Mo Brooks throws Trump under the bus in response to lawsuit that accuses him of inciting MAGA mob

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Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) claims in a new court filing that he was asked by a White House official to speak at former president Donald Trump’s infamous “Stop the Steal” rally that preceded the Jan. 6 insurrection.

The Alabama Republican was given Trump’s endorsement for the U.S. Senate after making the speech, which a lawsuit alleges helped incite the violent assault on the U.S. Capitol, but Brooks’ attorneys responded by insisting he only took part because the former president wanted him there.

“Brooks only gave the Ellipse Speech because the White House asked him to, in his capacity as a United States Congressman,” the new court filing says. “But for the White House request, Brooks would not have appeared at the Ellipse Rally.” Continue reading.

Trump biographer explains why Ivanka Trump ‘is in peril’ along with Allen Weisselberg

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President Donald Trump’s daughter Ivanka Trump is in about as much trouble as Allen Weisselberg is, according to biographer Michael D’Antonio.

Speaking to CNN’s Jim Acosta on Sunday, D’Antonio explained that the kinds of things that Weisselberg is accused of are similar to things that Ivanka Trump also did while working for the Trump Organization.

“You know, he really is acting as if he is going to go down with the ship,” said D’Antonio of Weisselberg. “I think this is astounding given Michael Cohen’s example. But there’s another thing that I notice in the president’s — or former president’s complaints. And his idea that, ‘Well, they’re going after really good people, and they would only be going after me because of political motivations.’ Well, the big problem for him is that he invited all of this. He ran for president in the first place as a publicity stunt. He wanted to amp up his visibility and increase his bottom line. He never intended to be elected president, and then when he became president, journalists started digging into the facts of his wealth, which has always been in doubt, and then people that he really hurt, that he steamrollered offer the years leaked documents to The New York Times that gave the truth about his taxes for the world to see. Faced with all of that, the prosecutions had no choice but to go after him. So, the idea this is political is crazy. He brought it on himself. These are practices that have been going on for more than a dozen years, and he’s getting what he deserves.”

Republican lashes out at ‘capitulation’ of GOP to Trump — and says Lauren Boebert clearly knew about Jan. 6

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Rep. Adam Kinzinger, a 43-year-old Air Force veteran, always assumed that there would be a “career-ending” vote he would have to take. But according to a New York Times profile, Kinzinger assumed it would be about Social Security instead. After the attack on the U.S Capitol Jan. 6, it became clear what he would have to do.

“I made the decision early in my career that I would be willing to take a potentially career-ending vote,” he told the Times. “But I thought that vote would be for something like a Social Security reform bill. I never thought it would be for defending democracy.”

He explained that things have changed because there is so much mistrust, and since Jan. 6 not many other Republicans have joined him. Continue reading.

FBI launches flurry of arrests over attacks on journalists during Capitol riot

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Nearly six months after the U.S. Capitol riot, the Justice Department has begun arresting a new category of alleged criminals — those who attacked reporters or damaged their equipment as journalists documented the violence perpetrated by supporters of President Donald Trump.

The first such charge came last week, when 43-year-old Shane Jason Woods of Illinois was charged with engaging in violence on the Capitol grounds Jan. 6, as well as assaulting a law enforcement officer. Authorities say Woods was caught on video knocking down a cameraman.

The arrests come at a contentious moment for the Justice Department and First Amendment advocates, who have sharply criticized federal law enforcement for secretly issuing subpoenas of reporters’ phone records during the Trump administration. Continue reading.

Prosecutors say spreadsheets from Trump Organization offer a road map for its indictment. Where the investigation goes now is the question.

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In prosecutors’ telling, the Trump Organization provided a road map for its own indictment.

In documents filed in the New York Supreme Court last week, prosecutors claimed that the company had spent 15 years paying its chief financial officer “off the books,” giving him cars, an apartment, tuition payments and cash that were hidden from income tax authorities.

But at the same time, according to allegations included in the indictment, the Trump Organization also was keeping internal spreadsheets that tallied the payments that were being hidden. Continue reading.

Rep. Adam Kinzinger on the Moral Failure of Republicans and the Big Lie

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Since the horrifying events at the Capitol on Jan. 6, Representative Adam Kinzinger of Illinois has been a consistent, if lonely, Republican voice speaking out against the big lie that the presidential election was stolen from Donald Trump. After the sidelining of Representative Liz Cheney from leadership, Kinzinger, a 43-year-old Air Force veteran who was first elected to the House in 2010, was further entrenched as one of the most influential sitting Republican politicians willing to regularly and publicly denounce that dangerous fiction. Inhabiting that position is just about the last thing Kinzinger ever imagined his job would entail. “I made the decision early in my career that I would be willing to take a potentially career-ending vote,” says Kinzinger, one of 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump for inciting the attempted insurrection. “But I thought that vote would be for something like a Social Security reform bill. I never thought it would be for defending democracy.”

How does it feel to have your job these days? I could imagine there’s an even greater sense of purpose. I could also imagine it being demoralizing. You pretty much nailed it. The job has changed because there is so much mistrust. Both within the party and between parties. But yes, there is a sense of aggressive purpose. On the one hand, it’s important for me to do what I’m doing and to speak out. On the other hand, you look around since the election and not many more people have joined me in speaking out about the big lie, and that is a little discouraging.

Trump Just Got Even Cozier With QAnon

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“We are the news now.”

Two major QAnon influencers were given official press credentials to the latest Trump rally held in Sarasota, Florida over the weekend, signaling a new level of acceptance of the QAnon conspiracy theory by the former president and his team.

In the build up to last November’s election, Trump repeatedly failed to directly condemn QAnon, instead calling them “people that love our country” and who “like me very much.”

Now Trump, who QAnon supporters—and much of the Republican party—believe is still the rightful president, appears willing to embrace QAnon even further, by handing two of the movement’s most influential voices official press passes to his rally. Continue reading.

Trump is already roadtesting his defense for a possible NY indictment — but there’s a big problem

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One section of former President Donald Trump’s rally speech on Saturday night in Florida stood out to many observers: his response to last week’s indictment of his company and its CFO Allen Weisselberg.

Weisselberg and the Trump Organization were hit with a 15-count indictment from the Manhattan DA, Cy Vance, alleging a scheme to defraud the government and avoid paying required taxes on more than a million dollars worth of non-salary compensation the CFO has received for over a decade.

Trump himself was not charged in the scheme, though many argue it’s hard to believe he wasn’t aware of this allegedly criminal conduct — and indeed, it’s hard to believe this kind of criminality wasn’t widespread under his leadership. But if Vance ever chooses to try and bring a case against the former president, Trump will likely try to claim he was unaware that these crimes were occurring, or that he was unaware that what was being done was illegal. On Saturday, he started roadtesting this type of defense — which, if true, would undermine the case that he had the criminal intent required to be found guilty of the crimes in question — for his fans: Continue reading.

Trump has cut off Rudy Giuliani, and is annoyed that he asked to be paid for his work on challenging the election, book says

Donald Trump’s family has cut off Rudy Giuliani, and the former president has been irked that the lawyer asked to be paid for his work challenging Trump’s loss in the 2020 election, a new book says.

On Sunday, The Times of London published an excerpt from “Landslide: The Final Days of the Trump Presidency,” the coming book on the Trump presidency from the author Michael Wolff.

In the extract, Wolff delves into Trump’s postpresidential life at his Mar-a-Lago resort and describes Trump as frustrated by the lack of progress in his quest to overturn the 2020 election result. Continue reading.

Pew’s Validated Post-Election Poll Details Biden’s 2020 Win

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Overall participation in the 2020 election among U.S. adults rose seven points from 2016 to reach 66 percent last year. A new analysis of validated voters from Pew Research Center (which provides a bigger, more reliable sample than exit polls) built on several of the 2020 trends that have already been reported. Here’re some of the key takeaways:

New 2020 Voters

One in 4 voters in 2020, or 25 percent, had not voted in 2016. About six percent of those new 2020 voters turned out in 2018, spiking participation in that midterm election. And voters who turned out in 2018 after skipping the 2016 presidential election were about twice as likely to back Joe Biden over Donald Trump in 2020.

But the 19 percent of new voters who came out in 2020 after skipping both 2016 and the midterms divided up almost evenly among Biden and Trump, 49 percent-47 percent. However, what was most notable about that group of new 2020 voters was the age disparity, writes Pew: Continue reading.