Fake Elector Update

Our 2020 book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good.

Rashad Rose at CNN:

Arizona state Sen. Jake Hoffman, one of the so-called fake electors charged in the Arizona 2020 election subversion case, announced Saturday that he’s been elected as a Republican National Committee national committeeman for the state.

“I’m humbled and honored to have been elected as the next RNC National Committeeman for Arizona!,” Hoffman said in a post on X Saturday.

His selection comes just days after a grand jury in Arizona handed up an indictment against former President Donald Trump’s allies, including Hoffman, over their efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss.

CNN previously reported that Hoffman sent a two-page letter to former Vice President Mike Pence on January 5, 2021, asking him to order that Arizona’s electors not be decided by the popular vote of the citizens, but instead by the members of the state legislature.

...

Boris Epshteyn, a former White House aide who remains one of Trump’s closest advisers; former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows; and Rudy Giuliani are also among those who have been indicted, according to a source familiar with the investigation.

While Trump is not among those charged in Arizona, the details in the indictment suggest he is “Unindicted Coconspirator 1.”

Yvonne Wingett Sanchez at WP:

Also charged are the Republicans who signed paperwork on Dec. 14, 2020, that falsely purported Trump was the rightful winner, including former state party chair Kelli Ward, two state senators and Tyler Bowyer, a GOP national committeeman and chief operating officer of Turning Point Action, the campaign arm of the pro-Trump conservative group Turning Point USA.

 

Rudy and the Pardons

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good.

Zoë Richards at NBC:

A woman who said she worked for Rudy Giuliani during the last two years of the Trump administration alleged in a wide-ranging lawsuit that Giuliani, the former president’s personal attorney, discussed selling presidential pardons and detailed plans to overturn the 2020 election results.

In a 70-page complaint filed in state court in New York on Monday, Noelle Dunphy said that after Giuliani hired her in January 2019 he sexually assaulted and harassed her, refused to pay her wages and often made "sexist, racist, and antisemitic remarks," adding that she had recordings of numerous interactions with him.

Dunphy, who is seeking $10 million in compensatory and punitive damages, said Giuliani had hired her for $1 million a year in addition to expenses and pro bono legal representation for a domestic abuse case against a former partner. But after she was hired, Dunphy alleged, Giuliani kept her employment “secret” and paid her only about $12,000 and reimbursed some of her business expenses, owing her $1,988,000 in unpaid wages. She said she was fired in January 2021.

Giuliani denied the allegations through a spokesperson.

The March on the Capitol Was Not Spontaneous

Our book, Divided We Stand, looks at the 2020 election and the January 6 insurrection.  Some Republican leaders -- and a measurable number of rank-and-file voters -- are open to violent rebellion, coups, and secession. 

Luke Broadwater and Alan Feuer at NYT:

President Donald J. Trump attempted to make the Jan. 6, 2021, march on the Capitol appear spontaneous even as he and his team intentionally assembled and galvanized a violence-prone mob to disrupt certification of his electoral defeat, the House committee investigating the attack showed on Tuesday.

“POTUS is going to have us march there/the Capitol,” Kylie Jane Kremer, an organizer of the “Save America” rally on Jan. 6, wrote in a Jan. 4 text shown by the panel on Tuesday as it detailed Mr. Trump’s efforts to gather his backers in Washington for a final, last-ditch effort to overturn his loss. Ms. Kremer added that Mr. Trump was “going to just call for it ‘unexpectedly.’”

Mr. Trump weighed announcing the move, according to documents obtained from the National Archives, which provided the investigators with a draft tweet that said: “I will be making a Big Speech at 10AM on January 6th at the Ellipse (South of the White House). Please arrive early, massive crowds expected. March to the Capitol after. Stop the Steal!!”

The tweet was never sent. But it was the latest evidence presented by the committee of how Mr. Trump undertook a public and private effort to channel angry supporters, including right-wing extremists, toward the Capitol, where Vice President Mike Pence and lawmakers were gathered to confirm Joseph R. Biden Jr. as the president-elect.

Lloyd Green at The Guardian:

By the time the closing gavel fell on Tuesday’s hearing, the American public had received another hours-long refresher on the 45th president’s disdain for the will of the electorate, and his appetite for chaos and self-aggrandizement.

On Friday night, 18 December 2020, he allowed the lunatics into the asylum. Sidney Powell, Mike Flynn and Patrick Byrne, the former lover of Maria Butina, the Russian spy, were all there in one place – that place being the Oval Office.

Some context: in mid-December, Flynn was a rock star. Just a week earlier, he had received a presidential pardon. Byrne is the former CEO of Overstock and a huge fan of cryptocurrency. He also doubted Rudy Giuliani’s legal chops.

“I had watched two months slide by Mayor Giuliani and his team displaying no organization or progress,” Byrne blogged. “Watching them trying to get anything done was like watching half-a-dozen monkeys trying to fuck a football.”

Fortunately, Pat Cipollone, the White House counsel, and Eric Herschmann, another Trump lawyer, pushed back against the motley crew. They made clear there was no basis to claim that fraud affected the election’s outcome.

Likewise, the duo said “no” to appointing Powell as a special election counsel and opposed the federal government seizing voting machines located in electoral battlegrounds. Some things really were beyond the pale.

Fake, Fake, Fake

Our new book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good. Trump and his minions falsely claimed that he won the election, and have kept repeating the Big Lie.

Justin Baragona at The Daily Beast

Well, it looks like the “con is winding down.”

Trump-boosting pillow salesman Mike Lindell had offered $5 million to anyone who showed up to his three-day “cyber symposium” and could disprove his claims that China hacked the 2020 presidential election via voting machines.

That offer is no longer on the table as of Wednesday evening, according to Josh Merritt, the MyPillow CEO’s lead cyber expert.

In an interview with The Washington Times on Wednesday, Merritt acknowledged that the data Lindell had long promised to reveal at this week’s symposium in South Dakota was bogus.

Devlin Barrett at WP:

During the February 2018 interview to try to determine if FBI agents had leaked him sensitive information, Giuliani’s then-law partner and counselor, Marc Mukasey, opined that the standards for truth-telling are different in electoral politics than in legal matters.

“In the heat of a political campaign, on television, I’m not saying Rudy necessarily, but everybody embellishes everything,” Mukasey said.

“Oh, you could throw a fake,” added Giuliani — who in addition to serving as mayor of New York from 1994 to 2001 also spent eight years as a federal prosecutor in the city.

“You’re under no obligation to tell the truth,” Mukasey replies, according to the transcript. To which Giuliani repeats, “You could throw a fake.”

 An agent then said, “Fake news, right?”

Mukasey replied, “Right.”

Mukasey declined to comment Wednesday. A lawyer for Giuliani did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Messing with Arizona

 Divided We Stand, our new book, explains that Trump's challenges to the election of Joseph Biden have toggled between appalling and farcical. 

Kerry Elveld at Daily Kos:

All credit to AZCentral reporter Yvonne Wingett Sanchez for this juicy Friday scoop about Donald Trump's desperate bid to change the Maricopa County election results that included an attempt to speak directly with the chair of the county’s board of supervisors shortly after pressuring Georgia's secretary of state to “find” votes.

But let's start by noting that winning Maricopa County was the linchpin of Joe Biden's narrow victory in Arizona.

On Nov. 13, just after a ballot update from Maricopa secured the county for Biden, Trump expressed interest in speaking directly with the county's board chair, Clint Hickman. Trump loyalist and state GOP party chair Kelli Ward told Hickman, "POTUS will probably be calling you."

Hickman, indicating that he wasn't particularly amenable to that communication, told Ward he couldn't speak to Trump about ongoing litigation in the county. That call ultimately wouldn’t come until weeks later.

When it did come on New Year's Eve, Hickman ignored it because he was out with his wife and didn't recognize the Washington, D.C., area code. When he later checked his voicemail, it turned out to be the White House switchboard asking him to return a call so he could speak with Trump. Hickman ignored the request and eventually deleted the voicemail.

Several days after receiving that message, the recording surfaced of Trump badgering Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to "find 11,780 votes" votes to overturn his loss in the Peach State. After listening to the recording on Jan. 3, Hickman effectively decided to ghost the president of the United States.

“I was horrified,” Hickman said.

That same night, at 9:22 p.m. — approaching midnight in Washington — his phone buzzed again. It was the same area code again. He let it go to voicemail again.

“Hello, sir. This is the White House operator I was calling to let you know that the president's available to take your call if you're free,” the voicemail said. “If you could please give us a call back, sir, that’d be great. You have a good evening.”

Hickman said he presumed Trump would try to pressure him to change the election results or outline election conspiracies, just as he had done to Georgia officials, so he never returned that call, either.

 

here's the leaked voicemail from Trump allies asking Maricopa County supervisors to stop counting ballotspic.twitter.com/ZlfMWtb2XN

— Keith Edwards (@keithedwards) July 2, 2021

Documents on the Big Lie

Our forthcoming book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good. Trump and his minions falsely claimed that he won the election, and have kept repeating the Big Lie.

Supreme Court of the State of New York Appellate Division, First Judicial Department has suspended Giuliani's law license:

For the reasons that follow, we conclude that there is uncontroverted evidence that respondent communicated demonstrably false and misleading statements to courts, lawmakers and the public at large in his capacity as lawyer for former President Donald J. Trump and the Trump campaign in connection with Trump’s failed effort at reelection in 2020. These false statements were made to improperly bolster respondent’s narrative that due to widespread voter fraud, victory in the 2020 United States presidential election was stolen from his client. We conclude that respondent’s conduct immediately threatens the public interest and warrants interim suspension from the practice of law, pending further proceedings before the Attorney Grievance Committee (sometimes AGC or Committee).

Reid J. Epstein at NYT:

A committee led by Michigan Republicans on Wednesday published an extraordinary debunking of voter fraud claims in the state, delivering a comprehensive rebuke to a litany of accusations about improprieties in the 2020 election and its aftermath.

The 55-page report, produced by a Michigan State Senate committee of three Republicans and one Democrat, is a systematic rebuttal to an array of false claims about the election from supporters of former President Donald J. Trump. The authors focus overwhelmingly on Michigan, but they also expose lies perpetuated about the vote-counting process in Georgia.

The report is unsparing in its criticism of those who have promoted false theories about the election. It debunks claims from Trump allies including Mike Lindell, the chief executive of MyPillow; Rudolph W. Giuliani, the former president’s lawyer; and Mr. Trump himself.

 

Audio: Giuliani Pressured Ukraine

Our new book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses foreign influence and Trump's attack on democracy.

Matthew Chance and Marshall Cohen at CNN:

Never-before-heard audio, obtained exclusively by CNN, shows how former President Donald Trump's longtime adviser Rudy Giuliani relentlessly pressured and coaxed the Ukrainian government in 2019 to investigate baseless conspiracies about then-candidate Joe Biden.

The audio is of a July 2019 phone call between Giuliani, US diplomat Kurt Volker, and Andriy Yermak, a senior adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. The call was a precursor to Trump's infamous call with Zelensky, and both conversations later became a central part of Trump's first impeachment, where he was accused of soliciting Ukrainian help for his campaign.

 During the roughly 40-minute call, Giuliani repeatedly told Yermak that Zelensky should publicly announce investigations into possible corruption by Biden in Ukraine, and into claims that Ukraine meddled in the 2016 election to hurt Trump. (These separate claims are both untrue.) 

Be Afraid, Rudy, Be Very Afraid

Our new book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses foreign influence and Trump's attack on democracy.

 Gabby Orr at CNN:

A Wednesday raid by federal agents of an apartment and office belonging to former New York City mayor and one-time Donald Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani has left allies of the former President feeling uneasy about what could come next, according to sources close to Trump.

"This was a show of force that sent a strong message to a lot of people in Trump's world that other things may be coming down the pipeline," one Trump adviser told CNN.

The searches, which Giuliani and his attorney Robert Costello have criticized as unnecessary due to what they claim is his ongoing cooperation with investigators, were linked to a criminal probe of the former mayor's business dealings in Ukraine and resulted in the seizure of several communications devices.

...

"Even the most loyal people have their breaking point," said a person close to the former President. The Trump adviser separately added that a potential shift in Giuliani's fealty to his former client "wouldn't shock me at all."

"I think we've seen some more surprising instances of things like that happening, especially with Michael Cohen," the person close to Trump said.

Indeed, longtime Trump fixer Michael Cohen, who once said he would be willing to "take a bullet" for his former boss, became a self-avowed Trump critic in 2018 after he flipped on the then-President following an FBI raid of his own home, office and hotel room. The raid was part of a probe led by the US Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York, which later resulted in charges of tax fraud, false statements to a bank and campaign finance violations that Cohen pleaded guilty to.

During an appearance on CNN earlier this week, Cohen himself speculated that Giuliani could "give up Donald in a heartbeat" if faced with an indictment.

"Prior to Donald becoming president, Rudy didn't like Donald and Donald didn't like Rudy," Cohen claimed. "He certainly doesn't want to follow my path down into a 36-month sentence."

Former prosecutor Renato Mariotti at Politico:

There can be no question that the execution of a search warrant at Giuliani’s residence is a serious step that indicates the criminal investigation against him is far along. Federal prosecutors can’t obtain a search warrant based on a hunch or mere suspicion. They had to present substantial evidence to a federal judge that there is good reason to believe that a federal crime was committed and that evidence of that federal crime was located in Giuliani’s apartment and his electronic devices. It’s significant a judge was persuaded they met that standard.

For that reason, prosecutors likely have a lot of the evidence they need already. During my time as a federal prosecutor, when I sought a search warrant for a subject’s electronic devices, typically I had already obtained some of the subject’s communications or electronic documents from other sources such as cooperators, subpoenas or prior search warrants. I used that evidence to persuade a judge that those communications would also be found on the devices. Even though prosecutors have some communications prior to obtaining electronic devices, the devices can contain more data, including deleted messages, metadata and location information.

In this particular case, one can trust the the evidence was solid and substantial given the significant internal scrutiny that this case would receive within the Justice Department. The criminal investigation of any lawyer is a sensitive matter due to the complexities caused by attorney-client privilege, and the DOJ takes special care when investigating a criminal defense attorney, to ensure that the department does not appear to be targeting opponents. Obviously, obtaining a search warrant for the residence and devices of the personal lawyer of the former president would receive even more scrutiny from senior department leadership.

 

Russia Helped Trump in 2020

Our new book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses foreign influence and Trump's attack on democracy.

llen Nakashima at WP:

Russian President Vladimir Putin and other senior officials in Moscow sought to influence the 2020 election by spreading misleading information about Joe Biden through prominent individuals, some of whom were close to former president Donald Trump, the U.S. intelligence community said in a report Tuesday.

The report does not identify those individuals by name, but it appears to reference Trump’s onetime personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani, whose repeated meetings with a suspected Russian agent came under scrutiny by U.S. officials.

 ...

 Indeed, Russia undertook a range of activities to influence the outcome, and to a far greater degree than any other country. And it was Putin and the Russian state, the document said, who authorized operations aimed at undercutting Biden’s campaign for president.

A key element of the strategy, according to the report, was to use Ukrainians linked to Russian intelligence to “launder” unsubstantiated allegations against Biden through U.S. media, lawmakers and prominent individuals, an apparent reference to Giuliani.

The intelligence community, for instance, assessed that Putin “had purview over” the activities of Ukrainian lawmaker Andriy Derkach, who played a prominent role in advancing the misleading narrative alleging corruption between Biden and Ukraine. Giuliani met with Derkach, whom the United States has sanctioned as an “active” Russian agent, in Ukraine and in the United States in 2019 and 2020 as Giuliani sought to release material that he thought would damage Biden. Last year, Derkach disclosed edited audio snippets of conversations Biden had as vice president with Ukrainian officials in an attempt to cast aspersions on him.

Text of the report here.

Pardons

In Defying the Odds, we discuss Trump's dishonesty and his record of disregarding the rule of law.  

He has abused the pardon power.

Lloyd Green at The Guardian:

With hours to spare before Christmas, Donald Trump has delivered pardons to Paul Manafort, Roger Stone, Charlie Kushner, a passel of war criminals and a bent congressman or two. There is no reason to believe our “law and order” president’s pardon binge is over. Too many people in his immediate orbit remain exposed to future prosecution, including the president himself.

Come noon on 20 January 2021, Trump and his inner circle will be private citizens again. Devoid of legal immunity, stripped of the air of invincibility, they become fair game for federal and local law enforcement alike. The potential for prison hovers over them like the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come.

Cyrus Vance, Manhattan’s district attorney, is circling Trump and his business. Eric Trump has testified at a court-ordered deposition conducted by New York’s attorney general. As for federal prosecutors in the southern district of New York, they labeled Trump an unindicted co-conspirator in the case of Michael Cohen. The statute of limitations has not expired.

And then there is Rudy Giuliani, the president’s personal lawyer. According to reports, he remains on the radar of federal law enforcement in connection with possible election law violations, and doesn’t like it one bit. On Wednesday Giuliani lashed out, calling investigators “secret police” and accusing them of toadying to Joe Biden, the president-elect.

Postgame

In Defying the Odds, we discuss the 2016 campaign, where Trump openly encouraged violence. .  His legal challenges to the election of Joseph Biden have toggled between appalling and farcical.    But his base continues to believe the bogus narrative.

Felicia Sonmez, Josh Dawsey, Dan Lamothe and Matt Zapotosky at WP:

President Trump has intensified efforts to overturn the election, raising a series of radical measures in recent days, including military intervention, seizing voting machines and a 13th-hour appeal to the Supreme Court.

On Sunday, Trump said in a radio interview that he had spoken with Sen.-elect Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) about challenging the electoral vote count when the House and Senate convene on Jan. 6 to formally affirm President-elect Joe Biden’s victory...Trump’s conversation with Tuberville is part of a much broader effort by the defeated president to invalidate the election. He is increasingly reaching out to allies like Giuliani and White House trade adviser Peter Navarro for ideas and searching his Twitter feed for information to promote, according to Trump advisers, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.

Sources who have gotten used to Trump’s eruptions over four years sound scared by what’s transpired in the past week when I’ve talked to them. https://t.co/oICndCsXIw

— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) December 19, 2020

Anita Kumar and Gaby Orr at Politico:

In total, the president talked to at least 31 Republicans, encompassing mostly local and state officials from four critical battleground states he lost — Michigan, Arizona, Georgia and Pennsylvania. The contacts included at least 12 personal phone calls to 11 individuals, and at least four White House meetings with 20 Republican state lawmakers, party leaders and attorneys general, all people he hoped to win over to his side. Trump also spoke by phone about his efforts with numerous House Republicans and at least three current or incoming Senate Republicans.

And it all occurred in parallel to his campaign’s quixotic efforts to launch recounts and file lawsuits demanding ballots be tossed.

Trump’s efforts to cling to power are unprecedented in American history. While political parties have fought over the results of presidential elections before, no incumbent president has ever made such expansive and individualized pleas to the officials who oversee certification of the election results. Trump even used his presidential perch to compel officials to talk with him, summoning state officials to the White House on a few-hours notice and insisting that his outreach was simply part of his presidential duties.

 

A great summary of the judicial response to Trump's election complaints. I've excerpted the parts focusing on Repub judges. Show this to those whining "but court losses were only on technicalities, no judge had the courage to look at merits!" Nonsense:https://t.co/GeZn7vOFfN pic.twitter.com/A6dHnhlcVa

— Bo Gardiner 🌎 (@Bo_Gardiner) December 13, 2020

Former national security adviser Michael Flynn was also at the White House meeting, where Trump reportedly asked him about invoking martial law. https://t.co/TsQnX7jlbf

— USA TODAY Politics (@usatodayDC) December 20, 2020

Arizona GOP chair’s hashtag calls for Trump to “cross the Rubicon.”

Julius Caesar’s decision to defy the Roman Senate and cross the Rubicon with his armies precipitated the Roman Civil War and ultimately the transition from a republic to an empire. pic.twitter.com/gZHcxoSuFQ

— Michael Squires (@mgsquires) December 20, 2020

Legal Challenges

In Defying the Odds, we discuss Trump's dishonesty and his record of disregarding the rule of law.  His legal challenges to the election of Joseph Biden have toggled between appalling and farcical.  

 Glen Johnson at Axios:

President Trump's frantic post-election challenges are having the opposite effect of what he intended: He's documenting his demise through a series of court fights and recounts showing Joe Biden's victory to be all the more obvious and unassailable.

Why it matters: The president’s push to overturn the election results is dispelling the cloud of corruption he alleged by forcing states to create a verified — and legally binding — accounting of his election loss.

• "Each loss further cements Biden's win," says election law expert Richard Hasen.
• "History shows that any leader who constructs a major myth, that is later shown to be false, will eventually fall," says Harvard science historian and "Merchants of Doubt" author Naomi Oreskes. "The risk is that he takes his country down with him."

That point is true for people who follow the details.  The general public is a different story.

Melanie Mason at LAT:

President Trump’s repeated — and baseless — insistence that widespread fraud undermined this month’s presidential election has left a mark on Americans’ faith in the voting process, a postelection USC Dornsife survey has found.

Using a 0-100 scale to measure their confidence that all ballots were tallied correctly, the average ranking from voters was a middling 58. Democrats gave higher marks — 79 — that the vote count was accurate, while Republicans on the whole rated their confidence in the election results’ accuracy at just 34.

“What’s really very clear is that the large group of voters who voted for Donald Trump in this election have absorbed the message that the vote may not have been completely, fairly counted,” said Jill Darling, the director of the USC Dornsife survey. Democrats, she said, may have lost confidence because of concerns about voter suppression or problems with the U.S. Postal Service.

Rudy Giuliani's Hair Dye Running Down Face at Sweaty News Conference https://t.co/4PMV8k1Rdb

— TMZ (@TMZ) November 20, 2020

Attacking the Outcome: Legal Failure, Political Success

In Defying the Odds, we discuss Trump's dishonesty and his record of disregarding the rule of law.  His legal challenges to the election of Joseph Biden have toggled between appalling and farcical. 

As a legal project, President Trump’s various (false) claims that the election he lost was rigged have been an absolute train wreck. As a political project, they’ve been remarkably effective.

Read this -> https://t.co/BggYtY6LD8

— Brad Heath (@bradheath) November 18, 2020

As Trump's election lawsuits continue to hit dead ends, his campaign and legal teams have descended into chaos behind the scenes.

In particular, Rudy Giuliani's ascent has led to an explosion of infighting and disillusionment.https://t.co/EB4pqfTp5g

— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) November 18, 2020

Update from U.S. district court in Williamsport, Pa., one of the Trump campaign's last stands:

GIULIANI: “I’m not sure what 'opacity' means. It probably means you can see.”

JUDGE BRANN: “It means you can’t.”

— Dan Zak (@MrDanZak) November 17, 2020

Impeachment Apocalypse Redux

In Defying the Odds, we discuss Trump's dishonesty and his record of disregarding the rule of law. The 2019 update includes a chapter on the 2018 midterms.

"In my capacity as counsel to the @realDonaldTrump and with his full knowledge and consent..." @RudyGiuliani picks up the nail and Parnas hammers it in ... #CountryOverParty #DoTheRightThing @gtconway3d https://t.co/ZM4Q7eKDoy

— Jennifer Horn (@NHJennifer) January 14, 2020

Among the evidence just produced by the House Intelligence Committee - a note from Parnas saying "get Zalensky to Annonce that the Biden case will be investigated" pic.twitter.com/nswPgc1kmF

— Nicholas Wu (@nicholaswu12) January 14, 2020

The messages, written in Russian, show Yuri Lutsenko urging Parnas to force out Yovanovitch in exchange for cooperation regarding Biden. At one point, Lutsenko suggests he won’t make any helpful public statements unless “madam” is removed.https://t.co/QdmsRSvfrM

— Julia Davis (@JuliaDavisNews) January 15, 2020

Speaker Nancy Pelosi today named Impeachment Managers.

Chair Adam Schiff of California, Lead Manager: Congressman Adam Schiff, Chair of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, is serving his 10th term in Congress. Before Congress, Mr. Schiff was a California State Senator and served as federal prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles for 6 years, most notably prosecuting the first FBI agent ever to be indicted for espionage.
Chair Jerry Nadler of New York: Congressman Jerry Nadler, Chair of the House Judiciary Committee, is serving his 15th term in Congress. Mr. Nadler has served as the top Democrat on the Judiciary Subcommittee on Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties for 13 years. Before Congress, Mr. Nadler served in the New York State Assembly for 16 years.
Chair Zoe Lofgren of California: Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren, Chair of the Committee on House Administration, which has jurisdiction over federal elections, is a senior Member of the House Judiciary Committee. Ms. Lofgren is serving her 13th term in Congress. The Congresswoman has played a role in three presidential impeachment proceedings: as a staffer for a Judiciary Committee Member during Nixon, as a Judiciary Committee Member during Clinton, and now as a Manager.
Chair Hakeem Jeffries of New York: Congressman Hakeem Jeffries is the Chair of the House Democratic Caucus and is currently serving his 4th term in Congress. Mr. Jeffries is a Member of the House Judiciary Committee. Before Congress, Mr. Jeffries served in the New York State Assembly for 6 years. An accomplished litigator in private practice before running for elected office, Mr. Jeffries clerked for the Honorable Harold Baer Jr. of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.
Congresswoman Val Demings of Florida: Congresswoman Val Demings is a Member of both the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the House Judiciary Committee. Ms. Demings is serving her 2nd term in Congress. Before Congress, Ms. Demings served in the Orlando Police Department for 27 years, including serving successfully as Orlando’s first female Chief of Police.
Congressman Jason Crow of Colorado: Congressman Jason Crow is Member of the House Armed Services Committee. Mr. Crow served his country bravely as an Army Ranger in Iraq and Afghanistan. Before running for elected office, Mr. Crow was a respected litigator in private practice in Colorado.
Congresswoman Sylvia Garcia of Texas: Congresswoman Sylvia Garcia is a Member of the House Judiciary Committee. Before Congress, Ms. Garcia served in the Texas State Senate. Previously, Ms. Garcia was the Director and Presiding Judge of the Houston Municipal System and was elected City Controller. Ms. Garcia was later elected the first Hispanic and first woman to be elected in her own right to the Harris County Commissioner’s Court.

Rudolph, the....

In Defying the Odds, we discuss the people surrounding Trump. (The update -- published in 2019 --includes a chapter on the 2018 midterms.)

The choice of servants is of no little importance to a prince, and they are good or not according to the discrimination of the prince. And the first opinion which one forms of a prince, and of his understanding, is by observing the men he has around him; and when they are capable and faithful he may always be considered wise, because he has known how to recognize the capable and to keep them faithful. But when they are otherwise one cannot form a good opinion of him, for the prime error which he made was in choosing them.

-- Machiavelli

One of the people around Trump is free television lawyer Rudy Giuliani.

Olivia Nuzzi at New York:

Over a sweater, he wore a navy-blue suit, the fly of the pants unzipped. He accessorized with an American-flag lapel pin, American-flag woven wallet, a diamond-encrusted pinky ring, and a diamond-encrusted Yankees World Series ring (about which an innocent question resulted in a 15-minute rant about “fucking Wayne Barrett,” a journalist who manages to enrage Giuliani even in death).

…

As we sped uptown, he spoke in monologue about the scandal he co-created, weaving one made-up talking point into another and another. He said former ambassador Marie Yovanovitch, whom he calls Santa Maria Yovanovitch, is “controlled” by George Soros. “He put all four ambassadors there. And he’s employing the FBI agents.” I told him he sounded crazy, but he insisted he wasn’t.

“Don’t tell me I’m anti-Semitic if I oppose him,” he said. “Soros is hardly a Jew. I’m more of a Jew than Soros is. I probably know more about — he doesn’t go to church, he doesn’t go to religion — synagogue. He doesn’t belong to a synagogue, he doesn’t support Israel, he’s an enemy of Israel. He’s elected eight anarchist DA’s in the United States. He’s a horrible human being.”

In the grand tradition of Soros conspiracy theorists, Giuliani believes the media is doing the billionaire’s bidding by printing lies about him, yet he often bungles his own attempts to discredit the media’s reporting. While attempting to argue that, despite what has been written, “I have no business interests in Ukraine,” he told me about his business interests in Ukraine.

“I’ve done two business deals in Ukraine. I’ve sought four or five others,” he said. Since he’s been representing the president, he said, he has been approached with two opportunities in Ukraine, both of which he turned down to avoid accusations of impropriety.

In 1997, when Ruth Messinger was running against him for mayor, Giuliani publicly upbraided her for not attending Mass on Columbus Day morning. She reminded him that she's Jewish.
He was, is and no doubt always will be a bullying jerk. https://t.co/6T5PIbq1wE

— Clyde Haberman (@ClydeHaberman) December 23, 2019

Giuliani, Trump, and Yovanovitch

In Defying the Odds, we discuss Trump's character and record of dishonesty. The update -- recently published --includes a chapter on the 2018 midterms.  Impeachment is becoming likely this week.

Marine One Shout Session, November 4, 2019:

Q    Was Marie Yovanovitch the target of a smear campaign by your allies?  She testified she was.
THE PRESIDENT:  I really don’t know her.  But if you look at the transcripts, the President of Ukraine was not a fan of hers either.  I mean, he did not exactly say glowing things.  I’m sure she’s a very fine woman.  I just don’t know much about her.

Giuliani has contradicted that denial.  Kenneth Vogel at NYT:

Rudolph W. Giuliani said on Monday that he provided President Trump with detailed information this year about how the United States ambassador to Ukraine was, in Mr. Giuliani’s view, impeding investigations that could benefit Mr. Trump, setting in motion the ambassador’s recall from her post.

In an interview, Mr. Giuliani, the president’s personal lawyer, described how he passed along to Mr. Trump “a couple of times” accounts about how the ambassador, Marie L. Yovanovitch, had frustrated efforts that could be politically helpful to Mr. Trump. They included investigations involving former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Ukrainians who disseminated documents that damaged Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign.

The Report: "President Trump Betrayed His Office"

In Defying the Odds, we discuss Trump's character and record of dishonesty. The update -- recently published --includes a chapter on the 2018 midterms.  Impeachment is becoming likely this week.

The House Judiciary Committee has issued its report to accompany articles of impeachment:

The Constitution grants the “sole Power of Impeachment” to the House of Representatives. Within our system of checks and balances, the President may not decide what constitutes a valid impeachment inquiry. Nor may he ignore lawful subpoenas for evidence and testimony or direct others to do so. If a President had such authority, he could block Congress from learning facts bearing upon impeachment in the House or trial in the Senate and could thus control a power that exists to restrain his own abuses. The evidence shows clearly that President Trump has assumed this power for himself
and, left unchecked, the President will continue to obstruct Congress through unlawful means.

Although the 2020 election is less than a year away, Congress cannot wait for the next election to address the President’s misconduct. President Trump has fallen into a pattern of behavior: this is not the first time he has solicited foreign interference in an election, been exposed, and attempted to obstruct the resulting investigation. He will almost certainly continue on this course. Indeed, in the same week that the Committee considered these articles of impeachment, the President’s private attorney was back
in Ukraine to promote the same sham investigations into the President’s political rivals and, upon returning to the United States, rapidly made his way to the White House. We cannot rely on the next election as a remedy for presidential misconduct when the President is seeking to threaten the very integrity of that election. We must act immediately.

The Committee now transmits these articles of impeachment to the full House. By his actions, President Trump betrayed his office. His high crimes and misdemeanors undermine the Constitution. His conduct continues to jeopardize our national security and the integrity of our elections, presenting great urgency for the House to act. His actions warrant his impeachment and trial, his removal from office, and his disqualification to hold and enjoy any office of honor, trust, or profit under the United
States.

Impeachment: Key Findings of Fact

In Defying the Odds, we discuss Trump's character and record of bigotry. The update -- recently published --includes a chapter on the 2018 midterms. This past summer, he told several Democratic congresswomen to "go back" to their countries. Impeachment is becoming likely.

From the House Intelligence Committee:

Based on witness testimony and evidence collected during the impeachment inquiry, the Intelligence Committee has found that:

I. Donald J. Trump, the 45th President of the United States—acting personally and through his agents within and outside of the U.S. government—solicited the interference of a foreign government, Ukraine, in the 2020 U.S. presidential election. The President engaged in this course of conduct for the benefit of his reelection, to harm the election prospects of a political opponent, and to influence our nation’s upcoming presidential election to his advantage. In so doing, the President placed his personal political interests above the national interests of the United States, sought to undermine the integrity of the U.S. presidential election process, and endangered U.S. national security.

II. In furtherance of this scheme, President Trump—directly and acting through his agents within and outside the U.S. government—sought to pressure and induce Ukraine’s newly-elected president, Volodymyr Zelensky, to publicly announce unfounded investigations that would benefit President Trump’s personal political interests and reelection effort. To advance his personal political objectives, President Trump encouraged the President of Ukraine to work with his personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani.

III. As part of this scheme, President Trump, acting in his official capacity and using his position of public trust, personally and directly requested from the President of Ukraine that the government of Ukraine publicly announce investigations into (1) the President’s political opponent, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. and his son, Hunter Biden, and (2) a baseless theory promoted by Russia alleging that Ukraine—rather than Russia—interfered in the 2016 U.S. election. These investigations were intended to harm a potential political opponent of President Trump and benefit the President’s domestic political standing.

IV. President Trump ordered the suspension of $391 million in vital military assistance urgently needed by Ukraine, a strategic partner, to resist Russian aggression. Because the aid was appropriated by Congress, on a bipartisan basis, and signed into law by the President, its expenditure was required by law. Acting directly and through his subordinates within the U.S. government, the President withheld from Ukraine this military assistance without any legitimate foreign policy, national security, or anti-corruption justification. The President did so despite the longstanding bipartisan support of Congress, uniform support across federal departments and agencies for the provision to Ukraine of the military assistance, and his obligations under the Impoundment Control Act.

V. President Trump used the power of the Office of the President and exercised his authority over the Executive Branch, including his control of the instruments of the federal government, to apply increasing pressure on the President of Ukraine and the Ukrainian government to announce the politically-motivated investigations desired by President Trump. Specifically, to advance and promote his scheme, the President withheld official acts of value to Ukraine and conditioned their fulfillment on actions by Ukraine that would benefit his personal political interests:

A. President Trump—acting through agents within and outside the U.S. government—conditioned a head of state meeting at the White House, which the President of Ukraine desperately sought to demonstrate continued United States support for Ukraine in the face of Russian aggression, on Ukraine publicly announcing the investigations that President Trump believed would aid his reelection campaign.

B. To increase leverage over the President of Ukraine, President Trump, acting through his agents and subordinates, conditioned release of the vital military assistance he had suspended to Ukraine on the President of Ukraine’s public announcement of the investigations that President Trump sought.

C. President Trump’s closest subordinates and advisors within the Executive Branch, including Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Secretary of Energy J. Richard Perry, and other senior White House and Executive Branch officials had knowledge of, in some cases facilitated and furthered the President’s scheme, and withheld information about the scheme from the Congress and the American public.

VI. In directing and orchestrating this scheme to advance his personal political interests, President Trump did not implement, promote, or advance U.S. anti-corruption policies. In fact, the President sought to pressure and induce the government of Ukraine to announce politically-motivated investigations lacking legitimate predication that the U.S. government otherwise discourages and opposes as a matter of policy in that country and around the world. In so doing, the President undermined U.S. policy supporting anti-corruption reform and the rule of law in Ukraine, and undermined U.S. national security.

VII. By withholding vital military assistance and diplomatic support from a strategic foreign partner government engaged in an ongoing military conflict illegally instigated by Russia, President Trump compromised national security to advance his personal political interests.

VIII. Faced with the revelation of his actions, President Trump publicly and repeatedly persisted in urging foreign governments, including Ukraine and China, to investigate his political opponent. This continued solicitation of foreign interference in a U.S. election presents a clear and present danger that the President will continue to use the power of his office for his personal political gain.

IX. Using the power of the Office of the President, and exercising his authority over the Executive Branch, President Trump ordered and implemented a campaign to conceal his conduct from the public and frustrate and obstruct the House of Representatives’ impeachment inquiry by:

A. refusing to produce to the impeachment inquiry’s investigating Committees information and records in the possession of the White House, in defiance of a lawful subpoena;

B. directing Executive Branch agencies to defy lawful subpoenas and withhold the production of all documents and records from the investigating Committees;

C. directing current and former Executive Branch officials not to cooperate with the Committees, including in defiance of lawful subpoenas for testimony; and

D. intimidating, threatening, and tampering with prospective and actual witnesses in the impeachment inquiry in an effort to prevent, delay, or influence the testimony of those witnesses.

In so doing, and despite the fact that the Constitution vests in the House of Representatives the “sole Power of Impeachment,” the President sought to arrogate to himself the right to determine the propriety, scope, and nature of an impeachment inquiry into his own misconduct, and the right to deny any and all information to the Congress in the conduct of its constitutional responsibilities.