Trump brags about the size of his rally on January 6
As the investigation into the attack on the US Capitol steadily yields more information about the events leading up to the 6 January attack, a new memo has been released detailing a new angle on the Trump team’s efforts to subvert the outcome of the 2020 election.
The memo, written by attorney Kenneth Chesebro, spells out a contorted multi-day plan to have Mike Pence take control of the electoral certification in the Senate, something the vice president ultimately refused to do despite intense pressure from the then-president.
Meanwhile, Democratic Congressman Jamie Raskin, a member of the House 6 January committee, has said that Donald Trump will “get his comeuppance” over the attack on the US Capitol.
Suggesting that criminal charges may soon be brought against the former president, Mr Raskin labelled Mr Trump “guilty as sin” and called him a “one-man crime wave” in an interview with Salon.
The select committee is set to begin its public hearings this month.
Giuliani ally developed plan for Pence to hijack electoral vote count
An attorney working with Donald Trump’s former lawyer Rudolph Giuliani drafted a plan for vice president Mike Pence to step aside from presiding over the counting of electoral votes on 6 January 2021 so the senate’s most senior Republican could refuse to count votes from swing states won by Joe Biden.
The plan, laid out in an email to Mr Giuliani which was forwarded to ex-law professor John Eastman, was drafted by attorney John Cheseboro and made public by the House 6 January select committee in a court filing last week.
It called for Mr Pence to ignore procedures laid out in the 1878 electoral count act and instead force the joint session to allow the “president of the Senate” sole authority to open and count electoral votes submitted by each state.
Alisha Rahaman Sarkar3 June 2022 05:01
ICYMI: Trump endorses Blake Masters in Arizona Senate primary
Donald Trump has made his endorsement in the Arizona Republican US Senate primary, backing Blake Masters in the crowded primary field which includes the state’s attorney general, Mark Brnovich.
Mr Trump is seeking to defeat Mr Brnovich, who until recently was the frontrunner in all polling of the race, due to Mr Brnovich’s refusal to back his falsehoods about the 2020 election. Mr Masters is polling in third place according to most surveys of voter support in the race, but a Trump endorsement could energise his campaign just as it did for another candidate backed by billionaire Peter Thiel, JD Vance, who catapaulted into the lead in Ohio’s US Senate primary after the ex-president’s endorsement.
Read more from The Independent’s Eric Garcia:
John Bowden3 June 2022 04:20
Kentucky GOP congressman calls for ending gun-free school zones in response to Uvalde
A Trump-endorsed GOP congressman in Kentucky believes the solution to mass shootings targeting schoolchildren is completely getting rid of gun-free zones around schools, where members of the public are not allowed to carry weapons.
“The biggest thing we can do here today is repeal the 1990 Gun-Free School Zone Act so that the default condition in this country is not to advertise every student as a target,” Thomas Massie asserted at a hearing of the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday.
Mr Massie was endorsed for reelection by Donald Trump last month. The former president said that the conservative congressman “fights hard to Protect your Liberties, especially the First and Second Amendments, which are under siege by the Radical Left”. He previously had called for Mr Massie’s ouster from the GOP over his opposition to a Covid-19 relief package.
Read more from The Independent’s Eric Garcia:
John Bowden3 June 2022 03:12
Biden hammers Republicans for opposing AR-15 restrictions
In a primetime address on Tuesday President Joe Biden took a much sharper…