Trump supporters and conspiracy theory - Part 2

[Rick Plant]

Former assistant contradicts Trump's sworn testimony in New York affidavit



On Monday, CBS News reported that a one-time executive assistant for former President Donald Trump has contradicted a key point he made in a sworn affidavit during his response to civil allegations in New York.

"Rhona Graff, who worked for years as executive assistant to Donald Trump, 'cast doubt on the completeness of' a sworn affidavit submitted by Trump in May in an effort to clear a judge's finding of contempt, according to a Monday filing by the New York Attorney General's Office," reported Graham Kates.

"Trump was held in contempt April 25 after claiming he had no documents demanded in a subpoena by investigators for New York Attorney General Letitia James. Her office sought records related to Trump's personal finances, as well as information related to the financing of several properties."

"As part of the former president's effort to clear the contempt ruling, Trump said in an affidavit that 'it has been my customary practice to delegate document handling and retention responsibilities to my executive assistants,'" the report continued. "But in her May 31 deposition, Graff, who worked for Trump for more than two decades, said that statement was 'very general. It doesn't mean (executive assistants) handled every document and maintained everything that came out of his office.' Trump 'had an inbox and an outbox,' Graff said. If material was sent to him in a folder, Graff 'didn't think it was my position to look inside,' she said, adding that Trump 'maybe on the outside would have said to return to so and so, whoever gave it to him.'"

Trump ultimately lost his bid to clear his contempt of court ruling, and at the end of last month, he paid $110,000 in fines to the court.

James is investigating whether the Trump organization lied about its finances by boosting the value of assets to qualify for loans while minimizing them to avoid paying taxes.

"Attorneys for James' office have repeatedly indicated recently that the investigation is nearing its conclusion, and that it may lead to an 'enforcement action in the near future.' They have not elaborated on what enforcement might be," the report noted. "But before that happens, a New York appeals court must decide if Trump, his son Donald Trump Jr. and his daughter Ivanka Trump must sit for depositions with James' investigations. The judge overseeing the investigation and a lower appeals court have both sided with James' office, ruling that a December subpoena seeking their testimony was valid."

Read more here:

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-assistant-rhona-graff-deposition-new-york-attorney-general/

[Rick Plant]

Some Trump officials knew election scheme was 'improper if not illegal' -- and new emails prove it: CNN legal analyst

Reacting to a report from the Washington Post that a slate of fake electors in Georgia who were attempting to award the state's 16 Electoral College votes to Donald Trump were instructed to keep quiet about their work, CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin said it reeked of illegality.

According to the Post, an email went out to the conservatives hoping to assist Trump in his quest to win re-election that stated, "Your duties are imperative to ensure the end result — a win in Georgia for President Trump — but will be hampered unless we have complete secrecy and discretion. Please, at no point should you mention anything to do with Presidential Electors or speak to the media," with the secrecy portion bolded.

Speaking with "New Day" hosts Brianna Keilar and John Berman, political analyst Laura Jarrett prompted, "Georgia is the sleeper in this whole thing. It is because it's the -- it's where I think the most exposure is."

"It speaks to this whole issue of intent," she continued. "If this whole thing was on the up and up and you actually believed that Donald Trump was the rightful winner, why is all of this shrouded in secrecy? I think it speaks to the criminality of it, and it speaks to the potential criminal intent of the actors involved. Now what Trump knew, of course, all of that is going to remain to be seen. The fact that a member of the Trump campaign is on the record in an e-mail saying we have to do all this shrouded in secrecy is noteworthy."

"Criminal intent is always the hardest thing to prove in a white-collar case," Toobin offered. "Donald Trump will say, 'Look, I was doing this in the open, working with a lawyer, John Eastman, a Supreme Court law clerk, what -- where is the secrecy here?"

"That e-mail suggests that they were operating in secret which suggests that they knew they were doing something wrong," Toobin continued. "In fairness, we need to point out the person who sent that e-mail appears to be a fairly low-level person. Where he got the instruction to act in secrecy, that's something people want to know. But it's a suggestion that at least some people in the Trump orbit knew that this was an improper, if not an illegal, operation."

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

GOP will be left 'defending the indefensible' in justifying Trump's 'autocratic power grab': analysis



The Republican strategy for defending Donald Trump against the House Select Committee hearings could lead the GOP even further into extremism.

Pro-Trump lawmakers are planning a media blitz to distract from the public hearings on the conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election to keep the former president in power, and CNN political analyst Stephen Collinson warned that could set the GOP onto a dark path.

"There are potential pitfalls for Republicans who stand with Trump as the lurid tale of violence, lies and autocratic power grabs is told again for the American people and for the benefit of history," Collinson wrote. "The evidence could be so damning that those who seek to discredit the hearings will find themselves defending the indefensible -- a dark moment of the American story that is so heinous it will live in infamy."

It's not clear what political impact the evidence will have, and most voters have already made up their minds about Trump after his four years in the White House, but the GOP's willingness to defend the former president to the bitter end shows that he maintains his grip on the party and its core voters.

"Republicans have a much clearer route to power five months before the midterm elections than yet again appeasing Trump's autocracy," Collinson wrote. "They can simply blame President Joe Biden for the ills afflicting the country, given the disastrous political environment for Democrats as gasoline prices hit record highs and the cost of living soars."

"Anything that deflects from that goal seems unwise," he added. "There's also a risk that standing with Trump will brand the GOP all over again with the stain of defending a strongman who tried to overthrow a democratic election. That vision repeatedly punished the party when Trump was in power. And defending him could remind critical suburban voters all over again of just how extreme their party has become."

https://www.rawstory.com/jan-6-hearings-2657468410/

[Rick Plant]

GOP lawmaker still 'livid' over Jan. 6, calls Trump a 'narcissist' who is 'driven by revenge'
https://www.rawstory.com/gop-lawmaker-still-livid-over-jan-6-calls-trump-a-narcissist-who-is-driven-by-revenge/

[Rick Plant]

Trump likely hoped to create enough chaos on Jan 6th that he could invoke martial law: former DHS official



Two days before the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6th insurrection begins televised hearings and testimony on the attack on the nation's Capitol that followed Donald Trump's appearance at a "Stop the Steal" rally, a former Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official suggested the former president may have hoped he could declare martial law in the aftermath.

Taking to Twitter, former DHS chief of staff Miles Taylor speculated that Trump possibly saw a way to remain in power if enough chaos was created then he could have declared martial law and halted all the proceedings of the day.

According to Taylor, who authored an anonymous New York Times op-ed in 2018 asserting there was a "resistance" effort within Trump's White House, "I believe Trump intended to incite an insurrection as a pretext for declaring some form of marshal (sic) law. He mused about invoking the Insurrection Act YEARS before Jan 6 — calling it a 'magic power' — in convos I witnessed & was briefed on," later correcting "marshal" to "martial."

By way of explanation about what martial law would have entailed, Yahoo reported, "The Insurrection Act of 1807 gives the president broad powers to deploy the military domestically in response to what he or she deems to be emergency situations."

The Washington Post previously reported that "Three days before Joe Biden’s inauguration, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene texted White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. She told him that some Republican members of Congress believed the only path for President Donald Trump to change the outcome of the 2020 election and stay in power was for him to declare martial law."

Yahoo adds, "Legal experts say using the Insurrection Act to contest an election would a gross violation of precedent, and that the law needs sharpening to prevent abuse."

You can read more here:

https://twitter.com/MilesTaylorUSA/status/1533867378555199489

[Rick Plant]

Trump is now under investigation for foreign gifts that weren't reported or disappeared

The National Archives has already been forced to go to Mar-a-Lago to find all of the papers that former President Donald Trump took from the White House. There are still documents missing, according to a Feb. 2022 report. In April, it was revealed that Trump officials failed to provide details or track any foreign gifts given to the president. It's now something that the House Oversight and Reform Committee is investigating, CNN reported.

When a president accepts a gift from a foreign country it is tracked and reported and ultimately belongs to the United States, not to the individual. The reason is to maintain transparency and ensure that no country could buy off a president or top US official. Trump's White House apparently didn't work that way.

Last year, the inspector general reported that the Trump administration allowed tens of thousands of dollars in gifts to go "missing." The report cited a 30-year-old Suntory Hibiki bottle of Japanese whiskey that was given to former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. It was worth $5,800. Another gift was a 22-karat gold commemorative coin valued at $560 given to a different State Department official. There were also "monogrammed commemorative pewter trays, marble trinket boxes, and leather portfolios," the Times reported. While readying for the change-over for the new administration, State Department appointees were also spotted taking gift bags meant for foreign leaders with them.

By April it was discovered that it wasn't merely the State Department, the West Wing also didn't give an accounting of the foreign gifts. In 2020, Trump traveled internationally and welcomed foreign leaders to the U.S. when gifts were exchanged. At least three items from his India trip were observed like a bust of Gandhi, a sculpture of Gandhi's famous "three monkeys" metaphor and a spinning wheel. None of the items were listed by the White House.

The New York Times "also reported that government officials had questions about whether [Mike] Pence’s wife, Karen Pence, wrongly took two gold-toned place card holders from the prime minister of Singapore without paying for them," said the report. "The Trump administration, The Times reported, also failed to disclose that Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, had been given two swords and a dagger from the Saudis. A month after Mr. Trump left office, Mr. Kushner paid $47,920 for them along with three other gifts."

According to a new letter sent to the National Archives by the House Oversight and Reform Committee, members of Congress intend to look into the failure to comply with laws that govern foreign gifts.

"As a result, the foreign sources and monetary value of gifts President Trump received remain unknown," the letter says. "The Department of State also stated that it was unable to determine the identities of some government officials who received foreign gifts during the Trump Administration, as well as the sources of those foreign gifts."

The public reports about the missing White House and State Department gifts "raise concerns about the potential for undue influence over former President Trump by foreign governments, which may have put the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States at risk, and about possible violations of the Constitution’s Emoluments Clause, which prohibits the president from obtaining benefits from foreign entities while in office," the letter also said.

It appears 2020 is the only year in which the State Department didn't get a list of the gifts, but the House said that the "Office of the Chief of Protocol failed to request a listing." It is only due to media reporting that the department realized there was no accounting of the gifts. Most of the gift exchanges were photographed or reported on at the time by the U.S. and international press.

Read the full report at CNN.com

https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/07/politics/democrats-investigate-trump-foreign-gifts/index.html

[Rick Plant]

Here's an excellent article that details the treasonous Republicans who were in cahoots with Criminal Donald to steal the election from the American people. There was never any "massive voter fraud". This was all a plot to keep Criminal Donald in power by a GOP coup. All of these seditionist Republicans need to be thrown in prison for treason against the United States of America. They helped cause and were also involved in the worst attack against the United States in American history.

Here are 19 of the most eye-popping tweets sent by Republicans in Congress leading up to and during the Jan. 6 Capitol riot

https://www.rawstory.com/republican-tweets-jan-6/