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Defend Our Country Digest

Defend Our Country Digest — September 12, 2022

By September 12, 2022No Comments

Driving the Day: 

Must Read Stories

Two Key Trump Aides, Including Stephen Miller, Subpoenaed In DOJ January 6 Investigation

  • New York Times: Two Top Trump Political Aides Among Those Subpoenaed in Jan. 6 Case: The Justice Department has subpoenaed two former top White House political advisers under President Donald J. Trump as part of a widening investigation related to Mr. Trump’s post-election fund-raising and plans for so-called fake electors, according to people briefed on the matter. Brian Jack, the final White House political director under Mr. Trump, and Stephen Miller, Mr. Trump’s top speechwriter and a senior policy adviser, were among more than a dozen people connected to the former president to receive subpoenas from a federal grand jury this week. The subpoenas seek information in connection with the Save America political action committee and the plan to submit slates of electors pledged to Mr. Trump from swing states that were won by Joseph R. Biden Jr. in the 2020 election. Mr. Trump and his allies promoted the idea that competing slates of electors would justify blocking or delaying certification of Mr. Biden’s Electoral College win during a joint session of Congress on Jan. 6, 2021. A lawyer for Mr. Miller declined to comment. Mr. Jack, who remains an adviser to Mr. Trump as well as to Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the House Republican leader, and several other House Republicans, declined to comment. A subpoena does not indicate someone is under investigation, but the Justice Department may send one to people from whom it is seeking information.

January 6 Committee Hearings To Restart This Month 

  • Wall Street Journal: Jan. 6 Panel to Restart Hearings as House Returns to Work:  Members of the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, storming of the Capitol are returning to work to plan a new round of televised hearings expected later this month, hoping to recapture the public’s attention after Congress’s August break. One focus of the hearings is likely to be the concerns among cabinet officials about then-President Donald Trump’s actions during and after the riot by his supporters, including any discussions about possibly using the Constitution’s 25th Amendment to try to remove him from power. Under the amendment, a majority of the cabinet, with the vice president, can temporarily unseat the president if they find him unable to discharge his duties.
  • Politico: 16 Weeks Left For A Heap Of Questions: Jan. 6 Panel Weighs Its Endgame: Should they seek Donald Trump’s testimony? What should they do with Republican lawmakers who defied subpoenas? Will they be able to negotiate an interview with Mike Pence? Members of the Jan. 6 select committee are confronting a momentous to-do list, including some of their most precedent-setting decisions, as they prepare to present closing arguments about the former president’s bid to overturn his loss in 2020. With barely 16 weeks until the panel dissolves, its nine lawmakers are still deciding when to release a comprehensive final report, as well as hundreds of witness transcripts that could provide extensive new details about Trump’s behavior surrounding the Capitol attack. And that’s not all. The panel is expected to soon announce additional public hearings, finalize efforts to obtain the testimony of two crucial Secret Service witnesses and issue legislative recommendations designed to prevent future attempted disruptions to the transfer of power. The Justice Department’s investigation into Trump’s possession of highly classified material at his Mar-a-Lago estate is vacuuming up some of the national headlines that they made earlier in the summer, but select panel members are determined not to let their inquiry peter out and believe they’ve moved the needle.

From Coast To Coast Election Offices Are Being Flooded With Coordinated Misinformation Attacks And Nonsensical Records Requests

  • Washington Post: Trump Backers Flood Election Offices With Requests As 2022 Vote Nears: Supporters of former president Donald Trump have swamped local election offices across the nation in recent weeks with a coordinated campaign of requests for 2020 voting records, in some cases paralyzing preparations for the fall election season. In nearly two dozen states and scores of counties, election officials are fielding what many describe as an unprecedented wave of public records requests in the final weeks of summer, one they say may be intended to hinder their work and weaken an already strained system. The avalanche of sometimes identically worded requests has forced some to dedicate days to the process of responding even as they scurry to finalize polling locations, mail out absentee ballots and prepare for early voting in October, officials said. In Wisconsin, one recent request asks for 34 different types of documents. In North Carolina, hundreds of requests came in at state and local offices on one day alone. In Kentucky, officials don’t recognize the technical-sounding documents they’re being asked to produce — and when they seek clarification, the requesters say they don’t know, either. The use of mass records requests by the former president’s supporters effectively weaponizes laws aimed at promoting principles of a democratic system — that the government should be transparent and accountable. Public records requests are a key feature of that system, used by regular citizens, journalists and others. In interviews, officials emphasized that they are trying to follow the law and fulfill the requests, but they also believe the system is being abused.
  • Associated Press: Fighting Bogus Claims A Growing Priority In Election Offices:  Election officials preparing for the rapidly approaching midterm elections have one more headache: trying to combat misinformation that sows distrust about voting and results while fueling vitriol aimed at rank-and-file election workers. Some states and counties are devoting more money or staff to a problem that has only grown more concerning since the 2020 presidential election and the false claims that it was marred by widespread fraud. A barrage of misinformation in some places has led election officials to complain that Facebook parent Meta, Twitter and other social media platforms aren’t doing enough to help them tackle the problem. “Our voters are angry and confused. They simply don’t know what to believe,” Lisa Marra, elections director in Cochise County, Arizona, told a U.S. House committee last month. “We’ve got to repair this damage.” Many election offices are taking matters into their own hands, starting public outreach campaigns to provide accurate information about how elections are run and how ballots are cast and counted. That means traveling town halls in Arizona, “Mythbuster Mondays” in North Carolina and animated videos in Ohio emphasizing the accuracy of election results. Connecticut is hiring a dedicated election misinformation analyst.

One Third Of Americans Hold Anti-Democratic Beliefs 

  • Axios: Two Americas Index: Democracy Deniers: About one in three Americans prefers strong unelected leaders to weak elected leaders and says presidents should be able to remove judges over their decisions, according to the latest findings from our Axios-Ipsos Two Americas Index. Why it matters: The findings from this poll shatter the myth that Americans overwhelmingly agree on a common set of democratic values around checks and balances on elected leaders, protection of minority rights and freedom of speech. They’re also a reality check against President Biden’s speech that portrayed threats to democracy as solely driven by Republican supporters of former President Trump who refuse to accept that he lost the 2020 election. [….] The big picture: If you’re looking for good news in this poll, it is primarily that the people who embrace the anti-democratic views are still in the minority. But the findings are a reminder that for all of the attention and congressional hearings around the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, anti-democratic views take many forms.

Vice President Harris Warns That Election Deniers Are Weakening The US Reputation Around The World 

  • Politico: Election Deniers Damage U.S. Reputation On The World Stage, Harris Says: Election deniers and elected officials who back rioters from the Jan. 6 insurrection are responsible for eroding the United States’ reputation on the world stage, Vice President Kamala Harris said in an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press” set to air Sunday. “Through the process of what we’ve been through, we’re starting to allow people to call into question our commitment to those principles,” Harris said. “And that’s a shame.” The remark was in response to a question by host Chuck Todd about the message that internal threats to American democracy send to the outside world, part of a wide-ranging interview. Attacks on democracy are “very dangerous, and I think it is very harmful. And it makes us weaker,” Harris said.

In The States 

ARIZONA:  Even The Public Utility Regulator In Arizona Wants To Hold A Public Hearing On Voting Machines 

  • Arizona Republic: Arizona Utility Regulator Wants Public Hearing On ‘Voting Machines’:  Utility regulator Jim O’Connor wants the five members of the Arizona Corporation Commission to conduct a hearing on “voting machines” in Arizona, in hopes they will recommend that counties abandon the use of modern technology in the upcoming election and “do one the old-fashioned way.”  Corporation Commissioners usually spend their time approving rates and tariffs for electric, water and gas utilities. They also oversee pipeline and railroad safety, and securities offered for investments to Arizonans. They do not regulate elections. But O’Connor, a Republican elected in 2020 after an against-the-odds write-in campaign, says he’d like a public hearing on the use of voting machines in Arizona in hopes it would convince election officials to abandon them and count ballots by hand.

PENNSYLVANIA: Doug Mastriano Prayed For MAGA To “Seize The Power” Before January 6 

  • Rolling Stone: Caught on Tape: Doug Mastriano Prayed for MAGA to ‘Seize the Power’ Ahead of Jan. 6: A week before Jan. 6, on a Zoom call organized by far-right Christian Nationalists seeking to reinstall Donald Trump in the White House, a man with a booming baritone voice bowed his bald head and began to pray. “We remember the promises of old,” he said, before invoking the book of Revelations and its account of the End Times: “We know we overcome Satan by the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony and not loving our lives unto death.” Seated before a Revolutionary War flag with the motto “An Appeal to Heaven,” the man spoke of the nation’s founding in biblical terms: “We remember 1776, our Declaration of Independence, speaking God’s Truth and Word over what would become the United States of America.” He tied Pennsylvania to God’s divine plan, from the Battle of Gettysbug to the fate of Flight 93, which crashed after a “strong Christian man” confronted Islamist hijackers on 9/11, with the cry, “Let’s roll!” “God I ask you that you help us roll in these dark times, that we fear not the darkness, that we will seize our Esther and Gideon moments,” the man said, invoking a pair of Old Testament heroes who made themselves instruments of God’s vengeance. “We’re surrounded by wickedness and fear, and dithering, and inaction,” he added, “But that’s not our problem. Our problem is following Your lead.” Looking ahead to Jan 6, the man said: “I pray that… we’ll seize the power that we had given to us by the Constitution, and as well by You, providentially. I pray for the leaders also in the federal government, God, on the Sixth of January that they will rise up with boldness.” The man was state senator Doug Mastriano, now the Republican nominee to be the next governor of Pennsylvania. As he spoke, Mastriano held up letters to Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy that he said Trump personally asked him to write to the Republican leaders “outlining the fraud in Pennsylvania.” He implored that Congress “disregard” the certified election results for the state, “in Jesus’ name, amen.”

VIRGINIA: Despite No Evidence Of Widespread voter Fraud, VA AG Launches 20 Attorney “Election Integrity” Unit 

  • DCist: Virginia’s Republican Attorney General Creates ‘Election Integrity’ Unit To Investigate Voter Fraud: State officials in Virginia announced this week they’ve created a new unit to investigate possible violations of election law in Virginia, where any evidence of voter fraud is scant and recent elections have run smoothly. The commonwealth’s Republican Attorney General, Jason Miyares, will lead the unit of prosecutors, attorneys, and paralegals. The Election Integrity unit, as it’s called, will provide legal advice to the state’s department of elections, investigate and prosecute any violations of election law, and partner with law enforcement to ensure fair elections, according to a press release from Miyares’ office on Friday. The new department is designed to “restore confidence in the our democratic process in the Commonwealth,” the attorney general says in the release. The unit, consisting of more than 20 attorneys, investigators, and paralegals, will work with the 133 local elections boards across Virginia starting with the upcoming election. (Early voting begins in Virginia on Sept. 17.) But the unit the unit does not appear to be a response to any specific instances of fraud. Miyares’ office has found no widespread voter fraud linked to the 2020 election, spokesperson Victoria LaCivita told DCist.

What Experts Are Saying

Timothy Snyder, Richard C. Levin Professor of History and Global Affairs at Yale University: “For 30 years, too many Americans took for granted that democracy was something that someone else did—or rather, that something else did: history by ending, alternatives by disappearing, capitalism by some inexplicable magic. (Russia and China are capitalist, after all.) That era ended when Zelensky emerged one night in February to film himself saying, ‘The president is here.’ If a leader believes that democracy is just a result of larger factors, then he will flee when those larger factors seem to be against him. The issue of responsibility will never arise. But democracy demands ‘earnest struggle,’ as the American abolitionist Frederick Douglass said. Ukrainian resistance to what appeared to be overwhelming force reminded the world that democracy is not about accepting the apparent verdict of history. It is about making history; striving toward human values despite the weight of empire, oligarchy, and propaganda; and, in so doing, revealing previously unseen possibilities.” Foreign Affairs 

Ruth Ben-Ghiat, professor of history at New York University: “[I]t’s one thing to call Tucker Carlson a fascist or Paul Gosar or all these people or Trump himself. It’s another thing to label all Republican voters who might like Trump for many reasons. It’s to label them all. Fascists isn’t perhaps very productive, because if you’re trying to get them away, if you’re trying to pry them away. And that’s why Biden was very careful to say MAGA extremists are a part of the Republican, you know, universe. But there are many Republicans who are not like that. And I think that’s probably accurate because we know even from studying regimes, there are people who go along with things or they’re just brainwashed. And secretly those some of those people are looking for an offramp. They’re looking for an exit.” Crooked Media’s Positively Dreadful podcast 

Barbara McQuade, former US attorney: “It’s telling that Trump’s lawyers do not repeat in court filings his claims of declassification or planted evidence. In court, lies can get you sanctioned or disbarred. But Trump’s baseless claims undermine public trust and fuel extremist violence.” Tweet 

Headlines

The MAGA Movement And The Ongoing Threat To Elections

Associated Press: GOP hopefuls for election posts see enemies within own party

Bloomberg: Mar-a-Lago Search Put FBI on High Alert for Pro-Trump Protest Violence

New Yorker: How Trump Supporters Came to Hate the Police

Politico: Republicans look to restrict ballot measures following a string of progressive wins

Washington Post: An ex-professor spreads election myths across the U.S., one town at a time

January 6 And The 2020 Election

CNBC: Former Trump White House lawyer Ty Cobb calls him ‘deeply wounded narcissist’ who acted in ‘criminal’ way to overturn Biden win

CNN: ‘I’m just not going to leave’: New book reveals Trump vowed to stay in White House

Grid: The Jan. 6 committee called Trump’s money machine a ‘big rip off.’ Now the DOJ is investigating.

Politico: They Voted to Overturn an Election. Did Their Obits Let Them Off the Hook?

Politico: House GOP eyes its own Trump-free Jan. 6 inquiry

Reuters: Georgia probe into Trump examines chaplain’s role in election meddling

Washington Post: Proud Boys who scrawled ‘Murder the Media’ at Capitol plead guilty

Other Trump Investigations 

Axios: Sneak peek: How Trump fired his man in Manhattan

CNN: Judge throws out Trump’s sprawling lawsuit against Hillary Clinton, ex-FBI officials over Russia probe

PIttsburgh Post Gazette: Senators press for details about fake heiress at Mar-a-Lago

Politico: Trump judges are on a tear

Opinion

New York Times (Katherine Miller): The Future of Election Skepticism Is Arizona

Washington Post (Greg Sargent): An ugly GOP election scam in Michigan unmasks a big right-wing lie

Political Violence

Boston Globe: Police investigating another threat called in to Boston Children’s Hospital

In The States 

Bolts: Michigan Republicans Stumble in Dress Rehearsal for Overturning Future Elections

Philadelphia Inquirer: Doug Mastriano’s security bubble insulates him from prying eyes and dissenting views