections.Here’s what else we followed:
      The US will not allow any further Russian annexation in Ukraine to go “unchallenged or unpunished”, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said, following secretary of state Antony Blinken’s conversation with Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov earlier in which he pressed his Kremlin counterpart over negotiations to release jailed Americans Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan.
      Justice department prosecutors are readying for a likely court fight to get testimony from Donald Trump’s former White House officials over his illegitimate actions to overturn his 2020 election defeat. CNN reports they are preparing arguments if Trump invokes executive privilege to prevent those close to his Oval Office revealing what they know.
      Text messages of two of Trump’s chief homeland security officials, Chad Wolf and Ken Cuccinelli, are missing for “a key period” surrounding the January 6 insurrection, the Washington Post reported.
      Joe Manchin and Chuck Schumer had secret basement meetings in the Capitol building as they negotiated the Inflation Reduction Act, the AP said. The size and scope of the climate concessions Manchin, the rebel West Virginia Democrat, agreed to surprised the Senate majority leader.
      The treasury department has imposed sanctions on two Russian individuals and four entities that support the Kremlin’s “global malign influence and election interference operations”. They “attempted to destabilize the US and its allies and partners, including Ukraine,” the department said.
      Nancy Pelosi said it was “sick” that children are learning to use assault weapons, amid a surge of deadly gun violence and mass shootings in the US. The House speaker announced a vote in the chamber this afternoon on gun controls, including an assault weapons ban.
      Joe Biden has nominated a lawyer who represented the Mississippi clinic at the heart of the supreme court’s decision to overturn abortion rights last month to become a federal appeals court judge, Reuters reports.Julie Rikelman, an abortion rights lawyer with the center for reproductive rights, was picked to serve on the Boston-based first circuit court of appeals, one of nine new judicial nominees announced by the president today.Rikelman argued for the Jackson women’s health organization – Mississippi’s only abortion clinic – in challenging a Republican-backed law that banned the procedure after 15 weeks. Republicans are likely to oppose her elevation in the equally divided Senate. Russian government officials asked that Vadim Krasikov, a spy and former army colonel convicted of murder in Germany last year, be added to the proposed prisoner swap for Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan, CNN reports. “Multiple sources” familiar with the situation told the network that Russia communicated the request to the US earlier this month through an informal backchannel used by the spy agency, known as the FSB.The request was problematic because Krasikov remains in German custody, the sources said, and because the request was not communicated formally the US government did not view it as a legitimate counter to its initial offer of arms dealer Viktor Bout.Secretary of state Antony Blinken spoke with Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov earlier today and pressed for the release of Griner and Whelan, whom the US considers “wrongfully detained”. It is not certain if Russia’s reported request over Krasikov featured in the conversation.We promised you news of the Biden administration’s changing position on Covid-19 boosters as the Omicron variant BA.5 continues to grip the nation. Here’s my colleague Sam Levine’s report:Instead of expanding eligibility for a fourth Covid-19 booster shot now, the Biden administration will push this fall to get Americans to take another booster vaccination that is predicted to better protect against the Omicron BA.5 subvariant of the coronavirus.Pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and Moderna are expected to start rolling out the reformulated boosters, which are expected to be authorized for anyone 12 and older, in September.The decision comes amid a surge in cases of the virus across the US – and Biden himself recently recovered from an infection.Some of the administration’s top health experts, including presidential adviser Anthony Fauci and White House Covid coordinator Ashish Jha, had advocated for expanding eligibility for a second dose of the current booster because of the latest spread.But public health officials worried that administering two different booster shots so close together could blunt their effectiveness.“You can’t get a vaccine shot August 1 and get another vaccine shot September 15 and expect the second shot to do anything,” Shane Crotty, a virologist at the La Jolla Institute for Immunology, told the New York Times.“You’ve got so much antibody around, if you get another dose, it won’t do anything.”The decision means that adults over 50 and those who are immunocompromised remain the only ones authorized for a second booster, ie their fourth shot since the vaccine began being administered widely in 2021. Fewer than a third of people 50 and older who are eligible have gotten one, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).Read the full story:US to hold push for Covid boosters until fall in order to better protect against BA.5Read moreA third candidate in a week has dropped out of the Wisconsin Democratic Senate primary, leaving Mandela Barnes, the state’s lieutenant governor, a clear favorite to challenge Republican incumbent Ron Johnson in November.Wisconsin treasurer Sarah Godlewski’s withdrawal followed those of former state assemblyman Tom Nelson on Monday and Barnes’ top rival, Alex Lasry, two days later.Democrats are hopeful of seizing Johnson’s seat in the fall in a state Joe Biden won narrowly in the 2020 presidential election, reversing Donald Trump’s victory there in 2016.Johsnon was quick to comment on Godlewski’s announcement. “Showing their lack of respect for voters and the democratic process, the power brokers of the Democrat party have now cleared the field for their most radical left candidate,” Johnson tweeted.Barnes, 35, would be the first Black senator from Wisconsin if elected. The US will not allow any further Russian annexation in Ukraine to go “unchallenged or unpunished,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre has said at an afternoon briefing.She is answering reporters’ questions about secretary of state Antony Blinken’s conversation with Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov earlier, in which he pressed his Kremlin counterpart over negotiations to release jailed Americans Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan.Blinken “thought it was it was important to make clear where we and our global partners stand on several key issues,” Jean-Pierre said:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}He spoke about the importance of Russia allowing ships to depart Odessa and to adhere to their grain deals. He also emphasized how Russia’s plan to annex parts of Ukraine by force, which we warned about from here at the podium, would be a gross violation of the UN charter and we would not allow it to go unchallenged or unpunished.
      We are under no illusions that Moscow is prepared to engage meaningfully and constructively yet, so Secretary Blinken made clear that this was not about a return to business as usual.Joe Biden has “no plans” to call Russian president Vladimir Putin over that or any other issue, Jean-Pierre said.As for Griner and Whelan, she added: .css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}What the president is doing, the secretary and his national security team, is to make sure we keep our promise and [are] doing everything that we can in bringing home US nationals that are wrongfully detained.
      This is top of [Biden’s] mind, this is a priority. We are doing everything we can to bring Paul home, to bring Britney home. Mick Mulvaney, Donald Trump’s former acting chief of staff, testified on Thursday before the House select committee investigating the insurrection on January 6, 2021, and the-then US president’s role in inciting it. And on Friday, Mulvaney spoke about it.He was asked questions by “four or five” lawyers for the committee, who interviewed him for about 2.5 hours behind closed doors, he told CNN on Friday morning.He said they were courteous and there was “no animosity”. he said the questions were “designed to find out stuff that might make President Trump look bad” and pointed out there was no-one there asking “the other side of the questions” [note: it is a bipartisan committee co-chaired by Republican Liz Cheney] “that might have made President Trump look good”, but he added that that was “fine” and it was not a fight, it was a free-flowing discussion.“I would have given the exact same answers, obviously, if there had been folks there from the other side of the political spectrum, so it just reaffirms in my mind that the committee is politically-biased, there is no question about that, the structure is politically biased.“But the information that you are getting is from Republicans, like myself, who are testifying – you are not under oath but you still can’t lie to Congress anyway, that’s still a crime, and I think the information they are getting is good and sound information.”Mulvaney said the lawyers were at the meeting in person while some members of the committee, who are all members of Congress, attended remotely, and Cheney questioned him.He also acknowledged that the separate Department of Justice investigation into events surrounding January 6 last year, when supporters of Trump stormed the US Capitol to try to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election victory over him, was now “moving closer and closer to the [Trump] White House”. CNN reported that federal prosecutors want to force Trump officials to testify.“They are starting to talk to people inside the Trump orbit as opposed to just the rioters themselves, the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers,” he said.It’s lunchtime, so time to take stock of where we’re at today in US politics:
      Justice department prosecutors are readying for a likely court fight to get testimony from Donald Trump’s former White House officials over his illegitimate actions to overturn his 2020 election defeat. CNN reports they are preparing arguments if Trump invokes executive privilege to prevent those close to his Oval Office revealing what they know.
      Text messages of two of Trump’s chief homeland security officials, Chad Wolf and Ken Cuccinelli, are missing for “a key period” surrounding the January 6 insurrection, the Washington Post reported.
      Joe Manchin and Chuck Schumer had secret basement meetings in the Capitol building as they negotiated the Inflation Reduction Act, the AP said. The size and scope of the climate concessions Manchin, the rebel West Virginia Democrat, agreed to surprised the Senate majority leader.
      The treasury department has imposed sanctions on two Russian individuals and four entities that support the Kremlin’s “global malign influence and election interference operations”. They “attempted to destabilize the US and its allies and partners, including Ukraine,” the department said.
      Secretary of State Antony Blinken said he pressed Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov to accept a US proposal for the release of detained Americans Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan. Blinken said he had a “frank and direct” conversation with Lavrov earlier today.
      Nancy Pelosi said it was “sick” that children are learning to use assault weapons, amid a surge of deadly gun violence and mass shootings in the US. The House speaker announced a vote in the chamber this afternoon on gun controls, including an assault weapons ban.
      Please stick with us. There’s more to come this afternoon, including White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre’s daily briefing.Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Friday he pressed Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov to accept a US proposal for the release of detained Americans Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan.Blinken said he had a “frank and direct” conversation with Lavrov earlier on Friday, and told his counterpart that Russia must fulfill commitments it made as part of deal on the export of grain from Ukraine, brokered by the United Nations and Turkey, and that the world would not accept Russian annexation of Ukrainian territory.Blinken and Lavrov spoke on the phone a few hours after Lavrov indicated some interest in Blinken’s offer.Griner’s trial resumes in Moscow on Monday.The White House has issued a statement encouraging the House to pass an assault weapons ban later today.The statement reminds the public that 40,000 Americans die from gunshot wounds every year and guns have “become the top killer of children” in the US.It notes that Joe Biden played a leading role when he was a US senator in the 1994 assault weapons ban, which stood for 10 years before the administration of George W Bush declined to extend it.The White House further notes that “when the ban expired, mass shootings tripled”.White House issues statement in support of assault weapons bill to be voted on later today in the House. pic.twitter.com/f7coJRwcXh— Jamie Dupree (@jamiedupree) July 29, 2022
      Earlier this month, the US president called once again for a ban on such rifles, saying the US was “awash in weapons of war” and decrying how such weapons have become more and more powerful so that when hitting human flesh, people are ripped apart and parents have to supply DNA samples after school shootings, such as in Uvalde, Texas, recently, because their children are so damaged from the bullets that they cannot otherwise be certainly identified.Buffalo, in upstate New York, is still grieving mightily after a racist mass shooting there, as well as the less-documented, everyday urban gun violence blighting life in many American neighborhoods, and the valiant attempts by some community leaders to tamp it.Meanwhile, ICYMI, here’s our Joanie Greve on what gun executives had to say at a congressional hearing earlier this week.Gun executives tell Congress: don’t blame us for deadly shootingsRead moreAnd here’s our Abené Clayton’s reporting as part of the Guardian’s Guns and Lies series.Can lessons of community violence interrupters prevent mass shootings?Read moreNancy Pelosi says it’s “sick” that children are learning to use assault weapons, amid a surge of deadly gun violence in the US that has claimed numerous lives in recent weeks in a series of mass shootings.The House speaker was talking at a lunchtime press briefing at which she announced a vote in the chamber this afternoon on gun controls, including an assault weapons ban:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}When I talk about it on the floor this afternoon I’m going to show a presentation of what some totally irresponsible people are putting out there about little children, toddlers, learning how to use an assault weapon.
      Smaller assault weapons, but a gun like mommy and daddy’s, small assault weapons for getting their muscles ready to be able to use it. Is that sick?Pelosi said there was an “outcry” for an assault weapons ban:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}We’re hopeful [over the] vote for the assault weapons ban. I think the best, most important thing to do is to have background checks, that probably saves the most lives on the ongoing.
      But with that it’s very important is to reinstate [the assault weapons ban], we like to say reinstate because we did pass this before. And it did save lives.Even if passed by the House, an assault weapons ban faces next to no chance of clearing the 50-50 divided Senate, where 60 votes would be needed for its passage.Such a measure would be unlikely to attract any Republican support.The treasury department said Friday it had imposed sanctions on two Russian individuals and four entities that support the Kremlin’s “global malign influence and election interference operations”, according to Reuters.“The individuals and entities designated today played various roles in Russia’s attempts to manipulate and destabilize the United States and its allies and partners, including Ukraine,” the department said in a statement.Brian E Nelson, undersecretary of the treasury for terrorism and financial intelligence, said: “Free and fair elections form a pillar of American democracy that must be protected from outside influence.“The Kremlin has repeatedly sought to threaten and undermine our democratic processes and institutions. The US will continue our extensive work to counter these efforts and safeguard our democracy from Russia’s interference.” The Russian citizens sanctioned are Aleksandr Viktorovich Ionov and Natalya Valeryevna Burlinova .Nancy Pelosi has scheduled a press conference for noon, at which we’re likely to learn of her plans for a House vote on the landmark Inflation Reduction Act announced yesterday, and whether she’s heading to Taiwan as early as tonight on a controversial trip.We’ll bring you her comments when she speaks. You can watch the speaker’s press conference on her YouTube channel here:Secret meetings in a dingy Capitol building basement, a “virtual handshake” across the miles to seal the deal… the Associated Press has published an extraordinary account of how the climate bill agreement between Joe Manchin and Chuck Schumer that has set Washington abuzz this week came to be.The size and scope of what Manchin, the rebel West Virginia Democrat who had stalled almost the entirety of Joe Biden’s ambitious first term agenda, was willing to accept to form the Inflation Reduction Act surprised Schumer, the Senate majority leader, the AP says.The news agency account suggests it was partly Manchin’s fears about losing his gavel as chair of the Senate energy committee (he has made millions from the coal industry) that led to his reversal, and willingness to accept climate change provisions he had previously fiercely resisted.“The coal state conservative was being publicly singled out, shamed even, as the sole figure stopping help for a planet in peril,” the AP said, noting the barrage of criticism directed at Manchin from progressive Democrats and climate crisis activists after he blocked Biden’s flagship Build Back Better project. According to the report, compiled with the help several people familiar with private conversations, and granted anonymity to discuss them, Manchin met Schumer secretly in a Capitol basement to get the conversation going.“What a beautiful office,” Schumer reportedly said. “Is it mine?”Over several sessions, the two men and their staffs thrashed out the details of what would become the $739bn Inflation Reduction Act, hailed yesterday by Biden as “the most significant legislation in history to tackle the climate crisis.”They sealed the deal on Wednesday afternoon with a “virtual handshake” on a Zoom call, with Manchin isolating after testing positive for Covid-19.Whether the bill becomes law remains to be seen. Democrats will need every one of their votes in the 50-50 divided Senate, while there will also be Republican opposition in the House. Speaker Nancy Pelosi says she’ll bring members back from their summer break to vote on the bill next week.Regardless of the outcome, just getting to this point was a remarkable achievement in itself, the AP says.Meanwhile, Fortune has this intriguing account of the role of former treasury secretary and Biden critic Larry Summers in the saga, suggesting he may just have “saved Biden’s presidency”.Read more:What’s in the climate bill that Joe Manchin supports – and what isn’t Read moreAn impassioned plea from a 12-year-old girl has gone viral after she spoke to West Virginia Republican lawmakers during a public hearing for an abortion bill that would prohibit the procedure in nearly all cases.On Wednesday, Addison Gardner of Buffalo middle school in Kenova, West Virginia, was among several people who spoke out against a bill that would not only ban abortions in most cases but also allow for physicians who perform abortions to be prosecuted.Addressing the West Virginia house of delegates, Gardner, among about 90 other speakers, was given 45 seconds to plead her case.“My education is very important to me and I plan on doing great things in life. If a man decides that I’m an object and does unspeakable and tragic things to me, am I, a child, supposed to carry and birth another child?” Gardner said.Read more here:‘What about my life?’ West Virginia girl, 12, speaks out against anti-abortion bill Read moreText messages of two of Donald Trump’s chief homeland security officials, Chad Wolf and Ken Cuccinelli, are missing for “a key period” surrounding the former president’s January 6 insurrection, the Washington Post reported Friday.It follows news that secret service texts from about the same time had been mysteriously erased, hampering the House panel’s inquiry into the deadly Capitol riot and Trump’s illegitimate efforts to remain in office.The previously unreported discovery of missing records for the most senior homeland security officials increases the volume of potential evidence that has vanished regarding the time around the Capitol attack, the Post says.🚨🔎🚨BREAKING POGO INVESTIGATION: yet another story of missing text messages at #DHS. This time, text messages to and from three top Trump-era officials at the dept. from early January 2021 are missing. Read the investigation now: https://t.co/AkWxoUu65Z— Project On Government Oversight (@POGOwatchdog) July 29, 2022
      The homeland security department told the agency’s inspector general in February that texts of Wolf and Cuccinelli were lost in a “reset” of their government phones when they left their jobs in January 2021 in preparation for the new Biden administration, the newspaper adds.The Post says its source is an internal record obtained by the Project on Government Oversight, whose own report on the disappearance of the messages can be found here.Messages of a third senior department official, the undersecretary of management Randolph “Tex” Alles, a former Secret Service director, are also no longer available because of the reset, according to the Post.In his forthcoming memoir, the former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort describes his travels through the US prison system after being convicted on tax charges – including a stay in a Manhattan facility alongside the financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and the Mexican drug baron Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán.Manafort also writes that during one transfer between facilities, at a private airfield “somewhere in Ohio”, the sight of “prisoners … being herded in long lines and then separated into other buses and on to … transport planes … reminded me of movies about the Holocaust”.Political Prisoner: Persecuted, Prosecuted, but Not Silenced, will be published in the US next month. The Guardian obtained a copy.Manafort’s book is not all quite so startling. But he does make the surprise admission that in 2020, he indirectly advised Trump’s campaign while in home confinement as part of a seven-year sentence – advice he kept secret as he hoped for a presidential pardon.“I didn’t want anything to get in the way of the president’s re-election or, importantly, a potential pardon,” Manafort writes.He got the pardon.Here’s more:Paul Manafort admits indirectly advising Trump in 2020 but keeping it secret in wait for pardon Read moreProsecutors at the justice department are gearing up for a courtroom battle to force the testimony of Donald Trump’s former White House officials, as they pursue their criminal inquiry into his insurrection, a report published Friday by CNN says.The former president is expected to try to invoke executive privilege to prevent his closest associates telling what they know about his conduct and actions following his 2020 election defeat, and efforts to prevent Joe Biden taking office, according to the network.But the department, which has taken a much more aggressive stance in recent weeks, is readying for that fight, CNN says, “the clearest sign yet” that the inquiry has become more narrowly focused on Trump’s conversations and interactions.This week attorney general Merrick Garland promised “justice without fear or favor” for anyone caught up in insurrection efforts and would not rule out charging Trump criminally if that’s where the evidence led.He told NBC’s Lester Holt:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}We intend to hold everyone, anyone who was criminally responsible for events surrounding January 6, or any attempt to interfere with the lawful transfer of power from one administration to another, accountable.
      That’s what we do. We don’t pay any attention to other issues with respect to that.CNN’s story suggests that prosecutors are acutely aware that Trumpworld insiders who are initially reluctant to testify will be more inclined to do so with a judge’s order compelling it.The network also says Trump’s attempt to maintain secrecy came up over recent federal grand jury testimony of two of former vice-president Mike Pence’s aides, Marc Short and Greg Jacob.Questioning reportedly skirted around issues likely to be covered by executive privilege, with prosecutors having an expectation they could return to those subjects at a later date, CNN’s sources said.The development is set to add more legal pressure on Trump following the announcement of an evidence-sharing “partnership” between the justice department and the parallel House January 6 inquiry, in which transcripts of testimony from at least 20 witnesses are passing to Garland’s investigation.Good morning blog readers, we’ve made it to the end of an extraordinary week in US politics, but we’re not through quite yet. There’s news today of more legal peril for Donald Trump over his efforts to illegitimately reverse his 2020 election defeat.Justice department prosecutors, according to CNN, are preparing a court fight to force Trump insiders to testify over the former president’s conversations and actions around January 6. They expect Trump to try to invoke executive privilege to prevent his former White House officials telling what they know.We’ll have more on that coming up, and will also be looking at the following:
      Washington is still abuzz with Senator Joe Manchin’s stunning reversal, leading to the surprise announcement of the Inflation Reduction Act and the chance for Joe Biden to achieve some of his signature climate policy goals.
      Text messages around the time of the January 6 Capitol riot “vanished” from the the phones of Trump’s senior homeland security officials Chad Wolf and Ken Cuccinelli, the Washington Post reports.
      The Biden administration reportedly has a new plan for Covid-19 boosters, scrapping advice for a summer shot and concentrating instead on pushing next-generation vaccines in the fall.
      It could be a busy day in the House with possible votes on gun controls and police funding, before members head off for a six-week break. But the speaker, Nancy Pelosi, could call them back next week for a vote on the Inflation Reduction Act.
      The White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, has her daily briefing scheduled for 1.30pm. Joe Biden has no public events listed. More