Facts About Trump And Jan. 6 Will Never Change, Despite His Supporters’ Best Efforts
Pam Bondi, trump’s nominee for attorney general, evidently did not read Special Counsel Jack Smith’s final report on trump’s foiled attempts to steal the 2020 election.
If Bondi had read the 137-page report she would have concluded beyond a doubt that Biden won and trump lost in 2020 and that trump tried valiantly to seize power illegally. The whole world has the report, including voluminous evidence from more than 250 people who were interviewed and grand jury testimony from more than 55 witnesses.
In the report, Smith said that he was confident that his team of prosecutors and investigators had enough evidence to convict Trump had the case been allowed to go to trial. The only reason there will be no trial is that after trump won the 2024 election, Smith moved to dismiss the charges of federal election interference because of the Justice Department’s policy against prosecuting sitting presidents.
Certainly, there are policies that require the attorney general, the nation’s top law enforcement officer, to avoid politics and stick with the facts and just be honest. That is exactly what Bondi would not do at her senate confirmation hearing.
Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii began her inquiry by telling Bondi that she wants an attorney general who “bases her decisions on facts.”
“I’m going to ask you a factual question,” said Hirono. “Who won the 2020 presidential election?”
Bondy should have abided by ethics and federal laws and simply have answered that Joe Biden won. Instead, visibly shaken and staring straight ahead, Bondy answered, “Joe Biden is the president of the United States.”
To which a flabbergasted Hirono came back with, “You know I can say that Donald Trump won the 2024 election. I may not like it but I can say that Donald Trump won the 2024 election. You cannot say who won the 2020 election. It’s disturbing you can’t give voice to that fact.”
Bondi looked puzzled and kept quiet with the same deer in the headlight gaze. It’s not clear if she really disbelieves all of the evidence that trump did not win in 2020 or if she is doing cartwheels to keep trump from pulling her nomination. Either way, it’s doubletalk and it says volumes about any hopes that Bondi could be an objective attorney general.
Possibly Bondi took heed of a 2022 interview with JD Vance by political comedian Jason Selvig, half of the comedy team of “The Good Liars.” Selvig asked Vance, “Did Donald Trump win the 2020 election?”
“No,” Vance answered.
Selvig asked the question again and Vance repeated his answer. The next year, Vance was elected to the U.S. Senate with a strong endorsement by trump and in 2024, trump named Vance as his vice presidential running mate. Lying pays.
Bondi and Vance are like most of their colleagues in refusing to acknowledge that Biden not only is the president but that he WON the 2020 election. As of December 2020, just 27 congressional Republicans acknowledged Biden’s win.
In the fall of 2022, trump was a subject of two separate criminal investigations by the Department of Justice. The first was an investigation into whether any person violated the law in connection with efforts to interfere with the lawful transfer of power following the 2020 presidential election. The results of this probe were released last week to the public.
The second investigation focused on the possession of highly classified documents at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago social club following his presidency. The results of the second inquiry were kept secret because of ongoing criminal charges against trump associates.
The report is long and often dry, with scores of citations and legal references but that is the language of lawyers like Bondi. Much of the report’s findings have previously been reported but many bear repeating, like the detailed description of the “unprecedented criminal effort” by trump “to overturn the legitimate results of the election in order to retain power” in 2020.
“Indeed,” the report concludes, “but for Mr. Trump’s election and imminent return to the Presidency, the Office assessed that the admissible evidence was sufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction at trial.”
The report also rejects trump’s claim that the report shows “complete exoneration.”
“That is false,” the report says. “The Department’s view that the Constitution prohibits Mr. Trump’s indictment and prosecution while he is in office is categorical and does not turn on the gravity of the crimes charged, the strength of the Government’s proof, or the merits of the prosecution — all of which the Office stands fully behind.”
The report said the Attorney General, FBI, and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) determined that the 2020 election was “the most secure election in our nation’s history and, despite unprecedented scrutiny, there has been no evidence of widespread fraud identified whatsoever.”
Smith’s report found that trump had led an effort to create phony slates of presidential electors in seven states that he had lost. As part of his conspiracy, he forced Justice Department officials and Vice President Mike Pence, “to act in contravention of their oaths and to instead advance Mr. Trump’s personal interests.”
To those ends, trump orchestrated “an angry mob (to march) to the United States Capitol to obstruct the congressional certification of the presidential election.” Trump’s plan was to then “leverage rioters’ violence” to further delay the certification.
Trump’s actions encouraged threats and violence against his perceived opponents. When elected officials refused to take improper actions that Trump urged, like discarding legitimate votes or appointing fraudulent electors, Trump attacked them publicly on Twitter, where he had more than 80 million followers.
“Inevitably, threats and intimidation to these officials followed,” the report said.
For instance, after trump targeted a Philadelphia City Commissioner in a Tweet criticizing the commissioner for saying there was no evidence of widespread election fraud in Philadelphia, threats against the Commissioner grew more targeted, more detailed, and more graphic. The threats extended to include highly personal information like the names and ages of the commissioner’s family members, as well as photos or the address of his home, the report said.
The report said that trump’s false claims included dozens of specific claims regarding certain states, such as that “large numbers of dead, non-resident, non-citizen, or otherwise ineligible voters had cast ballots, or that voting machines had changed votes for Trump to votes against him.”
“These claims were demonstrably and, in many cases, obviously false,” the report said.
For instance, Georgia’s secretary of state refuted a number of trump’s claims, including that at most, 74 convicted felons voted, not the claimed 2,506; that there were no underage voters and not 66,248, as claimed by trump; that there were no unregistered voters, not 2,423; and that none of the registrations were made past the deadline, although trump claimed 4,926 were past the deadline.
The Pennsylvania Department of State responded to trump’s tweet about claims of fraud and said, “Not only is there no evidence of ‘massive’ voter fraud in Philadelphia, but there haven’t been *any* documented instances in the many lawsuits filed in Pennsylvania.”
The investigation considered whether trump believed he had actually won the election and found, “evidence from a variety of sources” established that trump knew that there was no fraud in the 2020 election, that many of the specific claims he made were untrue, and that he had lost the election.
“He knew this because some of the highest-ranking officials in his own Administration, including the Vice President, told him directly that there was no evidence to support his claims,” the report said.
In Michigan, the Republican state Senate Majority Leader told Trump that he had lost the election not because of fraud, “but because he had underperformed with educated females, an assessment that displeased Mr. Trump.”
According to the report, trump privately acknowledged that his various claims of voter fraud were “crazy,” but which he “embraced and publicly amplified nonetheless.”
It refers to an unidentified, Justice Department official who worked on civil matters who joined with trump in an attempt to use the Justice Department “to open sham election crime investigations and influence state legislatures with knowingly false claims of election fraud.”
It notes that in Arizona, a pivotal state for trump’s reelection, state officials and legislators “whom Mr. Trump pressured to change vote tallies or stop certifications of results rebuffed him and informed him that his fraud claims were wrong.”
Trump leaned on state GOP officials to help him in his claims. Famously, on January 2, 2021, just days before the election results were to be certified, he called Georgia’s Secretary of State and pressed him to “find 11,780 votes” which was Biden’s margin of victory in the state.
“When the Secretary of State refuted Mr. Trump’s false fraud claims, Mr. Trump issued a threat, stating that because the Secretary of State knew ‘what they did and you’re not reporting it … that’s a criminal offense. And you know, you can’t let that happen. That’s a big risk to you ….’”
The federal Election Assistance Commission required that each state’s electors were required to vote and send their certificates of vote to Congress by Dec. 14. As the deadline approached, trump and co-conspirators launched another plan to organize the people who would have served as trump’s electors, had he won the popular vote, in seven states that Trump had lost, Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, “and cause them to sign and send to Washington false certifications claiming to be the legitimate electors.”
The plan foundered when not all of trump’s elector nominees were persuaded, forcing the co-conspirators to recruit substitutes in some of the targeted states. For example, one trump elector nominee in Pennsylvania recognized the plan as “illegal” and an attempt “to overthrow the Government,” and he declined to participate.
In seeking support for his plan for fake electors, trump tweeted on December 19, for his supporters to gather in Washington, D.C., to oppose the vote to verify Biden’s victory. Trump posted a copy of a report falsely alleging election fraud and wrote, “Statistically impossible to have lost the 2020 Election. Big protest in D.C. on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!”
Trump had insisted that he won re-election and that he was denied a return to the White House through widespread voter fraud. But the report quoted comments by trump that he implicitly acknowledged that he had lost the election. For example, in a January 3, 2021 Oval Office meeting regarding a national security matter, Trump said, “[I]t’s too late for us. We’re going to give that to the next guy,” meaning Biden.
The core of trump’s scheme was the false claims or voter fraud.
“Crucially, not only was Mr. Trump’s voter-fraud narrative objectively false-he knew that it was false. Mr. Trump’s false claims were repeatedly debunked, often directly to him by the very people best positioned to ascertain their truth,” the report said. “Campaign personnel told Mr. Trump his claims were unfounded; so did state officials, a White House official who engaged with Mr. Trump in his capacity as a candidate, and even his own running mate.”
Advisors told Trump that the election would be close and that initial returns might be misleading, showing an early lead for Trump that would diminish as mail-in ballots were counted.
“In response, Mr. Trump suggested that if that prediction were true, which it ultimately was, he would simply declare victory before all ballots were counted and a winner was projected,” the report said.
Trump made his first statement claiming fraud in the election only hours after polls closed, when no investigations had begun, much less concluded.
An unnamed co-conspirator proposed alerting the Governor, Speaker, and President pro temp of each relevant state to indicate that “in light of time urgency and sworn evidence of election irregularities presented to courts and to legislative committees, the legislatures thereof should each assemble and make a decision about elector appointment in light of their deliberations.”
Within about an hour of receiving the draft letter, the Acting Deputy Attorney General pointedly rejected the plan.
‘“I know of nothing that would support the statement, ‘we have identified significant concerns that may have impacted the outcome of the election in multiple states,”’ the acting deputy said. He also noted that the Justice Department had no role in states’ administration of their own elections.
“I cannot imagine a scenario in which the Department would recommend that a State assemble its legislature to determine whether already-certified election results should somehow be overridden by legislative action,” the deputy noted.
As the date for the Senate vote neared, trump pressured Pence and told him “hundreds of thousands” of people would “hate his guts” and think he was “stupid,” and that Pence was “too honest.” Trump falsely told Pence that the “Justice Department [was] finding major infractions.”
At a speech in Dalton, Ga,, trump focused the crowd on the idea that Pence could change the results of the election.
“I hope Mike Pence comes through for us, I have to tell you. I hope that our great Vice President, our great Vice President comes through for us. . . . Of course, if he doesn’t come through, I won’t like him quite as much,” trump told the crowd.
The next day, on January 5, trump issued a false statement that “The Vice President and I are in total agreement that the Vice President has the power to act.”
At around 1 a.m. on the morning of January 6, Trump tweeted, “If Vice President @Mike_Pence comes through for us, we will win the Presidency. Many States want to decertify the mistake they made in certifying incorrect & even fraudulent numbers in a process NOT approved by their State Legislatures (which it must be). Mike can send it back!”
Just before he left the White House to give his speech at the Ellipse, trump phoned Pence a last time. Pence told Trump that he planned to issue a public statement making clear that he lacked the authority to do what Trump wanted. “Mr. Trump expressed anger at him.”
During his call to arms at the ellipse on January 6, trump told his supporters to “peacefully and patriotically make [their] voices heard,” but he used the word “fight” more than 10 times in the speech before concluding by directing his supporters to march to the Capitol to give allied members of Congress “the kind of pride and boldness they need to take back our country.”
He also told the angry crowd that “if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”
After his speech, trump returned to the White House and, at around 1:30 p.m., settled in the dining room off of the Oval Office. He watched television news coverage of events at the Capitol and reviewed Twitter on his phone. The angry, violent rabble advanced on the Capitol building and breached it at around 2:13 p.m., forcing the Senate to recess.
Several of trump’s advisors rushed to the dining room and told him that a riot had started at the Capitol and that rioters were in the building.
“Over the course of the afternoon, they forcefully urged Mr. Trump to issue calming messages to his supporters. Mr. Trump resisted, repeatedly remarking that the people at the Capitol were angry because the election had been stolen,” the report said.
At 2:24 p.m., trump was alone when he tweeted, “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution, giving States a chance to certify a corrected set of facts, not the fraudulent or inaccurate ones which they were asked to previously certify. USA demands the truth!”
A minute later, the Secret Service was forced to evacuate Pence to a secure location at the Capitol. An advisor at the White House learned of Pence’s evacuation and rushed to the dining room and informed trump, who replied “So what?”
Throughout the afternoon, crowds at the Capitol hunted for Pence and other lawmakers, with some chanting, “Hang Mike Pence!” At 2:38 p.m. and 3:30 p.m., Trump issued two Tweets falsely suggesting that events at the Capitol were “peaceful” and asking individuals there (whom he termed “WE”) to remain that way.
“Please support our Capitol Police and Law Enforcement. They are truly on the side of our Country. Stay Peaceful!” trump tweeted. “I am asking for everyone at the U.S. Capitol to remain peaceful. No violence! Remember, WE are the Party of Law & Order, respect the Law.”
At 6:01 p.m., trump tweeted, “These are the things and events that happen when a sacred landslide election victory is so unceremoniously & viciously stripped away from great patriots who have been badly & unfairly treated for so long. Go home with love & in peace. Remember this day forever!”
The vice president’s lawyer said the riot had little to do with any facts about fake votes but rather that “whipping large numbers of people into a frenzy over something with no chance of ever attaining legal force through actual process of law, has led us to where we are.”
“The evidence established that the violence was foreseeable to Mr. Trump, that he caused it, that it was beneficial to his plan to interfere with the certification, and that when it occurred, he made a conscious choice not to stop it and instead to leverage it for more delay,” the report said.
When President-elect Biden appeared on television in November, trump said to a staffer, “can you believe I lost to this f’ing guy?”
The report rejected trump’s claims that he relied in good faith on his lawyers. It showed that trump was not looking for legal advice.
“Instead, Mr. Trump was the head of a conspiracy who sought legal cover from his co-conspirators,” the report said.
The report reacted to the expectation that trump would claim that his conduct was protected by the First Amendment. It noted the First Amendment right of free speech but said, “it is well established that the First Amendment does not protect speech that is used as an instrument of a crime.”
Finally, the report noted that trump’s words were not “mere political exaggeration or rough-and-tumble politics.”
“He was not being prosecuted for his ‘view’ on a political dispute; he [was] being prosecuted for acts constituting criminal conspiracy and obstruction of the electoral process,” the report said.