Rolling coverage of the former president’s latest legal woes
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Trump phones mother of shot Capitol rioter Ashli Babbitt
In an interview this morning, Donald Trump once again claimed that he had “absolute authority” as president to declassify documents, and that he had declassified the files found at Mar-a-Lago by the FBI in its August search.
The claim is misleading in that there are standardised protocols that generally have to be followed when documents are declassified, and there is no evidence Mr Trump or his team did so. More important for Mr Trump is that the classification status of the files he took with him to Florida is irrelevant to any of the crimes the FBI cited in its affidavit seeking a warrant for the search.
Meanwhile, the select committee investigating the 6 January attack on the US Capitol has obtained “thousands” of communications between Secret Service staff around the time of the riot, according to chair Bennie Thompson.
It is unclear what if any materials included in the data are new to the committee, but the announcement comes after two months of back-and-forth between the panel and the service after it emerged that the latter had deleted messages sent by agents before, during and after the insurrection.
Even after a run of special election victories and encouraging polls, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has issued a pessimistic prediction for House Democrats’ chances in the midterm elections.
In comments reported by Punchbowl News, Mr Schumer told Senate colleagues at a restaurant dinner that were the midterms to be held today, there would be “a 60 per cent chance we hold the Senate, and a 40 per cent chance we hold the House”.
The outlet cited numerous restaurant patrons as its sources, reporting that they overheard Mr Schumer as he “loudly” described how Nancy Pelosi is “in trouble” in her efforts to hold on to the majority in the lower chamber.
The majority leader’s prediction of losing the House puts him at odds with Ms Pelosi, who has said in the last few days not just that she thinks the Democrats can hold the chamber but that they can in fact widen their ultra-narrow majority.
Read more:
Senate majority leader’s assessment puts him at odds with Nancy Pelosi, but is still more optimistic than any forecast earlier this year
In an interview with right-wing radio host Hugh Hewitt this morning, Donald Trump was given a chance to riff on the Mar-a-Lago search and its aftermath.
Aside from boasting about his poll numbers and saying that “the people are not going to stand for” the search, he also fixated on John Durham’s fading probe into the Russia invesitagtion, insisted that “alternate slates” of electors submitted to overturn presidential are “common” rather than illegal, confirmed he had not been asked to appear before a grand jury (it was not clear which one), and also insisted a president has the “absolute right” to declassify classified documents.
This is inaccurate, and is also not the only matter at issue in the Mar-a-Lago case.
He also said that were he indicted, he “would have no prohibition” on running for president – and warned of “big problems” thanks to the uproar that would result. Asked if he was inciting violence, he replied: “I’m just saying what my opinion is”.
When Donald Trump floated the controversial idea to buy Greenland in 2019, it was not because of conversations with administration officials, as he said at the time. It was the by-product of a suggestion posed by one of his billionaire friends, a new book reports.
In August 2019, the former president compared the purchase of Greenland to a “large real estate deal”, stating that the notion had been planted in his head after ongoing conversations with members within his cabinet.
“The concept came up and….strategically it’s interesting,” he told a group of reporters on board Air Force One at the time. Later, a report from The Wall Street Journal would claim that the former real estate mogul became fixated on the semi-autonomous territory of Denmark after learning about its vast natural resources and geopolitical importance.
“First we have to find out whether or not they have any interest,” he said.
Johanna Chisholm has the story.
The former president once compared the purchase of the Scandanavian island to a ‘large real estate deal’
Bennie Thompson, chair of the House January 6 committee, has said the panel has obtained “thousands of exhibits” from Secret Service agents in relation to the panel’s investigation.
Mr Thompson told reporters on Wednesday that the materials obtained by his committee were a combination of different communications including “text messages, radio traffic … thousands of exhibits”, as Axios reported.
The receipt of “thousands” of materials comes three months after the committee issued a subpoena for Secret Service communications from the day of the assault on the US Capitol and the day before.
It remains unclear what, if any, new information has been obtained by the panel, which has recently announced a second round of hearings for September.
Gino Spocchia reports.
Subpoena was issued in July for text messages between agents from January 5 and 6 2021
Pennsylvania’s gubernatorial race has gotten plenty of attention thanks to GOP candidate Doug Mastriano, an outright Christian nationalist who attended the 6 January rally that preceded the attack on the US Capitol.
Mr Mastriano, an election conspiracy theorist who currently trails in the polls, has previously said he would order a purge of the state’s voter rolls if elected – and given that Pennsylvania’s secretary of state is appointed by the governor, not elected, he would have more leeway than most governors in the nation to reshape the way elections in his state are carried out.
Eric Garcia looks at what a Mastriano win could mean for the next election.
Doug Mastriano led the effort to overturn the 2020 election while Josh Shapiro beat Trump in court. Now the two are running for governor in one of the most important swing states, Eric Garcia reports from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania
As Republican Herschel Walker struggles in his challenge to incumbent Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock, polling indicates that even as the contest features two Black men, the gendered and racial gaps in whom voters are supporting are extremely stark:
Mr Warnock’s campaign has been hampered from the off by his history of domestic abuse, his steady stream of bizarre and rambling public statements, and his habit of repeating outright false claims – including lies about his professional and educational history.
Donald Trump’s wife, Melania, was reportedly so disturbed by her husband’s handling of the Covid-19 pandemic that she took to characterising his response as “screwing up”.
The news of one of the former president’s closest confidants, among others, expressing doubts in his ability to handle critical geopolitical issues comes from a forthcoming book from New York Times chief White House correspondent Peter Baker and New Yorker staff writer and CNN global affairs analyst Susan Glasser. CNN obtained an early copy of the book.
In one of the book’s more damning passages, the pair of veteran reporters cite interviews with Trump insiders who were able to confirm that the one-term president’s partner was concerned with how his administration was responding to the pandemic, which he was claiming as late as 27 February – after the US had retroactively confirmed its first death and the World Health Organisation had declared it a global health emergency – would disappear “like a miracle”.
Johanna Chisholm reports.
The former first lady reportedly made the damning remarks during a phone call with one of her husband’s initial backers, former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie
Donald Trump appears to be on something of a tear this morning, sharing various news clips and Fox News segments about John Durham’s probe into the origins of Robert Mueller’s investigation into connections between Trump’s team and Russian agents.
Mr Trump claims that the Durham probe proves that his 2016 campaign and administration was spied on thanks to a conspiracy masterminded to some extent by Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and compromised law enforcement officials. There is no evidence for this.
Most of what Mr Trump has shared is focused on Igor Danchenko, a Russia analyst who has been indicted for lying to federal investigators. However, that indictment was handed down by a grand jury last year.
Mr Trump has most likely been triggered by a New York Times story that described the three-year-old Durham investigation as entering its final stages with no major revelations on the horizon:
Mr. Durham appears to be winding down his three-year inquiry without anything close to the results Mr. Trump was seeking. The grand jury that Mr. Durham has recently used to hear evidence has expired, and while he could convene another, there are currently no plans to do so, three people familiar with the matter said…
Over the course of his inquiry, Mr. Durham has developed cases against two people accused of lying to the F.B.I. in relation to outside efforts to investigate purported Trump-Russia ties, but he has not charged any conspiracy or put any high-level officials on trial. The recent developments suggest that the chances of any more indictments are remote.
Speaking to reporters, 6 Jaunary committee chair Bennie Thompson not only said that his committee had obtained “thousands of exhibits” from the Secret Service – including texts and radio traffic between agents – but also confirmed that he and his colleagues are aiming to hold another public hearing on 28 September, as was reported earlier this week.
Watch his remarks below:
Punchbowl News has dropped a startling report this morning giving a glimpse into the usually behind-closed-doors decision-making of the 6 January select committee. It seems that the committee has decided not to co-operate with the Department of Justice on the department’s own 6 January investigation.
As per the site’s AM newsletter, here’s a sample of what’s going on:
The Jan. 6 panel’s decision not to cooperate comes after a months-long request from the Justice Department for transcripts from the roughly 1,000 interviews conducted by the select committee. It’s also a huge about-face for the select committee, which until recently had been telegraphing plans to share at least some of its evidence with DOJ officials.
Two sources told us the decision is not to cooperate with DOJ “at this time,” although this could change in the future depending on certain factors, including if the scope of federal officials’ request changes.
One of the main concerns for the select committee’s members is what would happen to the panel’s transcripts if they were turned over to DOJ. If the Justice Department were to seek an indictment based on evidence provided by the panel, that person would then have access to this material ahead of trial. Another source said handing over transcripts to DOJ could potentially delay pending trials as defendants request time to review the new evidence.
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