Trump defense lawyer Bruce Castor had not even finished his opening remarks in the U.S. Senate before he was harshly criticized by Alan Dershowitz, who defended Donald Trump in his last impeachment trial.
Dershowitz was interviewed on Newsmax during Castor’s presentation.
“What are you making of Bruce Castor’s arguments so far?” the host asked. “Where is he going with this?”
“There is no argument,” Dershowitz replied. “I have no idea what he’s doing.” Continue reading.
President Donald Trump was “horrified” when violence broke out at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, as a joint session of Congress convened to confirm that he lost the election, according to his defense attorneys.
Trump tweeted calls for peace “upon hearing of the reports of violence” and took “immediate steps” to mobilize resources to counter the rioters storming the building, his lawyers argued in a brief filed Monday in advance of Trump’s impeachment trial in the Senate. It is “absolutely not true,” they wrote, that Trump failed to act swiftly to quell the riot.
But that revisionist history conflicts with the timeline of events on the day of the Capitol riot, as well as accounts of multiple people in contact with the president that day, who have said Trump was initially pleased to see a halt in the counting of the electoral college votes. Some former White House officials have acknowledged that he only belatedly and reluctantly issued calls for peace, after first ignoring public and private entreaties to do so. Continue reading.
InfoWars’ Alex Jones, a notorious conspiracy theorist who has been kicked off multiple platforms for his extremism, was welcomed onto the stage at a Dec. 12 “prayer rally” organized by religious-right supporters of former President Donald Trump’s effort to stay in power as well as a Jan. 5 rally in Washington, D.C., the day before the violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. Jones was in sync with the rallies’ themes of Christian nationalism and rebellion intertwined with the persona and presidency of Donald Trump.
At the Dec. 12 “prayer rally,” Jones said that God had raised up Trump and that Joe Biden, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, and other “miserable globalists” are “slaves of Satan.” Jones said he didn’t know who would be going to White House in January, but he did know this: “Joe Biden is a globalist, and Joe Biden will be removed one way or another.”
At the Jan. 5 rally on the eve of the insurrection, Jones said that God had sent Donald Trump as a “deliverer.” He said the following day would be “Waterloo” for the “globalists” he said were behind the election fraud. He concluded by screaming, “The globalists are in fear! The globalists want to play God! They are not God! And the answer to their 1984 tyranny is 1776! 1776! 1776! 1776!” Continue reading.
Senators, acting in the impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump that begins on Feb. 9, will soon have to decide whether to convict the former president for inciting a deadly, violent insurrection at the Capitol building on Jan. 6.
A majority of House members, including 10 Republicans, took the first step in the two-step impeachment process in January. They voted to impeach Trump, for “incitement of insurrection.” Their resolution states that he “willfully made statements that, in context, encourage – and foreseeably resulted in – lawless action at the Capitol, such as: ‘if you don’t fight like hell you’re not going to have a country anymore.’”
Impeachment proceedings that consider incitement to insurrection are rare in American history. Yet dozens of legislators – including some Republicans – say that Trump’s actions leading up to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol contributed to an attempted insurrection against American democracy itself. Continue reading.
Less than 24 hours before thousands of Trump supporters would storm the U.S. Capitol in an armed and deadly insurrection Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) stood with that same building in the background and told MAGA adherents to “get ready to fight for America tomorrow.”
Greene, a racist and QAnon conspiracy theorist who has not stopped making incendiary remarks even after being stripped of her committee assignments last week, also told supporters, “Trump was re-elected for four more years,” which is a lie, part of the Big Lie Trump and his cult have been spreading since the November election.
The Congresswoman, who last week told her colleagues in the House that she was “allowed to believe” the QAnon cult claims to were real, also falsely claims the Electoral College vote was “stolen.” Continue reading.
Democratic House impeachment managers on Wednesday began formally laying out their case that President Donald Trump incited the rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. They are allowed 16 hours, spread over two days, to make their arguments.
Below are some takeaways from Day 2 of the Senate impeachment trial.
Before Tuesday’s proceedings, the House impeachment team sent word that its presentation would include never-before-seen video. Continue reading.
Then-President Donald Trump falsely claimed more than 100 times that Democrats had “rigged” or “stolen” the 2020 election ahead of January’s deadly insurrectionist attack on the U.S. Capitol, a HuffPost analysis found.
In reviewing all of Trump’s tweets and speeches between Election Day on Nov. 3 and the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, HuffPost mapped out the rhetoric his followers absorbed as their defiance against President Joe Biden’s win mounted.
Over the course of those two months, Trump ― the most powerful politician in the country and, arguably, the entire world ― lied that the election was rigged at least 68 times and that it was stolen or in the process of being stolen at least 35 times. He made claims of voter fraud and ballot-counting irregularities more than 250 times, specifically making baseless claims that voting machines tossed or changed votes at least 45 times. Continue reading.
Prosecutors allege Bruno Cua—who recently got busted for allegedly blaring his horn from a MAGA-themed truck in his hometown—was at the front of the pack.
Federal prosecutors on Monday unsealed charges against a MAGA-loving Georgia teen who allegedly shoved a police officer to enter the Senate chamber during the Jan. 6 Capitol Riot and encouraged his social media followers for days to show up to Washington, D.C., to “fight.”
Bruno Joseph Cua, 18, was arrested Friday and charged with several crimes—including assault on a federal officer and civil disorder—for his role in the unprecedented siege. In a criminal complaint, prosecutors allege that after encouraging his social media followers for almost two weeks to support former President Donald Trump and protest against the election, the Georgia teenager stormed the Capitol.
The Milton, Georgia, resident is seen in several photos and videos at the Capitol wearing a MAGA hat and a sweatshirt adorned with an eagle—including a New Yorker video showing a slew of rioters fighting their way onto the Senate floor. Continue reading.
The Georgia secretary of state’s office is investigating former President Trump’s efforts to overturn the election results in the Peach State, which included a phone call he placed to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) in early January.
Walter Jones, a spokesman for the office, confirmed the probe in a Monday statement and described it as “fact-finding and administrative.”
“The Secretary of State’s office investigates complaints it receives. The investigations are fact-finding and administrative in nature,” Jones said. “Any further legal efforts will be left to the Attorney General.” Continue reading.
Storming the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 was no spur-of-the-
moment decision for Jessica Marie Watkins, an Ohio bartender and founder of a small, self-styled militia, federal prosecutors allege.
In documents charging her with conspiracy and other crimes for her role in the insurrection, they say she began planning such an operation shortly after President Donald Trump lost the November election, ultimately helping recruit and allegedly helping lead dozens of people who took violent action to try to stop congressional certification of the electoral college vote last month.
In text messages cited in court documents, Watkins was clear about why she was heading to Washington. “Trump wants all able bodied patriots to come,” she wrote to one of her alleged co-conspirators on Dec. 29, eight days before prosecutors say they invaded the building. Continue reading.
