Thursday, October 7, 2021

Senate Report Details Trump's Attempts To Get DOJ To Overturn Election

 


In a nearly 400- page report released this morning, the Senate Judiciary Committee memorializes information (some of which has already seeped out since the election) that the malignant loser was pulling every lever he could get his hands on, including at the Department of Justice, to stage a coup to remain in office:

The Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday released a sweeping report about how former President Donald Trump and a top lawyer in the Justice Department attempted to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

Trump directly asked the Justice Department nine times to undermine the election result, and his chief of staff Mark Meadows broke administration policy by pressuring a Justice Department lawyer to investigate claims of election fraud, according to the report, which is based on witness interviews of top former Justice Department officials.
 
The Democratic-led committee also revealed that White House counsel Pat Cipollone threatened to quit in early January as Trump considered replacing then-acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen with Jeffrey Clark, a DOJ lawyer who supported election fraud conspiracies.  [snip]
 
After the eight-month investigation, the findings highlight the relentlessness of Trump and some of his top advisers as they fixated on using the Justice Department to prop up false conspiracies of election fraud. The committee report called Trump's repeated demands an abuse of presidential power.

Clark was a particularly active player in the plot:
 
Clark had pushed Rosen and Richard Donoghue, then the second-in-command at the Justice Department, to use the Justice Department to announce election fraud investigations and and ask state leaders in Georgia to appoint electors, potentially disregarding the certified popular vote. Clark began making the pitch in late December after speaking with Trump directly, the committee found.
 
The Senate committee wrote he may have had assistance from "lower-level allies" within the Justice Department and even attempted to bargain with Rosen on his plan, saying he would turn down a chance at taking Rosen's place if Rosen would agree to support his Georgia elector initiative.
 
"Clark's proposal to wield DOJ's power to override the already-certified popular vote reflected a stunning distortion of DOJ's authority: DOJ protects ballot access and ballot integrity, but has no role in determining which candidate won a particular election," the committee wrote.
 
The Committee has made a referral to the DC Bar regarding Clark's despicable, seditious actions.  That's the least jeopardy he should be facing.
 
Of course, the malignant loser's  interactions with Rosen and Donoghue (which have been previously reported) indicate the extent of his desperation to get others to cast doubt on the outcome and rely on his fascist friends in Congress take it from there:
 
In multiple calls, Trump claimed there was election fraud in Pennsylvania and Arizona -- both states he lost -- telling Rosen "people are saying" and asking the Justice Department to look into the rumors, according to the committee.
 
Trump also told the DOJ leadership, "You guys aren't following the internet the way I do," according to both Donoghue and Rosen.
 
Rosen told the President the department "can't and won't just flip a switch and change the election." That prompted Trump to simply ask for an official Justice announcement that the election was corrupt and then "leave the rest to me and the [Republican] Congressmen," the committee report noted.
 
Again, much of this has been reported earlier, but the value lies in the documents and testimony that are now available for the January 6 select committee's work, as well as putting this unprecedented act of sedition formally into the historical record.  Add the ongoing investigation by the Fulton County (GA) District Attorney's investigation into the malignant loser's attempts to manipulate Georgia's election results, where he's potentially facing criminal charges (including engaging in election fraud, conspiracy and state RICO violations), he'll be facing plenty of legal peril -- as long as the "system" remains steadfast in seeking accountability and meting out justice.
 

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