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      Leaked audio contradicts Kevin McCarthy’s denial that he considered asking Trump to resign – live

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      US politics liveRepublicansLeaked audio contradicts Kevin McCarthy’s denial that he considered asking Trump to resign – live
      Top House Republican denied he made such request
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      LIVE Updated 10m agoMartin Pengelly (now), Lauren Arataniand Richard Luscombe (earlier)Fri 22 Apr 2022 11.12 EDTFirst published on Fri 22 Apr 2022 09.06 EDT Show key events onlyLive feedShow key events onlyThe Marjorie Taylor Greene hearing on Atlanta is back in session now, with the far-right Republican congresswoma testifying as liberal groups and voters try to bar her from Congress under the 14th amendment to the US constitution, which bars those who have engaged in sedition or rebellion.“Please try to refrain from clapping and shouting,” an official asked attendees, after a raucous opening including clapping and cheering for Greene when she walked in.The judge agreed, saying: “That will not happen.”The hearing opened with a presentation in Greene’s defence. Those seeking to bar her from Congress began with extensive questioning of a historian about what the 14th amendment means and about past rebellions, including the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794, which was quashed by George Washington.The historical conversation continued after the break.Underlining the circus-like aspect of the hearing, the far-right Florida congressman Matt Gaetz was attending and tweeting, at one point criticising the case against Greene and calling the hearing a “Total Kangaroo Court”.House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy spoke with Donald Trump last night about the audio that was leaked to the New York Times that reveals McCarthy was considering telling Trump to resign. Citing anonymous sources with knowledge of the call, the Washington Post reports that Trump told McCarthy that he’s not mad at McCarthy (insert sigh of relief) and that he is glad McCarthy didn’t follow through on that plan. McCarthy has not responded to the leaked audio of his conversations with Republicans. The sources told the Post that House Republicans are waiting for Trump to release his official statement to determine how – and if – they should support McCarthy amid the Times’ report. “If Trump comes out and says [McCarthy] lost my faith and can’t be speaker, that is bold. That will move people. If he puts out a statement complaining — he complains about McConnell all the time and hasn’t threatened his position in leadership,” said one Republican congressional aide who asked for anonymity to discuss private conversations.The far right Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene was cheered into court in Georgia on Friday, for a hearing in an attempt by a coalition of voters and liberal groups to bar her from Congress under the 14th amendment to the US constitution, for aiding the insurrection at the US Capitol on 6 January 2021.Some people in the courtroom cheered and applauded as Greene took her seat.As the hearing began, Greene tweeted: “Only the People have the right to choose who they send to Congress.”The 14th amendment, passed after the civil war, says: “No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath … to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.”Supporters of Donald Trump attacked the US Capitol in an attempt to stop certification of his defeat by Joe Biden, an attack mounted in service of Trump’s lies about electoral fraud. A bipartisan Senate committee connected seven deaths to the riot. More than 100 law enforcement officers were hurt. About 800 people, including members of far-right and militia groups, have been charged, some with seditious conspiracy. A House investigation continues.Trump was impeached for inciting an insurrection – and acquitted when Senate Republicans stayed loyal.Organisers of events in Washington on January 6 have tied Greene to their efforts. Greene has denied such links and said she does not encourage violence.In October, however, she told a radio show: “January 6 was just a riot at the Capitol and if you think about what our Declaration of Independence says, it says to overthrow tyrants.”After the riot, Greene was one of 147 Republicans in Congress who went ahead with objections to results in battleground states.An effort to use the 14th amendment against Madison Cawthorn, a far-right Republican from North Carolina, was unsuccessful, after a judge ruled an 1872 civil war amnesty law was not merely retroactive.In Greene’s case, a federal judge said the 1872 law did not apply and allowed the hearing on Friday to proceed.Greene’s full tweet as her hearing began read as follows: “Republicans must protect election integrity. It’s one of the most important issues in our country. When the People lose their right to vote and their freedom to choose their representatives, our country is lost. Only the People have the right to choose who they send to Congress.”The hearing opened with a presentation in her defence. Matt Gaetz of Florida, another far-right Republican congressman, was pictured in the room.The hearing is streaming here.The New York Times just released another clip of Republican House leader Kevin McCarthy telling Republican leaders that he believes Donald Trump was responsible for the January 6 insurrection.In the clip, McCarthy can be heard detailing a conversation he had with Trump where he asked the former president whether he believes he had responsibility for the attack. “Well, let me be very clear to all of you, and I’ve been very clear to the president: He bears responsibility for his words and actions. No if’s, and’s or but’s. I asked him personally today, “Does he hold responsibility for what happened? Does he feel bad about what happened?” He told me he does have some responsibility for what happened and he needs to acknowledge that,” McCarthy said in the clip, which was just played live on CNN. The audio comes from a call that took place January 11, 2021.Seems like the special house panel investigating the January 6 insurrection is planning to hold its public hearings in June. The committee had previously suggested that the hearings would be held next month. Representative Jamie Raskin, a prominent Democrat on the committee, has been making the rounds hyping up the findings of the committee to the press. He recently told NBC News: “The hearings will tell a story that will really blow the roof off the House.” He also said that the committee plans on holding the hearings in June.Earlier this week, Raskin told the Guardian that the committee is “going to tell the whole story of everything that happened. There was a violent insurrection and an attempted coup and we were saved by Mike Pence’s refusal to go along with that plan.” The hearings in June will be televised and will be the first time the public will get a direct look at the investigations into the attack that are underway. About 800 people have been charged with crimes committed in relation to the Capitol attack over the last year.The Washington Post obtained records that show Donald Trump’s former chief of staff Mark Meadows was simultaneously registered to vote in three different states – North Carolina, Virginia and South Carolina – until last week.“The overlap lasted about three weeks, and it might have continued if revelations about Meadows’s voting record had not attracted scrutiny in North Carolina. Meadows is still registered in Virginia and South Carolina,” writes Glenn Kessler, writer for the Post’s “Fact Checker” column. This isn’t the first revelation that Meadows is registered to vote in multiple states. The New Yorker reported in March that the former South Carolina senator and his wife, Debra, submitted voter registration forms that linked to a mobile home in North Carolina, even though the couple did not actually live there. North Carolina recently removed Meadows from its voter rolls and is investigating potential voter fraud. The irony, of course, is that Meadows has become outspoken about the voter fraud that he believed happened in 2020. Meadows has been critical of “lowered” standards for mail-in ballots.Some analysis about the released audio clip of Kevin McCarthy considering telling Donald Trump to resign: The McCarthy tape is the same rolling crisis of bad faith going on since 2016. Large chunks of the party said, or say in private, Trump is unfit and dangerous. Every race features all MAGA candidates, the divide is who’s coded to donors and backers as secretly believing it too.— Benjy Sarlin (@BenjySarlin) April 22, 2022
      “The McCarthy tape is the same rolling crisis of bad faith going on since 2016. Large chunks of the party said, or say in private, Trump is unfit and dangerous,” writes Benjy Sarlin of NBC on Twitter. This brings to mind a great piece from New York Magazine by Olivia Nuzzi that was published in October 2020, right before the presidential election. Nuzzi profiles an anonymous Republican source who, like the many anonymous sources who were prolific at talking to the media during Trump’s presidency, privately bashed Trump while publicly supporting him. While McCarthy didn’t hide behind anonymity per se, the leak of the audio clip reveals how pervasive private sentiments against Trump were, just as the breadth of anonymous sourcing that was seen during the Trump presidency demonstrated. The subject of the piece grapples with his anonymous criticism of Trump. “It’s hard to go up against the president of your own party – even if he’s not really a Republican.” And, he notes, “If you don’t like Trump, but you like money, and you’re willing to be vocal about how much we need to reelect him, there’s a lot of money to be made this year.” The source said that while some Republicans may have seen supporting Trump as a way to “prevent the worst stuff from happening”, keeping a close eye on him, he admitted that “it’s definitely self-serving.” “I mean, once you grow up, life is all about contradictions.” Good morning readers of the US politics blog, and happy Earth Day!It’s not such a happy one for the House minority leader and Donald Trump apologist Kevin McCarthy, who appears to have been caught in a lie over whether he said he would seek the former president’s resignation in the aftermath of the 6 January Capitol riot.The backstory is that yesterday, the top House Republican angrily denied claims in a new book by New York Times journalists Alexander Burns and Jonathan Martin that he was so outraged with Trump’s incitement of the insurrection that he said he would push him to quit.Unfortunately for McCarthy, there’s a stunning audio recording of him saying just that to Wyoming congresswoman Liz Cheney, whom he helped oust from party leadership when she didn’t follow the would-be House speaker’s reversal back to Trump acolyte.We’ll have plenty more on that today.Developments in the Ukraine conflict can be found on our 24-hour live blog here.And here’s what else we’re watching in the US today:
      Joe Biden travels to Washington state, where he will talk about the climate crisis and reveal steps to “safeguard the nation’s forests”.
      Later, in Auburn, the president will deliver another address about his plans to lower healthcare and energy prices.
      The extremist Republican congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene is set to appear in a Georgia courtroom at a hearing to determine if she should be disqualified from seeking re-election for supporting the 6 January insurrection.
      TopicsRepublicansUS politics liveUS politicsDonald TrumpUS Capitol attackJoe BidenReuse this content More

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      Republican leader Kevin McCarthy considered urging Trump to quit, audio reveals

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      Republican leader Kevin McCarthy considered urging Trump to quit, audio revealsMcCarthy told Liz Cheney he was ‘seriously thinking about having that conversation’ with then president following Capitol attack A new audio clip reveals that House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy considered asking Donald Trump to resign as president in the immediate aftermath of the January 6 Capitol insurrection.The explosive clip was released by the New York Times and played on MSNBC Thursday night, just half a day after McCarthy released a lengthy denial of an earlier Times report that said he and the Republican Senate leader, Mitch McConnell, initially both held Trump responsible for the attack, and both privately expressed anger against him.In the clip, which is a soundbite from a call with House GOP leaders, McCarthy can be heard answering a question from Republican representative Liz Cheney, who was in party leadership at the time. Cheney asked McCarthy if he believed Trump would resign if Congress successfully passed a 25th amendment resolution, which would declare Trump incapable of holding office.“My gut tells me no. I am seriously thinking about having that conversation with him tonight,” he said. “The only discussion I would have with him is I think [the resolution] will pass, and it would be my recommendation that he should resign.“That would be my take, but I don’t think he would take it. But I don’t know.”In a statement on Thursday morning before the clip was released, McCarthy made a blanket denial of the New York Times report saying that it is “totally false and wrong”.“It comes as no surprise that the corporate media is obsessed with doing everything it can to further the liberal agenda,” the statement read. “The corporate media is more concerned with profiting from manufactured political intrigue from politically-motivated sources.“Our country has suffered enough under failed one-party Democrat rule, and no amount of media ignorance and bias will stop Americans from delivering a clear message this fall that it is time for change.”McCarthy has not responded to the release of the audio clip. A spokesperson for Cheney, who is also heard on the clip, said she did not release the tape and does not know who leaked it.The Times story, the reporting for which comes from the upcoming book This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden and the Battle for America’s Future, by reporters Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns, detailed scathing comments against Trump that Republican leaders made in the days after the Capitol insurrection.McCarthy reportedly told colleagues in private: “I’ve had it with this guy,” adding: “What he did is unacceptable. Nobody can defend it and nobody should defend it.”Meanwhile, McConnell reportedly told two of his senior advisers: “If this isn’t impeachable, I don’t know what is.“The Democrats are going to take care of the son of a bitch for us,” McConnell said, according to the book.Although McConnell criticized Trump publicly for his role in the attack, he voted to acquit the former president in his impeachment trial. He also said he would support Trump should Trump be the 2024 Republican nominee.McCarthy, for his part, did a more complete about-face: he has claimed that Trump was unaware of the attack until McCarthy broke the news to him that it was happening. He has also condemned the special House panel that is investigating the insurrection and refused to cooperate with its inquiry on conversations he had with Trump after the attack.TopicsRepublicansUS Capitol attackUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      Donald Trump Jr to appear before House Capitol attack panel – report

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      Donald Trump Jr to appear before House Capitol attack panel – reportThe meeting comes in the wake of other family members such as Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner testifying to the committee Donald Trump Jr. has agreed to meet in the near future with the US House of Representatives panel that is investigating the 6 January 2021, attack on the US Capitol, the New York Times reported Thursday, citing a source.Ivanka Trump testifies before panel investigating Capitol attackRead moreTrump, the eldest son of former president Donald Trump, is set to meet with the House committee of his own will and without the threat of a subpoena, the outlet said without reporting when the testimony was scheduled.A request for comment from the House committee investigating the Capitol siege was not immediately returned.The meeting would come in the wake of appearances by other Trump family members before the select committee investigating the events that lead to the deadly raid on the Capitol building in protest against the result of the 2020 presidential election.Ivanka Trump, Donald Trump’s daughter and one of his senior White House advisers, testified for about eight hours earlier this month days after Jared Kushner, her husband and former White House adviser, testified to the committee. TopicsUS Capitol attackDonald Trump JrDonald TrumpUS politicsIvanka TrumpJared KushnernewsReuse this content More

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      Top two Republicans blamed Trump for Capitol attack, book says

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      Top two Republicans blamed Trump for Capitol attack, book saysNew book reveals post-insurrection anger from Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy, who said of Trump: ‘I’ve had it with this guy’ In the days after the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol, Kevin McCarthy and Mitch McConnell, the two top Republican leaders in Congress, privately told associates that they believed Donald Trump should be held responsible for the attack.A new report from the New York Times, the reporting for which comes from a forthcoming book by reporters Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns called This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden and the Battle for America’s Future, details private conversations that McCarthy and McConnell had with colleagues revealing the extent of their anger toward Trump.“I’ve had it with this guy,” McCarthy reportedly told a group of Republicans in the immediate aftermath of the attack.The leaders floated the idea of impeachment with their colleagues, though both men ultimately voted against holding Trump responsible in Democratic-led impeachment proceedings.On a phone call with several top House Republicans, McCarthy allegedly said that Trump had been “atrocious and totally wrong” and blamed him for “inciting people”. He inquired about invoking the 25th amendment, which involves the removal of a president from office.McCarthy, the book reports, went on to tell colleagues that his plan was to tell Trump to resign. “What he did is unacceptable. Nobody can defend it and nobody should defend it,” he said.Other top Republicans chimed in supporting the idea of moving away from Trump, including Steve Scalise of Louisiana, who said that the party should think of a “post-Trump Republican House” and Tom Emmer of Minnesota, who brought up the possibility of censuring the president. Scalise and Emmer voted against Trump’s impeachment.McCarthy also spoke of his wish that the big tech companies would de-platform Republican lawmakers, as Twitter and Facebook did with Trump following the insurrection, who had also played a role in stoking the insurrection.“We can’t put up with that,” McCarthy said. “Can’t they take their Twitter accounts away, too?”A spokesperson for McCarthy told the New York Times that McCarthy “never said that particular members should be removed from Twitter”.It appears that McCarthy and other top Republicans paid more heed to warnings that their Republican base would retaliate if House members publicly denounced Trump. Bill Johnson, a congressman from Ohio, told McCarthy that his voters would “go ballistic” if they criticized Trump.“I’m just telling you that that’s the kind of thing that we’re dealing with, with our base,” Johnson reportedly said.In a statement to the New York Times, a spokesperson for McCarthy said that he “never said he’d call Trump to say he should resign”.Meanwhile, McConnell met with two longtime advisers over lunch in Kentucky on 11 January, five days after the insurrection. He spoke to the men about the upcoming impeachment proceedings led by the Democrats.“The Democrats are going to take care of the son of a bitch for us,” McConnell said. “If this isn’t impeachable, I don’t know what is.”Several senior Republican senators believed that McConnell was leaning toward impeachment once the proceedings would get to the Senate. The Democratic Senate leader, Chuck Schumer, told associates that he believed McConnell’s frustration with Trump could push him toward impeachment, but said “I don’t trust him, and I would not count on it.”While McCarthy and McConnell acknowledged Trump’s responsibility in the immediate aftermath of the insurrection, both men quickly went back to publicly supporting Trump. In April 2021, McCarthy told Fox News that Trump was unaware that the attack was happening until McCarthy broke the news to him.“He didn’t see it, but he ended the call … telling me he’ll put something out to make sure to stop this.”As the special House panel investigating the attack prepares to hold public hearings next month, McCarthy has denounced the committee’s investigation, refusing to cooperate with its inquiry on conversations the leader had with Trump in the days after the attack.McConnell, meanwhile, has taken a more supportive stance of the committee, saying in December that he believes their investigation is “something the public needs to know”. Still, the Senate minority leader said he would “absolutely” support Trump if he was the Republican presidential nominee in 2024.TopicsUS Capitol attackUS politicsDonald TrumpRepublicansnewsReuse this content More

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      Top Republicans held ‘atrocious’ Trump responsible for Capitol attack, book says

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      Top Republicans held ‘atrocious’ Trump responsible for Capitol attack, book saysNew book reveals post-insurrection anger from Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy, who said of Trump: ‘I’ve had it with this guy’ In the days after the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol, Kevin McCarthy and Mitch McConnell, the two top Republican leaders in Congress, privately told associates that they believed Donald Trump should be held responsible for the attack.A new report from the New York Times, the reporting for which comes from a forthcoming book by reporters Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns called This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden and the Battle for America’s Future, details private conversations that McCarthy and McConnell had with colleagues revealing the extent of their anger toward Trump.“I’ve had it with this guy,” McCarthy reportedly told a group of Republicans in the immediate aftermath of the attack.The leaders floated the idea of impeachment with their colleagues, though both men ultimately voted to acquit Trump in Democratic-led impeachment proceedings.On a phone call with several top House Republicans, McCarthy allegedly said that Trump had been “atrocious and totally wrong” and blamed him for “inciting people”. He inquired about invoking the 25th amendment, which involves the removal of a president from office.McCarthy, the book reports, went on to tell colleagues that his plan was to tell Trump to resign. “What he did is unacceptable. Nobody can defend it and nobody should defend it,” he said.Other top Republicans chimed in supporting the idea of moving away from Trump, including Steve Scalise of Louisiana, who said that the party should think of a “post-Trump Republican House” and Tom Emmer of Minnesota, who brought up the possibility of censuring the president. Scalise and Emmer voted against Trump’s impeachment.McCarthy also spoke of his wish that the big tech companies would de-platform Republican lawmakers, as Twitter and Facebook did with Trump following the insurrection, who had also played a role in stoking the insurrection.“We can’t put up with that,” McCarthy said. “Can’t they take their Twitter accounts away, too?”A spokesperson for McCarthy told the New York Times that McCarthy “never said that particularly members should be removed from Twitter”.It appears that McCarthy and other top Republicans heeded more to warnings that their Republican base would retaliate if House members publicly denounced Trump. Bill Johnson, a congressman from Ohio, told McCarthy that his voters would “go ballistic” if they criticized Trump.“I’m just telling you that that’s the kind of thing that we’re dealing with, with out base,” Johnson reportedly said.In a statement to the New York Times, a spokesperson for McCarthy said that he “never said he’d call Trump to say he should resign”.Meanwhile, McConnell met with two longtime advisers over lunch in Kentucky on January 11, five days after the insurrection. He spoke to the men about the upcoming impeachment proceedings led by the Democrats.“The Democrats are going to take care of the son of a bitch for us,” McConnell said. “If this isn’t impeachable, I don’t know what is.”Several senior Republican senators believed that McConnell was leaning toward impeachment once the proceedings would get to the Senate. Democratic Senate leader Chuck Schumer told associates that he believed McConnell’s frustration with Trump could push him toward impeachment, but said “I don’t trust him, and I would not count on it.”While McCarthy and McConnell acknowledged Trump’s responsibility in the immediate aftermath of the insurrection, both men quickly went back to publicly supporting Trump. In April 2021, McCarthy told Fox News that Trump was unaware that the attack was happening until McCarthy broke the news to him.“He didn’t see it, but he ended the call … telling me he’ll put something out to make sure to stop this.”As the special House panel investigating the attack prepares to hold public hearings next month, McCarthy has denounced the committee’s investigation, refusing to cooperate with its inquiry on conversations the leader had with Trump in the days after the attack.McConnell, meanwhile, has taken a more supportive stance of the committee, saying in December that he believes their investigation is “something the public needs to know”. Still, the Senate minority leader said he would “absolutely” support Trump if he was the Republican presidential nominee in 2024.TopicsUS Capitol attackUS politicsDonald TrumpRepublicansnewsReuse this content More

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      Capitol rioter caught after FBI finds recording of him boasting to Uber driver

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      Capitol rioter caught after FBI finds recording of him boasting to Uber driverA 15-month long investigation resulted in Jerry Braun’s arrest on 12 April; he’s been charged with violent entry and disorderly conduct On 6 January 2021, Jerry Braun hailed an Uber in Washington DC and got in the car, nursing a bleeding eye wound. The Uber driver noticed and asked, “So, has it been violent all day?”“Well it started around, right when I got there. I tore down the barricades,” Braun bragged.The conversation, captured on video by the driver’s recording device installed on the dashboard, triggered a 15-month long investigation by the FBI. Earlier this month, on 12 April, Braun was finally arrested by federal authorities and charged with violent entry or disorderly conduct, obstruction during civil disorder, and entering and remaining on restricted grounds, according to an affidavit by Lucas Bauers, FBI special agent.January 6 ‘was a coup organized by the president’, says Jamie RaskinRead moreBraun boasted openly to the Uber driver about his involvement in the deadly riots, which resulted in the deaths of five people. When he explained he’d torn down the barricades, the driver asked, “You did? Why?”“Well, because, so we could get to the Capitol,” Braun replied.The driver asked, “Well, how’d that work out for ya?”“Well, it looks like, uh, Biden’s gonna be our president,” said Braun.The Uber driver’s tip to the authorities identified Braun as “Jerry Last Name Unknown”, according to court documents. The car dropped him off at a Holiday Inn in Arlington, Virginia; authorities searched the booking records to discover that Braun had checked in as “JD Braun” on 5 January and checked out two days later. He had listed his phone number and an address in South El Monte, California.Authorities then compared the Uber image of Braun with a California Department of Motor Vehicles photo of him. With a positive match, they began to pore over images and video footage taken on the day of the riot, searching for Braun.“Agents reviewed several images on the webpage, including one of the digital images that depicts an individual with a white beard, wearing a black face mask covering his nose and chin, black sunglasses, a black beanie hat, black gloves, and a dark colored jacket with a hood,” said the affidavit.“The individual’s white beard is coming out from underneath the black mask, and a backpack shoulder strap is seen over the individual’s left shoulder,” it added.Authorities also noticed a pocket holding a pen and paper with graphics “near the individual’s left shoulder”. Upon enlarging the image, they found the following text: “23-359-4”, “Ask For JD”, and a website, shotgunshock.com – the website of a South El Monte-based store that sells motorcycle air-suspension systems.Officials accessed the Google cached version of the site and found an email address, shotgunshock@yahoo.com – which turned out to be the same address associated with Braun’s Uber account – and a phone number that was registered with the AT&T Corporation under “Jerry Braun”, according to court documents.The affidavit included screenshots of video footage that showed Braun “physically struggling with law-enforcement officers using a barricade”. At one point, Braun is also seen with a wooden plank in his hands. “The officer body camera videos show Braun in possession of the wood plank, controlling the wood plank and maneuvering the wood plank towards law enforcement officers in an aggressive manner,” the affidavit said.“In one instance … Braun extends the wood plank and physically strikes an individual who is wearing a helmet with the text ‘PRESS’ displayed across the front (the photographer) and appears to be taking photographs with a camera,” it added.“Braun and the photographer appear to exchange words. Braun then strikes the photographer with his left hand, and subsequently strikes the photographer once more with the wood plank.”On 8 November, authorities executed a search warrant in Braun’s California residence and found clothing he appeared to wear at the riot. They also seized Braun’s cellphone, which included a selfie of his eye wound as well as text message exchanges in which Braun wrote, “Occupied the capitol”, and “Hand to hand combat”, in reference to videos he took at the riot.When authorities asked Braun if he had anything to say during the search, Braun replied, “Guilty.” Authorities then asked him what he was guilty of, to which he said, “Everything.”More than 800 people have been charged for their involvement in the riot, of which more than 250 have so far pled guilty.TopicsUS Capitol attackWashington DCUS politicsUberDonald TrumpJoe BidennewsReuse this content More

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      January 6 ‘was a coup organized by the president’, says Jamie Raskin

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      January 6 ‘was a coup organized by the president’, says Jamie RaskinMember of House Capitol attack panel says hearings will focus on Trump’s bid to cling to power Donald Trump attempted a coup on 6 January 2021 as he tried to salvage his doomed presidency, and that will be a central focus of forthcoming public hearings of the special House panel investigating events surrounding the insurrection at the US Capitol, the congressman Jamie Raskin has said.Raskin is a prominent Democrat on the committee and also led the House efforts when Trump was impeached for a historic second time, in 2021, accused of inciting the storming of the US Capitol by his extremist supporters who were trying to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s victory.“This was a coup organized by the president against the vice-president and against the Congress in order to overturn the 2020 presidential election,” Raskin said in an interview with the Guardian, Reuters news agency and the Climate One radio program.Public hearings by the bipartisan special committee investigating January 6 and related actions by Trump and his White House team and other allies, chaired by the Mississippi Democrat Bennie Thompson, are expected next month.“We’re going to tell the whole story of everything that happened. There was a violent insurrection and an attempted coup and we were saved by Mike Pence’s refusal to go along with that plan,” said Raskin.He was referring to Trump’s vice-president, who went ahead in his role of overseeing the certification of Biden’s win, which was delayed until the early hours of the following day after Pence and other lawmakers, staff and journalists ended up running for their lives as rioters stormed the building, shortly after Trump held a rally near the White House exhorting his supporters to “fight like hell”.The November 2020 presidential election was deemed by experts at the local, state and federal level to have been “the most secure” in American history, with Trump’s attorney general Bill Barr also concluding that December that the result was accurate.Raskin told the Guardian, however, that the panel’s hearings would demonstrate to the American public the actions Trump, and the cohort who went along with his efforts, took to overturn the election result.If the attack on the Capitol had succeeded in preventing the certification of Biden as the incoming president, Raskin asserted that “Trump was prepared to seize the presidency and likely to invoke the insurrection act and declare martial law”.The insurrection resulted in death and injury to law enforcement and Raskin said that in addition to Pence’s stance against Trump’s demands, the democratic process that day was also saved by “the valor and the bravery of our officers who stood strong against the attempt to just overrun the whole process”.After a broad criminal investigation, about 800 people have been charged with crimes committed in relation to the Capitol attack.Raskin said: “We don’t have a lot of experience with coups in our own country and we think of a coup as something that takes place against a president.”However, January 6 was not what is typically regarded as a coup because it did not involve the military or another faction in society attacking the head of the government.Jamie Raskin on the climate crisis: ‘We’ve got to save democracy in order to save our species’Read more“It’s what the political scientists call a self-coup … It’s a president fearful of defeat, overthrowing the constitutional process,” Raskin said.The Maryland congressman is also looking at the bigger, interrelated picture of American democracy and the climate crisis.“We’ve got to save the democracy in order to save the climate and save our species,” he told the Guardian, Reuters and Climate One in the interview, as part of the Covering Climate Now media collaboration.Extremist groups were part of the insurrection and have been an outsize, renewed influence on political and social division in the US in recent years.Raskin said: “We’re never going to be able to successfully deal with climate change if we’re spending all our time fighting the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers and Ku Klux Klan, and the Aryan nations and all of Steve Bannon’s alt-right nonsense.”TopicsDonald TrumpUS Capitol attackUS CongressUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      Oath Keepers and Proud Boys were in touch before US Capitol attack, texts reveal

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      Oath Keepers and Proud Boys were in touch before US Capitol attack, texts revealThe messages could strengthen a theory being explored by the House committee that January 6 included a coordinated assault Top leaders in the Oath Keepers militia group indicted on seditious conspiracy charges over the Capitol attack had contacts with the Proud Boys and a figure in the Stop the Steal movement and may also have been in touch with the Republican congressman Ronny Jackson, newly released text messages show.Attempt to bar Marjorie Taylor Greene from Congress can proceed, judge saysRead moreThe texts – which indicate the apparent ease with which Oath Keepers messaged Proud Boys – could strengthen a theory being explored by the House January 6 committee and the US justice department: that the Capitol attack included a coordinated assault.Oath Keepers text messages released in a court filing on Monday night showed members of the group were in direct communication with the Proud Boys leader Enqrique Tarrio in the days before the Capitol attack.In an exchange on 4 January 2021, the Oath Keepers Florida chapter leader, Kelly Meggs, indicates an attempt to call Tarrio after learning of his arrest.“I just called him no answer,” Meggs texted a group chat. “But he will [call if] he’s out.”That close relationship is certain to be of interest to the House committee as it zeroes in on whether the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys coordinated an attack on the Capitol in an attempt to stop certification of Joe Biden’s election win over Donald Trump.As the Guardian first reported, the committee has amassed deep evidence of connections between the far-right groups which could play a role in establishing whether Trump oversaw a criminal conspiracy as part of his attempt to hold on to power.The newly released text messages also show a new link between the Oath Keepers and an unnamed figure from the Stop the Steal movement, which has ties to the pro-Trump operative Roger Stone and to Ali Alexander, a prominent Trump ally and activist.On the evening of 1 January, Stewart Rhodes, the national leader of the Oath Keepers, texted to say he was adding an unidentified person affiliated with Stop the Steal to the group chat, to help them prepare for January 6.The name was redacted in the released texts but Rhodes described an “event producer for Stop the Steal. He requested I add him here. He can sort out who is doing what in the creative chaos that will be Jan 5/6.“He’s a good egg.”It was not clear whether Rhodes misattributed an affiliation to Stop the Steal, given the January 6 rally at the Ellipse was a Save America event. Neither Alexander nor Stone appeared to message the group chat or were otherwise involved.New Republican connectionThe Oath Keepers text messages also show a connection to Ronny Jackson that allowed one of its members to learn that the Texas congressman – Trump’s former White House doctor – needed protection as the Capitol attack unfolded.The potential connection between the Oath Keepers and a Republican member of Congress could mark a new investigatory direction for the committee and the justice department: whether Jackson or others might have had advance knowledge of the Oath Keepers’ plans.In the exchange on January 6, an unidentified Oath Keeper texts the group chat that “Ronnie Jackson (TX) office inside Capitol – he needs OK help. Anyone inside?”The same Oath Keeper provides an update less than 10 minutes later: “Dr Ronnie Jackson – on the move. Needs protection. If anyone inside cover him. He has critical data to protect.”Rhodes quickly responds: “Give him my cell.”In a statement to the Guardian, a spokesperson said Jackson “is frequently talked about by people he does not know. He does not know nor has he ever spoken to the people in question”.Asked if Jackson was never in contact with the Oath Keepers, the spokesperson did not answer.The House committee has not given any indication that Republican members of Congress were connected to a potential conspiracy overseen by Trump that would connect his plan to have then-vice president Mike Pence overturn the election with the Capitol attack.The Oath Keepers texts were included in a motion for release from pre-trial detention by Ed Vallejo, one of 11 group members facing charges of seditious conspiracy. On January 6, prosecutors say, Vallejo was at a Comfort Inn in Virginia with a cache of weapons, meant to act as a quick reaction force.The messages show the Oath Keepers discussed providing security for prominent Trump allies including Stone, Alexander, Alex Jones, Lin Wood and Mike Flynn, Trump’s former national security adviser.‘Election integrity summits’ aim to fire up Trump activists over big lieRead moreOne week before January 6, Rhodes, the leader of the Oath Keepers, mentioned requests to provide security for Bianca Garcia, president of the group Latinos for Trump, for which Tarrio, the Proud Boys leader, was also chief of staff.The next day, Meggs, the Florida Oath Keepers leader who would ultimately lead Stone’s security detail, boasted that he had spoken to Stone the night before. Jessica Watkins, another member of the Oath Keepers, said she was also in touch with Stone.“Roger Stone just asked for security,” Watkins texted the group chat on 1 January, to which Meggs responded: “Who reached out to you? I [spoke] to him Wednesday.”Meggs – using the alias “OK Gator 1” – added: “I just texted him.”Though the Oath Keepers discussed providing security for other Trump allies, the extent of their voluntary services remains unclear. Alexander said in a recent statement that the Oath Keepers did not perform security duties for him on January 6.TopicsUS Capitol attackUS politicsThe far rightnewsReuse this content More