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Defend Our Country Digest

Defend Our Country Digest — November 30, 2022

By November 30, 2022No Comments

Driving the Day: 

Must Read Stories

Oath Keepers Founder Stewart Rhodes Found Guilty of Seditious Conspiracy For January 6

  • Washington Post: Oath Keepers Founder Stewart Rhodes Guilty Of Jan. 6 Seditious Conspiracy: A federal jury on Tuesday convicted Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and a top deputy of seditious conspiracy for leading a months-long plot to unleash political violence to prevent the inauguration of President Biden, culminating in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. The panel of seven men and five women deliberated for three days before finding Rhodes and lead Florida Oath Keeper Kelly Meggs guilty of conspiring to oppose by force the lawful transition of presidential power. But three other associates were not convicted of the historically rare and politically freighted sedition count. All five were convicted of obstructing Congress as it met to confirm the results of the 2020 election. Both offenses are punishable by up to 20 years in prison. Rhodes, 56, in a dark suit and black eye-patch from an old gun accident, looked down briefly upon hearing his verdict on the central charge, then leaned back in his chair as others were read.
  • Bloomberg: Oath Keepers Leader Rhodes Convicted of Jan. 6 Sedition Charge: Stewart Rhodes, leader of the right-wing Oath Keepers group, and one other defendant were convicted of seditious conspiracy for their roles in the storming of the US Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, capping a trial of the most serious crimes alleged among the hundreds of people prosecuted. The guilty verdicts by a Washington jury Tuesday mark a major win for the Justice Department in its effort to hold individuals accountable for breaking into the Capitol while Congress met to ratify the 2020 presidential election. The riot by thousands of former President Donald Trump supporters involved assaults on 140 police officers and caused more than $2 million in damage on the building. 

Former Trump White House Officials Meet With Jan. 6 Investigators

  • CNN: Top Trump Adviser Stephen Miller Testifies To January 6 Federal Grand Jury: Former Trump adviser Stephen Miller testified on Tuesday to a federal grand jury in Washington, DC, as part of the January 6, 2021, investigation, CNN has learned, making him the first known witness to testify since the Justice Department appointed a special counsel to oversee the criminal investigations around the former president. Miller was at the federal courthouse in downtown Washington for several hours throughout Tuesday, according to a person familiar with the investigation. January 6 lead prosecutor Thomas Windom was spotted at the same federal courthouse on Tuesday. Windom is expected to join the newly created Special Counsel’s Office led by longtime public corruption prosecutor Jack Smith and will continue leading the investigation into former President Donald Trump’s role in efforts to impede the transfer of power following the 2020 election. Federal investigators have for months sought information from Trump’s inner circle in the White House, attempting to gather insight into Trump’s state of mind before his supporters rioted on January 6.
  • MSNBC: Kellyanne Conway Meets With Jan. 6 Committee For Nearly 5 Hours: Former Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway met for nearly five hours Monday with investigators on the House committee probing the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. The committee did not publicly issue Conway a subpoena, and aides refused to comment on whether she was issued one privately. The panel declined to comment on her appearance Monday. The closed-door meeting took place at the O’Neill House Office Building, where Conway was seen entering a conference room with attorney Emmet Flood, a lawyer in former President Donald Trump’s White House. Conway spoke to the committee on the record, two sources familiar with her appearance said. Speaking to reporters around 3 p.m. after the meeting ended, Conway said she did not invoke the Fifth Amendment at any point Monday. Earlier, when Conway left the meeting room for a break, she told reporters, “I’m here voluntarily.” Asked by a reporter when she last spoke with Trump, Conway said he called her last week.
  • Politico: Mark Meadows Ordered To Testify In Trump Investigation: South Carolina’s Supreme Court has ordered former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows to testify to an Atlanta-area grand jury investigating Donald Trump’s effort to overturn the election in Georgia. “We have reviewed the arguments raised by Appellant and find them to be manifestly without merit,” South Carolina’s Supreme Court justices wrote. The decision affirmed a lower court’s ruling requiring Meadows to testify to the Fulton County grand jury investigation led by District Attorney Fani Willis. Attorneys for Meadows and a spokeswoman for Willis did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The five-member court’s decision was just three paragraphs long. It cited the “exigent circumstances involved” but did not go into detail about the dispute. Willis sought Meadows’ testimony in September as part of her expansive investigation into efforts by Trump and his allies to disrupt the election process in Georgia, including his push for Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” enough votes to overturn Joe Biden’s victory in the state. The fight over the Meadows’ subpoena wound up before the South Carolina courts under procedures many states have agreed on to enforce court orders for testimony issued by courts in another state. To compel testimony from out-of-state residents, Willis must first get the approval of local courts. Meadows is a resident of South Carolina.

A New Court Ruling Invalidates The Former President’s Efforts to Overturn Election Results

  • NBC: Trump Doesn’t Have ‘Absolute Immunity’ Over Efforts To Overturn 2020 Election, Judge Says: A federal judge on Monday rejected former President Donald Trump’s argument that he has “absolute immunity” in response to a lawsuit alleging he committed civil rights violations in his attempts to challenge the 2020 presidential election results. The lawsuit, filed by the NAACP, the Michigan Welfare Rights Organization and others, accuses the former president and the Republican National Committee of efforts to disenfranchise voters through targeted harassment, intimidation and efforts to prevent the complete counting and certification of ballots after the 2020 election. The ruling notes that Trump’s lawyers previously argued that he is “absolutely immune” from damages for his actions within the “outer perimeter” of his official responsibilities as president. U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan in Washington sided with the civil rights groups, writing that Trump’s conduct after the 2020 election was “purely political and therefore well beyond the contours of presidential immunity.” 
  • The Guardian: US Courts Ruling In Favor Of Justice Department Turns Legal Tide On Trump: A pate of major court rulings rejecting claims of executive privilege and other arguments by Donald Trump and his top allies are boosting investigations by the US justice department (DoJ) and a special Georgia grand jury into whether the former US president broke laws as he sought to overturn the 2020 election results. Former prosecutors say the upshot of these court rulings is that key Trump backers and ex-administration lawyers – such as ex-chief of staff Mark Meadows and legal adviser John Eastman – can no longer stave off testifying before grand juries in DC and Georgia. They are wanted for questioning about their knowledge of – or active roles in – Trump’s crusade to stop Joe Biden from taking office by leveling false charges of fraud. Due to a number of court decisions, Meadows, Eastman, Senator Lindsey Graham and others must testify before a special Georgia grand jury working with the Fulton county district attorney focused on the intense drive by Trump and top loyalists to pressure the Georgia secretary of state and other officials to thwart Biden’s victory there. Similarly, court rulings have meant that top Trump lawyers such as former White House counsel Pat Cipollone, who opposed Trump’s zealous drive to overturn the 2020 election, had to testify without invoking executive privilege before a DC grand jury investigating Trump’s efforts to block Congress from certifying Biden’s election victory.

In The States 

ARIZONA: MAGA County Officials Face Two Lawsuits After Refusing to Certify Midterm Election Results

  • The Guardian: Arizona Secretary Of State Sues After Republican Officials Refuse To Certify County Election Results: Republican officials in a rural Arizona county refused on Monday to certify the results of the 2022 midterm election, despite no evidence of anything wrong with the count from earlier this month. Some officials who have embraced voter fraud theories held out, defying a state deadline and setting the stage for a legal battle. The move came amid pressure from prominent Republicans to reject results showing Democrats winning top races, and the county was holding out in the afternoon of a nail-biting day that was the deadline for several counties to confirm results. In a lawsuit on Monday, the secretary of state, Katie Hobbs, a Democrat who narrowly won the race for governor, asked a judge to order county officials to canvass the election, which she said was an obligation under Arizona law. Lawyers representing a Cochise county voter and a group of retirees filed a similar lawsuit on Monday, the deadline for counties to approve the official tally of votes, known as the canvass. The two Republican county supervisors delayed the canvass vote until hearing once more about concerns over the certification of ballot tabulators, though election officials have repeatedly said the equipment is properly approved.
  • Arizona Republic: Cochise County Sued Twice After Not Certifying Election Results: Two lawsuits filed hours after Cochise County officials balked — again — at certifying election results seek a court order to compel the Board of Supervisors to approve the Nov. 8 tallies. The Arizona Alliance of Retired Americans and Cochise County resident Stephani Stephenson filed the first complaint late Monday, followed by a lawsuit from Secretary of State Katie Hobbs. Both lawsuits, filed in Cochise County Superior Court, ask the court to order the three-member board to certify election results, as required by law. And they ask for action by Thursday so the statewide canvass scheduled for Dec. 5 can proceed with results from all Arizona voters.
  • Arizona Republic: ‘This Craziness Has To Stop’: Ex-Prosecutors Recommend Charging Cochise County Supervisors: Former Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard and former Maricopa County Attorney Rick Romley on Tuesday urged prosecutors to consider criminal charges against the Cochise County supervisors who refused to certify the county’s election Monday. Supervisors Tom Crosby and Peggy Judd have repeatedly questioned election procedures and also been warned that if they did not canvass their election Monday, the state deadline, they not only could disenfranchise voters in southeastern Arizona but also face criminal penalties. The supervisors already are facing two civil cases, both seeking to force them to certify the election this week so the statewide canvass can include Cochise County votes Monday. “Their votes against certification resulted in the three-member Board failing to perform its legal duty to certify the election,” said the letter from Goddard, a Democrat, and Romley, a Republican. They added that they “take no pleasure in making this prosecution recommendation,” which was sent to Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich and Cochise County Attorney Brian McIntyre. “But we believe deeply that the rule of law dictates that public officials be held accountable when they refuse to comply with their legal obligations — all the more so where those officials’ actions threaten to undo the proper administration and integrity of elections, disenfranchise thousands of voters, and potentially even alter the results of some races,” they wrote. 

PENNSYLVANIA: Final Certification Delayed By Rogue County Officials and Unruly Election Deniers

  • ABC27: Luzerne County Election Board Fails To Certify Election: On Monday the Luzerne County Election Board failed to certify the election. The board voted two yes and two no, and one board member abstained on the vote, saying he wants answers about problems on election day before he will vote to certify the results. It’s unclear what will happen next. Residents urged the board not to certify the results until there are answers as to what led to the paper shortage and other issues at polling places. All of this comes as the Luzerne County District Attorney investigates a paper shortage on election day.
  • Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Allegheny County Election Board Certifies 2022 Election; Deputies Called To Calm Raucous Crowd. Sheriff’s deputies were called to a meeting of the Allegheny County Board of Elections on Monday after the crowd of about 30 began loudly jeering as the board prepared to certify the Nov. 8 midterm election results. In the end, the three-member board unanimously certified results in all but 12 of the county’s 1,332 precincts. A group of voters petitioned county Common Pleas Court for recounts in those 12 precincts, though county lawyers told the board the petitions are “defective” because the voters failed to pay a $50 fee required for recount requests.

MICHIGAN: State Canvassers Certify Election Results Over GOP Protests

  • Michigan Advance: State Board Certifies Michigan Election Results Despite Protest From Some GOP Candidates: The Michigan Board of State Canvassers unanimously voted Monday to certify the results of the Nov. 8 election. The midterm election resulted in victories for the three Democratic incumbents in the top statewide offices. Democrats in Michigan also took control of both the state House and Senate, making it the first time in four decades that Democrats have had a trifecta in Michigan. None of the top races were close in Michigan. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer beat Republican Tudor Dixon by 11 points; Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson defeated Republican Kristina Karamo by 14 points and Attorney General Dana Nessel fended off Republican Matt DePerno by 9 points. All three Republicans also have questioned the results of the 2020 election that former President Donald Trump lost to President Joe Biden and signed onto lawsuits seeking to overturn the results. Brandenburg ran for governor as a Republican but failed to make the ballot amid a massive signature-gathering fraud scandal. She then ran on the far-right U.S. Taxpayers ticket.
  • Detroit News: Bipartisan Michigan Board Votes 4-0 To Certify Nov. 8 Election Results: The Michigan Board of State Canvassers voted unanimously Monday to certify the results of the state’s Nov. 8 general election during an at-capacity, hours-long meeting in which an audience member was escorted out by police. Several candidates challenging Election Day practices, including Republican Secretary of State candidate Kristina Karamo, spoke out against Election Day practices in an attempt to delay the certification. But the four-member bipartisan board stood by the results and argued candidates either misunderstood the process or were taking issue with the law underlying the practice — in which case, they could file litigation or lobby for a change in law. “A lot of questions that arise are from just a lack of proper understanding, which is unfortunately fed by candidates and parties from both sides of the aisle who feed into this nonsense, who make these claims that fire everybody up because there’s a short-term gain for them,” said Board of State Canvassers Chairman Tony Daunt, a Republican.

What Experts Are Saying

Barbara McQuade, former US attorney, re: Oath Keepers verdicts: “Great work by DOJ to charge seditious conspiracy and make the case that attacking Congress to stop the transfer of presidential power is a serious crime. Accountability is essential to deterrence.” Tweet 

Joyce Vance, former US attorney (MSNBC video): “The result today gives DOJ a little bit of momentum… because it is clear that Stewart Rhodes is not the most culpable participant in the events 1/6. There were people who were more accountable, people who had greater intent” MSNBC’s Deadline White House Tweet 

Kathleen Belew, professor of history at Northwestern University: 

“Q: ‘You write that white power groups were heavily present in the Jan. 6 mob. Is it fair to say parts of the movement see Trump and Jan. 6 as carrying forward their own war to overturn the U.S. government, in service of a vision of a global Aryan nation?’ 

A: ‘The movement saw that as a stunning act of propaganda. We saw upticks in recruitment drives. And the lack of condemnation of those events by the mainstream Republican Party really showed these activists that there is plenty more space for them in our political process.’” WaPo’s Greg Sargent Column/Interview: How Trump is handing white supremacists huge propaganda victories

More Than 1,000 Department Of Justice Alumni: “We are alumni of the Department of Justice and together have served under Republican and Democratic administrations at different levels of the federal system, some as career attorneys and law enforcement personnel, some as political appointees, and some as both. In those roles, we furthered the Department’s mission to ensure the fair and impartial administration of justice. Those of us who were prosecutors or who otherwise worked on criminal matters applied the standards for investigating and charging criminal conduct set forth in the Justice Manual and the Principles of Federal Prosecution. Each of us believes that, under those standards, Donald Trump’s announcement of his candidacy for president in the 2024 election should not deter the Department’s ongoing criminal investigations of his actions related to the attempt to overturn the 2020 election or his possession, as a private citizen, of classified and other government documents, including highly sensitive materials that impact our national security. The fact that the Attorney General has chosen to appoint a special counsel does not change the analysis — as the Attorney General noted, ‘[the special counsel] must comply with the regulations, procedures, and policies of the Department.’ Based on the facts in the public record, Mr. Trump’s actions are properly a subject of those investigations, which were underway long before he declared his candidacy.” DOJ Alumni Statement on Trump Candidacy and DOJ’s Ongoing Investigations | Protect Democracy Tweet 

Headlines

The MAGA Movement And The Ongoing Threat To Elections

Daily Kos: New ‘election crimes’ units find nothing—because voters abusing the system was never a problem

Slate: Ron DeSantis Can Steal the 2024 Election—for Himself

FiveThirtyEight: When Democracy Was On The Ballot In 2022, Voters Usually Chose It

Trump 2024

Politico: McConnell: Anyone meeting with antisemites, white supremacists ‘highly unlikely’ to be president

CNN: Kevin McCarthy just tried to explain away Donald Trump’s dinner with a White nationalist

Washington Post (Analysis): What Trump Investigations Mean for a Trump Candidacy

Fox News: Republicans blast Trump over dinner with Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes: ‘I am appalled’

Slate: How Donald Trump Excuses His Bigotry

January 6 And The 2020 Election

CNN: House January 6 committee chairman says panel ‘close to putting pens down’ on final report

Other Trump Investigations 

Salon: “He has the right to remain silent”: Legal experts say Trump’s Truth Social post may be “evidence”

Opinion

CNN (Stephen Collinson): January 6 convictions bolster democracy, but McCarthy’s defense of Trump threatens it

Washington Post (Greg Sargent): New Trumpist threats in Arizona make electoral college reform urgent

The Atlantic (Quinta Jurecic): Moore v. Harper Could Derail America’s Democracy
New York Times (Carolos Lozada): Mike Pence Is Having a Moment He Doesn’t Deserve

In The States

Arizona Republic: Judge dismisses Hamadeh effort to delay certifying results in attorney general race

Politico: Andrew Warren v. Ron DeSantis heads to court

WEIS Radio: Republicans in Arizona, Pennsylvania counties decline to certify midterm election results

WRAL News: NC officials unanimously certify midterm election results, report ‘tremendous’ turnout

MLive: Judge orders election worker to stand trial for tampering with voting equipment

Minnesota Reformer: South Dakota’s new secretary of state has ties to vocal Minnesota election denier