Trump supporters and conspiracy theory - Part 2

[Rick Plant]

Criminal Donald's deranged violent cult is threatening the life of Rep. Adam Kinzinger and his family.     

Republican Adam Kinzinger faces threats of assassination against him, his wife and new baby

Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) isn't seeking reelection but his position on the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack has made his life more dangerous.

While appearing on ABC's "This Week," Kinzinger revealed one of the death threats against him, specifically mentioning his wife and their five-month-old baby.

"I’d never seen or had anything like that. It was sent from the local area," he said.

Kinzinger isn't the only one, right-wing members and conspiracy theorists have been among the top groups to threaten officials at the federal, state and even local election officials. The threats against the local officials have been so serious that the Justice Department was forced to send local police departments guidance.

He went on to explain that he wasn't surprised by the violence by those who believe in the conspiracy theories around the 2020 election.

“If you truly believe the deep state owned the election and the democracy was stolen and the election was stolen, that’s the most logical outcome,” said Kinzinger, who voted to impeach Trump shortly after the Jan. 6 attack and is not running for reelection.

He also accused others in his party of failing the American people by refusing to fight to uphold the Constitution and American democracy.

See the interview with Kinzinger below:

[Rick Plant]

Legal expert anticipates the next Jan. 6 hearing evidence — and predicts nothing can save Trump



The House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on Congress and the plot to overthrow the 2020 election is set to meet again on Tuesday for a public hearing at 1 p.m. EST.

Speaking about the issues the committee will deal with, CNN legal expert Elie Honig noted that thus far, Americans have seen the way in which former President Donald Trump pressured Mike Pence and "weaponized the Justice Department." On Tuesday, Honig noted that the committee will show, among other things, how Trump pressured Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to magically "find" 11,780 votes so he could win the 2020 election.

"I think what we will see on Tuesday, the most audacious of all those efforts to get state officials to hand him their electoral votes," said Honig. "The Constitution tells us state legislatures do have the right to decide how they'll award their electoral votes, but the problem is they decided that many, many years ago, whoever wins the popular vote in the state gets all the electoral votes and Donald Trump quite aggressively thinks he can pick up the phone, call state officials and get them to flip that and hand him the electoral votes. And to the credit of those state-level officials, many Republicans, they said, no, that would violate the Constitution, violate our oaths. It would violate the law. Ultimately, this scheme really backfired and self-destructed in remarkable fashion."

Host Pamela Brown cited an ABC/Ipsos poll showing that 58 percent of Americans support charges against Trump after seeing just two hearings from the committee. That doesn't necessarily mean that prosecutors will form a decision based on that.

"DOJ and prosecutors are supposed to be separate from politics and from whatever the public thinks, but I do think the poll is interesting," Honig said. "I think it reflects the fact the committee has made a powerful evidentiary showing. The committee has given us new facts and re-established things we knew. Donald Trump tried to steal this election and most importantly, they've shown us inside Donald Trump's mind what prosecutors called intent. I think they've made a really powerful argument that he knew he had lost the election, that he knew there was no evidence of widespread election fraud, that he knew his legal schemes were completely unconstitutional and invalid. I think the committee has shown us a really strong foundation that prosecutors ought to be working off of."

Trump's defense has been that he believed legal experts who told him that the election was fraudulent. While many of his legal experts had advised him that the election couldn't be changed, even John Eastman confessed on Jan. 4, 2021, that the attempt to stop the certification on Jan. 6 wouldn't work. Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell were among the few maintaining that Trump could change the results.

"I think you've hit on what Donald Trump's defense will be. 'I'm entitled to believe who I want to believe,'" suggested Honig. "The comeback from prosecutors here is going to be something called willful blindness. As a prosecutor, you can prove intent in two ways: the person actually knew the truth, or the person was what we call willfully blind. Judges describe it as like an ostrich burying his head in the sand. I think the argument would be Donald Trump knew the truth. He understood what the real truth was, but he chose to shut out those people, the people Bill Stepien called 'Team Normal', and only listened to those who would tell him what he wanted to hear. There is an out route to get around the difficult question of how do you prove what someone knew. It's enough to say, okay, but he shut out certain input and only heard what he wanted to hear."

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

‘This is starting to sink in’: Morning Joe says Jan. 6 findings are starting to ‘resonate’ with Trump’s base

MSNBC's Joe Scarborough was shocked by the results of a new poll showing a majority of Americans -- including one in five Republicans -- think Donald Trump should be prosecuted.

The survey conducted after the first week of public hearings by the House select committee found 58 percent of Americans believe the former president should be charged with a crime for his role in the Jan. 6 insurrection, and the "Morning Joe" host found the results astonishing.

"You look at the number -- only 19 percent of Republicans, let's stop for a second and think about this," Scarborough said. "In this world of small margins that we play by every election, whether it was 2016 or 2020, let's just stop for a second and go, oh, wow. Only 19 percent of Republicans think he should be charged with a crime and go to jail. That's one in five Republicans."

"Now, I must say, I ran four times and won easily four times," he added. "But if one in five of my base thought I should have been charged with a crime and gone to jail, I mean, I would have gone and practiced law a lot earlier. Again, this is starting to resonate, this is starting to sink in. I just -- we love to knock around Washington institutions. I'm not saying you, but all of us, we love to talk about how ineffective people in Congress or committees are. This committee has gotten the truth out to the American people, and even at the beginning of the summer, they're listening. That's shocking to me."

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

‘Avalanche’ of evidence proves Trump was engaged in a ‘multi-faceted criminal conspiracy’: legal expert



Former Department of Justice prosecutors and officials speaking to The Guardian say that the testimony and evidence collected by the committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol riot has increased the odds of former President Donald Trump being prosecuted.

The ex-DOJ lawyers say new revelations make it more likely that Trump will be charged with crimes involving conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding or defrauding the United States. They also speculate Trump will be also be charged with fraud in regards to an alleged fundraising scheme that netted $250 million for an "election defense fund."

Former federal prosecutor Dennis Aftergut told The Guardian that no one "should underestimate the gravity of deciding to criminally charge an ex-president."

“Ultimately, the avalanche of documents and sworn testimony proving a multi-faceted criminal conspiracy to overturn the will of the people means one thing: if no one is above the law, even an ex-president who led that conspiracy must be indicted," he said.

In three hearings, a series of Trump advisers were shown saying they had warned him of the illegality of attempting to overturn Democrat Joe Biden's victory by persuading Mike Pence to block a normally pro forma process.

One committee member, Adam Schiff, told CNN on Sunday that subpoenaing Pence was "certainly a possibility," adding, "We're not excluding anyone or anything at this point."

Pence faced intense pressure from Trump to break with history and refuse on January 6 to formally certify Biden's victory.

But even after Trump supporters violently stormed the building, with some chanting "Hang Mike Pence," he refused to leave the complex and returned to the Senate chamber late at night to carry out the certification

“The January 6 committee’s investigation has developed substantial, compelling evidence that Trump committed crimes, including but not limited to conspiracy to defraud the United States and obstruct official proceedings,” Michael Bromwich, a former inspector general at the DOJ, told the Guardian.

“Bizarrely, Trump’s best defense to the mountain of evidence that proves these crimes seems to be that he was incapable of forming the criminal intent necessary to convict," Bromwich said. "That he was detached from reality, in Barr’s words. But there is strong evidence that he is not crazy – but instead is crazy like a fox."

“How else to explain his attempts to pressure the Georgia secretary of state to ‘find the votes’ necessary to change the result? Or his telling DOJ officials to simply declare the election ‘corrupt’ and leave ‘the rest to me’ and Republican House allies?” Bromwich said.

“All of this shows not someone incapable of forming criminal intent, but someone who understood what the facts were and was determined not to accept them. Because he couldn’t stand to lose. That was far more important to him than honoring our institutions or the constitution," he added.

A new poll shows that most Americans believe the former president should face charges. "This is starting to resonate, this is starting to sink in," said MSNBC commentator Joe Scarborough, noting that the poll showed that 19 percent of Republicans thought Trump should be charged with a crime.

Read more here:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/jun/19/trump-charges-january-6-hearings-capitol-attack

[Rick Plant]

Internal Trump campaign emails show fake electors gambit was a 'concerted strategy': Washington Post

The gambit to send phony pro-Trump electors to back him in the 2020 electoral college was part of a "concerted strategy" that was aimed at giving Vice President Mike Pence cover to block the certification of the results on January 6th, reports the Washington Post.

Internal Trump campaign emails obtained by the Post show that campaign officials pressed Pence to accept the validity of the fake pro-Trump electors, even as lawyers working for the campaign acknowledged "they did not have legal validity and the gatherings had not been in compliance with state laws."

One email highlighted by the Post was written by notorious "coup memo" author John Eastman, who on December 19th, 2020 argued that the plan to send the electors to Congress was "dead on arrival" from a legal perspective because no state legislatures had certified them.

Nonetheless, Eastman said that Pence should accept them as valid in another email written days later, as doing so would create the impression that the results of the election were still in dispute.

"The fact that we have multiple slates of electors demonstrate the uncertainty of either," he wrote. "That should be enough."

The use of fake electors is drawing legal scrutiny in both Georgia and Washington D.C., where Department of Justice lawyers reportedly have empaneled a grand jury to look into the scheme.

The Post notes that the House Select Committee investigating the January 6th Capitol riots will be examining the fake electors scheme during its next hearing on Tuesday, June 21st.

Read More Here:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/20/trump-documents-fake-elector-plan/

[Rick Plant]

Former prosecutor cites clues that could uncover proof of Donald Trump’s seditious conspiracy



Speaking over the weekend, House Select Committee member Rep. Adam Schiff (R-IL) cited "seditious conspiracy" as a charge for former President Donald Trump. Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) made the same comment when the first hearing unfolded and she made a detailed opening statement.

Among the things she promised, she said, that the committee will detail "plots to commit seditious conspiracy on January 6th."

Since then, MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace explained, Cheney has made it clear that she, "has made abundantly clear there's one person on trial and his name is Donald Trump, and in the court of public opinion, Liz Cheney has accused Donald Trump of obstruction an official proceeding ... there are fraud allegations being levied against him in the court of public opinion by this congressional committee."

Former deputy assistant attorney general Harry Litman said that it sounds to him that Kinzinger is alleging that Trump essentially "joined with the people who the department has already charged in the most serious thing and actually acted to try to overthrow the republic."

He went on to say that there are three "solid" charges he thinks that the Justice Department could try Trump with, but that the fourth cited by Kinzinger is possible but requires identifying co-conspirators.

"I think that's one where there's a very big dot for the DOJ to fill in, but on the others, basically, they seem different and convoluted," he said, noting that the way to spot the crime is to, "just look for a lie at the bottom. So, the alternate slates of electors, you just heard the email from [John] Eastman saying 'the fact that there are alternate states of electors.' That's not a fact. In fact, it's a fiction, and when you have that kind of knowing lie that's what's going to anchor one of the charges they think can be proven easily so far. Seditious conspiracy, [that's] the big-ticket item that they haven't shown yet with respect to Congressman Kinzinger. His hearing hasn't happened yet. So, we don't know what the evidence is that he will present."

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

Donald Trump Has 'Zero' Defense in Georgia Investigation: Akerman



Donald Trump has "zero" defense against a criminal investigation into whether him pressuring Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to tilt the election in his favor constitutes as election interference, said former Watergate prosecutor Nick Akerman on Sunday.

The ex-president is facing an investigation in the key swing state's Fulton County about whether or not his phone call with Raffensperger, whom Trump implored to "find" 11,780 votes to tilt the election in his favor, amounts to interfering in the election. The state's investigation is coupled with the House select committee that is investigating the attack on the U.S. Capitol last year, which is seeking to determine the extent of Trump's involvement in inciting the violence.

The committee's now-televised hearings have received much attention, but Akerman said during an appearance on MSNBC's The Katie Phang Show that the investigation in Georgia is more likely to "send Donald Trump to prison" because the tapes could bolster the prosecution's case against him.

"What is significant with those tapes is that when you put it in context of all of the evidence that the January 6 committee has uncovered—you put that together, Donald Trump has zero defense in Georgia," he said. "If I had to put my money on one prosecution that's going to go forward here that will send Donald Trump to jail—it's Georgia. No question about it."

Akerman explained the recorded audio tapes could be difficult for the former president's defense team to defend in court. In fact, he argued Trump's only defense in the case would be "trying to somehow pick up on some ambiguity in the tape that he didn't really mean what he said."

The former president, meanwhile, defended the call with Raffensperger in a post on his social media platform Truth Social on Sunday morning. He has previously declared investigations against him as a "witch hunt," and has insisted on his innocence, while also continuing to repeat the baseless claims that he lost the 2020 presidential election due to widespread voter fraud.

"My phone call to the Georgia Secretary of State, with many other people, including numerous lawyers, knowingly on the line, was absolutely PERFECT and appropriate. YES, it was a PERFECT CALL," he wrote.

As part of the state's investigation, a special grand jury earlier in June began hearing testimony from about 50 witnesses. The jury will provide a report to Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, who will ultimately decide whether or not to indict Trump.

Other legal experts have offered similar perspectives that Trump could face criminal charges in the investigation. Former White House special counsel Norm Eisen said on CNN last Sunday that Trump "likely" committed crimes, and that the evidence "is particularly strong" against him.

https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-has-zero-defense-georgia-investigation-akerman-1717186