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      in Elections

      Riots, effigies and a guillotine: Capitol attack could be a glimpse of violence to come

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      A guillotine outside the state capitol in Arizona. A Democratic governor burned in effigy in Oregon. Lawmakers evacuated as pro-Trump crowds gathered at state capitols in Georgia and New Mexico. Cheers in Idaho as a crowd was told fellow citizens were “taking the capitol” and “taking out” Vice-president Mike Pence.As a mob of thousands invaded the US capitol on 6 January, Trump supporters threatened lawmakers and fellow citizens in cities across the country. Compared with the violent mob in Washington, the pro-Trump crowds elsewhere in the country were much smaller, attracting dozens to hundreds of people. But they used the same extreme rhetoric, labeling both Democratic politicians and Republicans perceived as disloyal to Trump as “traitors”.As the FBI warns of plans for new armed protests in Washington and all 50 state capitols in the days leading up to Biden’s inauguration, and fresh calls for extreme violence circulate on social media forums, the intensity of the nationwide pro-Trump demonstrations and attacks last week offer evidence of what might be coming next. Some of the pro-Trump demonstrations on Wednesday did not turn violent. The dozens of Trump supporters who entered the Kansas state capitol remained peaceful, according to multiple news reports. In Carson City, Nevada, hundreds of Trump supporters drank beer and listened to rock music while denouncing the election results, the Reno Gazette Journal reported.But in Los Angeles, white Trump supporters assaulted and ripped the wig off the head of a young black woman who happened to pass their 6 January protest, the Los Angeles Times reported. A white woman was captured on video holding the wig and shouting, “Fuck BLM!” and, “I did the first scalping of the new civil war.”In Ohio and Oregon, fights broke out between counter-protesters and members of the Proud Boys, the neo-fascist group Trump directed in September to “stand back and stand by”. Proud Boys also reportedly demonstrated in Utah, California, Florida, and South Carolina.And in Washington state, Trump supporters, some armed, pushed through the gate of the governor’s mansion and stormed onto the lawn of Democrat Jay Inslee’s house. In Georgia, where lawmakers were evacuated from the state capitol, members of the III% Security Force militia, a group known for its anti-Muslim activism, had gathered outside.An effigy of Gov. Kate Brown is tarred and feathered by pro-Trump Supporters and anti-lockdown protesters at the Oregon State Capitol. pic.twitter.com/XSmHI82cXD— Brian Hayes (@_Brian_ICT) January 6, 2021
      Militia members, neo-Nazis, and other rightwing extremists have discussed multiple potential dates for armed protests in the coming days, researchers who monitor extremist groups say, with proposals ranging from rallies or attacks on state capitols to a “million militia march” in Washington.The FBI’s intelligence bulletin has warned of potential armed protests from 16 January “at least” through inauguration day on 20 January, but researchers say that energy had not yet coalesced around a single event. Public social media forums where Trump supporters have gathered to discuss plans are full of dramatic, contradictory rumors, but experts say that more concrete plans are likely being made in private and in smaller forums that are more difficult to infiltrate.The United States has no shortage of heavily armed extremists who have been openly calling for a new civil war, from members of the Boogaloo Bois – a nascent domestic terrorism group that has been linked to the murders of two law enforcement officers – to militia leaders such as Stewart Rhodes, the Yale-educated founder of an anti-government group that recruits policy and military officers, who was photographed outside the capitol during the mob invasion last week.Accusations at public protests that Democratic politicians are dictators, tyrants and “traitors” and suggestions that white Americans need to seize power back from their elected officials, have been intensifying for more than a year, fueled in part by furious demonstrations against public health measures that forced businesses to close to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, which has disproportionately killed Black and Latino residents.Before they stormed the US Capitol last week, angry crowds of white Americans, some armed with rifles, had staged chaotic demonstrations at state capitols in Michigan, Idaho, California and elsewhere, often calling law enforcement officers “traitors” when they would not let them pass.On 6 January, the news that Trump supporters were forcing their way into the capitol was greeted with cheers at pro-Trump protests in other states. “Patriots have stormed the Capitol,” a protest organizer in Arizona announced, prompting chants of “USA!” according to the Arizona Republic.“Supposedly, they’re taking the Capitol and taking out Pence,” the organizer of an Idaho protest told a crowd of about 300 people, according to the Spokesman-Review. The crowd cheered.In Washington DC, part of the mob at the capitol had been captured on video shouting “Hang Mike Pence!” after the vice-president refused to give in to Trump’s repeated demands to deny the results of the election and name him the winner.Signs and rhetoric linked to the QAnon conspiracy theory, which holds that Trump is fighting a secret war against a powerful network of elite pedophiles, were present at multiple state events last week.In Salem, Oregon, where an effigy of Democratic governor Kate Brown was tarred and feathered before being burned, the protest outside the statehouse turned violent, as Proud Boys clashed with counter-protesters. In Colorado, an estimated 700 people gathered at the state capitol to protest, many of them not wearing masks, and Denver’s mayor announced he was closing municipal buildings early as a precaution.In Arizona, where 1,000 Trump supporters gathered to protest the certification of Biden’s victory, the guillotine outside the state capitol had a Trump flag on it, and the Trump supporters who had brought it gave an Arizona Republic reporter a written statement, which included a list of baseless allegations of election fraud, and demands for new fraud audits and investigations.“Why do we have a guillotine with us? The answer is simple,” the statement read. “For six weeks Americans have written emails, gathered peacefully, made phone calls and begged their elected officials to listen to their concerns. We have been ignored, ridiculed, scorned, dismissed, lied to, laughed at and essentially told, no one cares.“We pray for peace,” the statement concluded, “but we do not fear war.” More

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      in US Politics

      Lawyers face fallout from fueling Trump’s false claims of election fraud

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      Rudy Giuliani, the president’s personal attorney, could be included in a federal investigation and is facing a disbarment complaintProminent lawyers who helped fuel Donald Trump’s baseless charges of election fraud to try and thwart Joe Biden’s win, are now facing potentially serious legal and financial problems of their own tied to their aggressive echoing of Trump’s false election claims, say former Department of Justice lawyers and legal experts.They include a federal investigation into the Capitol attack by a pro-Trump mob, possible disbarment and a defamation lawsuit. Continue reading… More

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      in US Politics

      'Sedition and conspiracy': prosecutors cite wide-ranging crimes in Capitol attack – video

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      The acting US attorney for the District of Columbia, Michael Sherwin, has indicated that many amid the hundreds of pro-Trump rioters who violently invaded the US Capitol last Wednesday are suspected of a range of crimes including felony murder, sedition and conspiracy.
      At a press conference in Washington, prosecutors said there are at least 160 federal criminal cases open and they are ready to track down individuals across the country and apprehend them wherever possible – potentially arresting hundreds if not thousands of people.
      ‘The range of criminal conduct was unmatched,’ Sherwin said. He warned rioters: ‘You will be charged and you will be found’ More

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      in US Politics

      Capitol riot prompts top US firms to pull funding for leading Republicans

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      [embedded content]
      Republicans who voted to block Joe Biden’s confirmation as president have been deserted by some of the biggest corporations in the US, as some leading rightwing politicians begin to face potential consequences for the Capitol riot on Wednesday.
      A slew of companies, including Citigroup, one of the biggest banks in the US, and the Marriott hotel chain, said they would halt donations to Republicans who voted against certifying the results of the presidential election.
      The desertion comes after riots at the Capitol on Wednesday. Despite mobs storming the building, egged on by Donald Trump’s spurious claims of voter fraud, 147 Republicans voted to reject Joe Biden’s electoral victory later that same day. Senators Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley were among those to dissent, along with scores of House representatives.
      “At the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association, we continuously evaluate our political contributions to ensure that those we support share our values and goals,” said Kim Keck, president and CEO of BlueCross BlueShield, a sprawling healthcare company.
      “In light of this week’s violent, shocking assault on the United States Capitol, and the votes of some members of Congress to subvert the results of November’s election by challenging Electoral College results, BCBSA will suspend contributions to those lawmakers who voted to undermine our democracy.”
      The companies’ donations amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars, and could have a lasting impact on future elections. The political committee arm of Blue Cross Blue Shield, Bluepac, alone donated $246,750 to Republican officials during the 2020 elections, according to Opensecrets.org.
      In a memo to staff, Citigroup said it had donated $1,000 to Hawley’s campaign – citing a “significant employee presence” in the senator’s state of Missouri, the Wall Street Journal reported. Hawley, with Cruz, has become one of the highest-profile objectors to the certification of Biden’s win, and has perpetuated hoaxes about voter fraud. There are growing calls for both men to resign.
      ‘We want you to be assured that we will not support candidates who do not respect the rule of law,’ wrote Candi Wolff, head of Citi’s global government affairs.
      ‘We intend to pause our contributions during the quarter as the country goes through the presidential transition and hopefully emerges from these events stronger and more united.’
      The Marriott hotel chain said it would also suspend donations from its political action campaign to lawmakers who opposed the presidential election results. Marriott gave $1,000 to Hawley’s election campaign and $1,000 to his leadership committee, Mother Jones reported.
      “We have taken the destructive events at the Capitol to undermine a legitimate and fair election into consideration and will be pausing political giving from our Political Action Committee to those who voted against certification of the election,” the company said in a statement.
      Boston Scientific, a medical device company, and the parent company of Commerce Bank also said they would not donate to the Republicans who attempted to overturn the election result. “At this time, we have suspended all support for officials who have impeded the peaceful transfer of power,” a spokesperson for Commerce Bancshares told the Popular Information newsletter.
      CVS, Exxon Mobil, FedEx and Target all said they were reviewing future political donations, according to multiple reports, as were Bank of America, Ford and AT&T.
      In a further blow to Donald Trump and the Republican party, the digital payment company Stripe said it would stop processing payments for Trump’s campaign website, company sources told the Wall Street Journal.
      Trump has raised more than $200m since the election, as his team has appealed for donations based on Trump’s false claims of election fraud. More

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      in US Politics

      Trump impeachment: Democrats formally charge president with inciting insurrection

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      Donald Trump is facing a historic second impeachment after Democrats in the House of Representatives formally charged him with one count of “incitement of insurrection” over the Capitol Hill riot.
      Five people died in the attack last week, including a police officer, which Trump prompted when he told supporters to “fight like hell” in his attempt to overturn election defeat by Joe Biden. Emerging video footage has revealed just how close the mob came to a potentially deadly confrontation with members of Congress.
      On Monday, security officials scrambled to ensure that Biden’s inauguration next week would not be marred by further violence.
      The US Secret Service will begin carrying out its special security arrangements for the inauguration this Wednesday, almost a week earlier than originally planned.
      And ABC News said it had obtained an internal FBI bulletin which detailed plans for “armed protests” and calls for the “storming” of state, local and federal courthouses and buildings across the country if Trump was removed from power before then.
      On Capitol Hill, the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, who in an interview on Sunday called Trump “a deranged, unhinged, dangerous president”, initiated a plan in two parts.
      “The president’s threat to America is urgent, and so too will be our action,” she said.
      An initial resolution called on Mike Pence, the vice-president, to support removing Trump under the 25th amendment.
      A clause in the amendment, never before invoked, describes how members of the cabinet can agree to remove a president under extreme circumstances. Pence, a staunch loyalist until the climax of Trump’s effort to overturn the election, has signaled no intention of joining such a move.
      Republicans in the House duly blocked the Democratic resolution.
      But it was followed by the introduction of an impeachment article citing “incitement of insurrection”. Trump was charged to have “engaged in high crimes and misdemeanors by inciting violence against the government of the United States” and thus having violated his oath of office.
      The article cites 14th amendment prohibitions against any person “engaged in insurrection or rebellion against” the US from “hold[ing] any office … under the United States”.
      The House could bring the single article to the floor for a vote by midweek. The Democratic congressman David Cicilline of Rhode Island, who introduced the measure, tweeted that Democrats now have sufficient votes to pass it and impeach Trump a second time – a first in American history. But for him to be removed would require conviction in the Senate.
      The Senate is in recess until after the inauguration, and Democratic leaders have said they will not take up impeachment until after the Biden administration has had time to try to have nominees confirmed and to pass key legislation in its first 100 days.
      A small number of Republicans in the Senate and House have joined Democrats’ effort to remove Trump.
      Adam Schiff, the Democratic chairman of the House intelligence committee and a key figure in the first Trump impeachment, tweeted: “Every day Trump stays in office, he’s a threat to our democracy. Congress must act, and with urgency.”
      But conviction in the Senate would be a long shot, as it was last time the president was impeached. Some Republicans have indicated support this time but about a dozen more will be needed for success.
      Trump was charged with two articles of impeachment in December 2019 and acquitted in February 2020.
      If Trump were convicted after he had left office, the Senate could decide to punish him by barring him from seeking office again, as opponents fear is his plan in 2024.
      Since the attack on the US Capitol, the president has retreated from the public eye and been banned from Facebook and Twitter, condemned by former allies and vowed not to attend Biden’s inauguration on 20 January.
      His silence was filled by full-throated calls from Democrats for his ejection from office – and meek pushback from some Republicans calling for national “unity” after their attempt to overturn the November election produced one of the most egregious acts of violence on Capitol Hill in two centuries.
      There are now signs that diehard Trump loyalists are planning to march on the Capitol yet again, on inauguration day, in an event branded online as “A Million Militia March”.
      The FBI has arrested dozens of participants in last week’s rioting and continued to circulate wanted posters of suspects, potentially dampening participation in another rally.
      But with nine days to go to the inauguration, officials were planning to secure the area. The mayor of Washington, Muriel Bowser, asked the Department of Homeland Security to put new restrictions in place and urged people to avoid the city on 20 January.
      The Pentagon, FBI, Secret Service and other agencies were reportedly placed on alert and the national guard said it would increase troops in Washington to at least 10,000 by Saturday. The National Park Service temporarily closed the Washington Monument “in response to credible threats to visitors and park resources”.
      The inauguration will be attended by Barack and Michelle Obama, George and Laura Bush and Bill and Hillary Clinton. Biden, the incoming Vice-President, Kamala Harris, and their families will be joined by the former presidents and their families in a visit to Arlington national cemetery, ABC reported.
      Such plans were made as the nation struggled to come to terms with the violence last week in which five died and dozens were injured.
      On Monday, the 75-year-old New Jersey Democratic congresswoman Bonnie Watson Coleman said she had tested positive for coronavirus and believed she had become infected while locked down for hours at the Capitol during the riot last week with colleagues who were not wearing face masks.
      Coleman is awaiting a more comprehensive Covid test, noting that she had already received the first shot of the two-dose vaccine. More

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      in US Politics

      Anywhere but Washington: an eye-opening journey in a deeply divided nation

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      Oliver Laughland, US southern bureau chief: It was somewhere along the 700-mile night-time drive from Tampa, Florida, to my home in New Orleans that I realized filming the Anywhere But Washington series was becoming one of the hardest assignments in my career.Hours earlier, my colleague Tom Silverstone and I had interviewed a conservative radio host spreading baseless conspiracy theories about Covid-19 to a crowd of at-risk, Donald Trump-supporting senior citizens. We had been forced to make a sharp exit, and got caught in the middle of a powerful thunderstorm that drenched us through. Thankfully, we’d managed to keep the camera dry and preserve the footage, but the whole day became a precursor to the rest of our two and half month long trip through America.Fiery interactions, pervasive disinformation and mammoth car journeys became normality. Alongside countless nasal swabs, hundreds of disposable face masks, and seemingly endless nights editing the films over Zoom on increasingly tight deadlines, while preparing for shoots in the coming days.It was not only an immense logistical challenge and a constant battle to establish facts, but an eye-opening journey into a bitterly divided country during the most important election in a generation.Tom Silverstone, senior video producer: For many months, I’d been confined to making short videos through Skype – fuzzy webcam interviews that make it hard to go deep into a story. So it was with some relief, and a bit of a trepidation, that Oliver and I, along with our video-editor colleague Noah Payne-Frank, who is based in London, were given the go-ahead for the series.Trying to encompass how an entire country feels about its election is tricky at the best of times. America’s deep complexities, size and diversity have always made singular narratives hard to find. But the pandemic made everything a lot more difficult. As we travelled from state to state, we found empty streets and cancelled public events, and few political events to attend – particularly on the Democratic side as the party toed a stricter, safer line on the pandemic.This meant that canvassing public opinion became a harder task and we had to organize almost every element of each episode, days – sometimes weeks – beforehand.OL: It was clear throughout our journey that two diametrical forces were underpinning this election and it was vital for any viewer seeking to understand the state of US politics to encounter both in our films.We made a commitment to visit as many diverse communities as possible to examine how Joe Biden’s candidacy was viewed, and interrogate his platform as best we could. We were interested in how progressive politics and rapidly diversifying populaces in once conservative strongholds might tip the outcome of the election, prompting trips to Georgia, Texas and North Carolina.But we were also determined to robustly engage with the post-factual, conspiracy-tinged world ushered in by the Trump presidency, as well as to hold him accountable for the numerous policy failures of his tenure.TS: Four years ago I filmed our 2016 version of the series and watched as Trump successfully motivated his base with cultural and racial narratives to create anger and division.This time, what Oliver and I encountered was even more extreme. At mainstream Republican events we came into contact with groups like the Proud Boys – the far-right “western supremacists” who now patrol Maga [Make America Great Again] marches across the country. We interviewed Republican candidates running for Congress who pushed baseless conspiracy theories tied to QAnon.After years of Trump repeating cries of “fake news”, his rallies have become hostile places for reporters, and we were often met with deep distrust. On one occasion a small group of his supporters followed us back to our car, labelling us “agitators” as we tried to film their public event. It did not always feel safe.But away from these rallies, we found people who were curious about two reporters roaming across the country, eager to speak to us about their lives. We met unemployed factory workers in Ohio, let down by Trump’s broken promises; evangelical Christians in North Carolina, loyal to the president despite his transgressions; and progressive Latina Democrats looking to flip a historically conservative Texas. After four years of Trump, this is a country in a passionate and frequently angry debate about what it was, what it is – and what it could be.OL: We ended the series as the news networks eventually called the election Joe Biden, acutely aware that this was far from the end of the story.The shocking events in Washington last week, a mob invasion of the US Congress, only serve to emphasize this further. Donald Trump’s baseless claims of election fraud alongside four years of extremist rhetoric and policy have fundamentally altered the fabric of American democracy. And the end of Trump’s presidency is far from the end of Trumpism.So Tom and I will continue to produce new Anywhere But Washington episodes, starting from Biden’s inauguration later this month. We want to examine if the 46th president will deliver for the communities he promised, what efforts he makes to restore faith in institutions, and what the long-term legacy of Trump’s four years in office will be. It all starts from day one, when Biden’s desk will be landed with a public health crisis, a humanitarian disaster on the southern border, and a host of other national and geopolitical issues stemming from the past four years.We’ve been blown away by the support from Guardian viewers in the US, UK and around the world, and appreciated the dozens of encouraging emails and direct messages sent to us over the course of the series.We’d love to hear more suggestions about where to visit next, the sort of stories you’d like to see us engage with. We’re keen to visit new areas of the country and revisit many of the communities we spent time with last year, and we hope you’ll continue with us throughout the journey. More

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      in Elections

      'Find the fraud': details emerge of another Trump call to Georgia officials

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      While election officials in Georgia were verifying signatures on absentee ballot envelopes in one metro Atlanta county, Donald Trump pressed a lead investigator to “find the fraud” and said it would make the investigator a national hero.The December call, described by a person familiar with it, is yet another link in the chain of the extraordinary pressure campaign waged by the US president on state officials as he sought to overturn the results of the November election, which he lost to Democrat Joe Biden.It is one of at least three phone calls, held over the course of a month between early December and early January, where Trump sought help from high-level Georgia officials in subverting the election – only to be rebuffed each time. Trump lost to Biden in Georgia by 11,779 votes.The call to the investigator preceded Trump’s call on 2 January to Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, where he asked election officials to “find” enough votes to overturn Biden’s win in the state. It occurred as election officials were conducting an audit of signatures on absentee ballot envelopes in Cobb County.The audit, which reviewed more than 15,000 signatures, found no cases of fraud. The Georgia bureau of investigation helped conduct the signature audit.Trump and his allies have for months made false claims about Georgia’s signature verification process for absentee ballots and about the results of the November election. Among other things, they demanded an audit of the signature matches.The White House had no immediate comment. The call was first reported on Saturday by the Washington Post, which said it was withholding the name of the investigator, who did not respond to requests for comment, because of the risk of threats and harassment directed at election officials.Various election officials across the country and Trump’s former attorney general, William Barr, have said there was no widespread fraud in the election. Raffensperger and other officials in Georgia have repeatedly disputed Trump’s false claims about the election and said it was conducted freely and fairly.Congress certified Biden’s electoral college win early on Thursday – hours after a violent throng of pro-Trump rioters stormed the Capitol.During another call in early December, Trump pressed Georgia’s governor, Brian Kemp, to order a special session of the state legislature to subvert Biden’s victory. Kemp refused.Trump repeatedly lashed out at Raffensperger and Kemp, both fellow Republicans, and others he saw as standing in his way of overturning the election loss.In last week’s call with Raffensperger, Trump urged the secretary of state to change the certified results. “All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have,” Trump said. “Because we won the state.”Raffensperger said in response: “President Trump, we’ve had several lawsuits, and we’ve had to respond in court to the lawsuits and the contentions. We don’t agree that you have won.”Legal experts said the call raised questions about possible election law violations by Trump, and several Democrats in the state have called for an investigation to be opened. More

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      in US Politics

      Trump is being pelted in the stocks now – but don’t bet against him wriggling free

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      The chances of seeing the outgoing president in an orange jumpsuit are low – even as the potential charges mount up fastLock him up! Echoing Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign chant against Hillary Clinton, many Americans appear keen on jailing their president after his criminally reckless incitement of last week’s mob-driven, amateur-hour insurrection in Washington.His harshest critics would despatch him forthwith to a federal penitentiary or mental institution. Yet despite fears that an unstable Trump poses a security threat in his final 10 days in office, he is unlikely to be forced out. It’s just not that easy, politically or legally. Continue reading… More