by Farnosh Amiri
WASHINGTON ( Associated Press) – Rioters who stormed the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 succeeded – at least temporarily – in delaying the certification of the election of Joe Biden to the White House.
A few hours ago, Rep Jim Jordan was trying to achieve the same thing.
At midnight on January 5, when then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, a close aide and friend, Jordan offered a legal rationale for President Donald Trump’s publicly demanding – that Vice President Mike Pence, in his ceremonial role While presiding over the electoral count in the U.S., somehow Biden-won states voters claim the right to disapprove.
Pence “must call all electoral votes that he believes are unconstitutional because there is no electoral vote at all,” Jordan wrote.
“I insisted on it,” replied Meadows. “Not sure it’s going to happen.”
The text exchange, in an April 22 court filing from a congressional panel probing the January 6 riots, is among a batch of startling evidence that shows the deep involvement of some House Republicans in Trump’s desperate attempt to stay in power. A review of the evidence provides new details of how, long before the attack on the Capitol came to the fore, several GOP lawmakers were participating directly in Trump’s campaign to reverse the results of a free and fair election.
It is a connection that members of the House 6 January committee are clarifying as they prepare to begin public hearings in June. Republicans conspiring with Trump and the rioters attacking the Capitol aligned in their goals, if not the violent tactics of the mob, creating a convergence that nearly ended the country’s peaceful transfer.
“It appears that a significant number of House members and some senators only had a significant role,” Rep. Benny Thompson, the Democratic chairman of the January 6 committee, told the Associated Press last week.
Since launching its investigation last summer, the January 6 panel has been slowly gaining new details about what lawmakers said and did in the weeks before the rebellion. Members have asked three GOP lawmakers — Representative Scott Perry of Pennsylvania, Jordan of Ohio, and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California — to testify voluntarily. Everyone has refused. Other MPs may be called in the coming days.
So far, the 6 January committee has avoided issuing summons to lawmakers, fearing the repercussions of such an extraordinary move. But the lack of co-operation from lawmakers didn’t stop the panel from getting new information about their actions.
The latest court document, submitted in response to a lawsuit from Meadows, contains only excerpts from more than 930 interviews conducted by the January 6 panel. It includes information from several high-level meetings attended by about a dozen House Republicans, where Trump aides teased ways to give him another term.
Among the ideas: naming fake slates of voters in seven swing states, declaring martial law, and confiscating voting machines.
The efforts began in the weeks after Biden was declared president-elect by The Associated Press.
In early December 2020, several lawmakers attended a meeting at the White House attorney’s office, where the president’s lawyers advised them that the plan to have an alternative slate of voters declaring Trump the winner was “legally correct.” “It was not. Representative Scott Perry of Pennsylvania, a lawmaker, withdrew from that position. According to testimony from Cassidy Hutchinson, a former special assistant to the Trump White House, Florida’s GOP Reps. Matt Getz and Louis Gohart of Texas did the same.
Despite warnings from the attorney’s office, Trump aides went ahead. On December 14, 2020, as right-elected Democratic voters in seven states – Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, New Mexico, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin – met to cast their vote in their seat of state government, mock voters also gathered .
They declared themselves right voters and presented false Electoral College certificates declaring Trump the true winner of the presidential election in their states.
Those certificates of “alternative voters” were then sent to Congress, where they were ignored.
Most lawmakers have since denied their involvement in these efforts.
Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene testified at a hearing in April that she did not remember conversations with the White House or messages Trump sent to Meadows about the imposition of martial law.
Gohmert told the Associated Press that he doesn’t even remember being involved and isn’t sure he can be helpful in the committee’s investigation. Georgia Representative Jody Hiss downplayed his actions, saying that it is routine for members of the president’s party to talk on a range of topics inside and outside the White House. Hiss is now running for Secretary of State in Georgia, which is responsible for state elections.
Arizona Representative Andy Biggs did not deny his public attempts to challenge the election results, but denied recent reports about his deep involvement in the polls.
In a statement on Saturday, Representative Paul Goser of Arizona reiterated his “serious” concerns about the 2020 election. “The discussion about the Electoral Count Act was proper, necessary and necessary,” he said.
Requests for comment from other lawmakers were not immediately returned.
Less than a week after the White House meeting in early December, another plan emerged. In a meeting with House Freedom Caucus members and Trump White House officials, the discussion turned into decisive action they believed Pence could take on Jan.
According to committee testimony, both virtually and in person in attendance, Hiss, Biggs, Goser, Reps. Perry, Getz, Jordan, Gohmert, Mo Brooks of Alabama, Debbie Lesco of Arizona, and Green, were then a congressman-elect.
“How was the conversation?” The committee asked Hutchinson, who was a frequent presence at meetings held in December 2020 and January 2021.
Hutchinson, referring to Pence, said, “He felt he had the right, I’m sorry if my phrasing isn’t right on this, but — send the vote back to the states or the electorate.”
Asked if any lawmakers disagree with the idea that the vice president has such authority, Hutchinson said there is no objection from any Republican lawmakers.
In another meeting about Pence’s potential role, Trump’s lawyers Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell and Jenna Ellis were again asked to reunite with Perry and Jordan, as well as Green and Lauren Boebert, a Republican who had just run from Colorado to the House. Was selected, joined.
As January 6 approached, the communication between lawmakers and the White House did not subside. The day after Christmas — more than two months after the election had called for Biden — Perry texted Meadows with a countdown.
“11 days to 1/6th and 25 days to the inauguration,” the text read. “we have to leave!” Perry urged Meadows to call an assistant attorney general, Jeffrey Clark, who supported Trump’s efforts to challenge the election results. Perry admits to introducing Clark to Trump.
Clark clashed with senior Justice Department officials over his plan to send a letter to Georgia and other battlefield states questioning the election results and urging their state legislatures to investigate. It all culminated in a dramatic White House meeting, in which Trump considered promoting Clarke to attorney general, only to be made clear by top Justice Department officials that he would resign.
The January 6 investigation is under pressure from lawmakers and the White House on the Justice Department in several areas of investigation. Jamie Ruskin, a Democratic member of the Maryland panel, has indicated there will be more revelations to come.
Ruskin tweeted last week, “As mobs smashed our windows, bloodied our police, and stormed the Capitol, Trump and his allies seek to destroy Biden’s majority in the Electoral College and overthrow our constitutional order.” plotted to throw.”
When the results of the panel’s investigation came out, Ruskin predicted, “America will see how the coups and rebellions converge.”
