After the second week of hearings from the Select Committee on January 6th, it is clearer than ever that Donald Trump knew his plot to overturn the will of the people was unconstitutional and illegal and chose to forge ahead regardless. The starkest takeaway was that the threat that Trump and his MAGA allies pose to future elections continues to this day. We must hold all individuals accountable for their actions, including presidents and members of Congress, in order to protect our right to vote and choose those who represent us. 

Here’s what you need to know for the weekend:

Main Points for the Weekend:  

1. Trump ignored his closest advisors and pressured Vice President Pence to stop the certification and count of electoral votes. Senior White House advisors,the legal team, and even the plan’s architect himself, John Eastman, made clear this scheme was illegal and unconstitutional. When Pence refused, Trump incited the violent mob who attacked the Capitol. 

• • Top point to make: Trump and his MAGA allies will stop at nothing to override the will of the people in their attempt to overturn elections they lose, including criminal and unconstitutional routes. 
  • If you read one thing: Wall Street Journal, 6/16/22: Witnesses Lay Out How Pence Resisted Pressure to Block 2020 Election Results. “Mr. Trump and allies had advanced legal theories that the vice president could reject electors from certain states or suspend the counting of votes for 10 days and turn the matter back to those states, and publicly pressured Mr. Pence to embrace that position. Mr. Pence, meanwhile, remained dead set against interfering in the outcome, seeing his job as purely ceremonial, a stance that frustrated the president and his supporters.”

2. Trump’s closest advisors repeatedly told him conspiracy theories about voter fraud were false. Top Trump advisors, lawyers, and family members, including former Attorney General Bill Barr, testified to the committee that Trump’s claims of voter fraud were “bullshit” and “nonsense”. Trump continued to push unfounded election fraud conspiracy theories, before, during, and after the events of January 6. He’s still pushing them.

• • Top point to make: Trump knew that his claims he won the election were lies, but continued to rally his base around them in an attempt to overthrow the will of the people.
  • If you read one thing: The Washington Post, 6/13/22: Trump’s inner circle warned him election-fraud claims were false. “Former attorney general William P. Barr, meanwhile, told the committee in a deposition earlier this month that he concluded early on after the November 2020 vote that the stolen-election claims “were completely bogus and silly and usually based on complete misinformation… “My opinion then and my opinion now is that the election was not stolen by fraud,” Barr said in the deposition. “And I haven’t seen anything since the election that changes my mind on that.”

3. Trump and his MAGA allies are waging an ongoing campaign to sabotage future elections. Luttig says Trump and his supporters remain a “clear and present danger” to American democracy because they “pledge” in 2024 to overturn another election, should he or an ally run and be defeated.

• • Top point to make: Judge Luttig was right: Trump and his allies do represent a clear and present threat to our ability to pick who leads us.
  • If you read one thing: ABC News, 6/17/22: Jan. 6, primaries combine to highlight ‘clear and present danger’: The Note. “Perhaps the most resonant takeaway of the latest Jan. 6 committee hearing was the strong message that threats to democracy didn’t end on that fateful day–or with the end of the Trump presidency. “Donald Trump and his allies and supporters are a clear and present danger to our democracy,” J. Michael Luttig, the former federal judge who advised then-Vice President Mike Pence on how to handle his role in counting electoral votes, told the committee in closing on Thursday. “That’s not because of Jan. 6.” As Luttig noted, Trump continues to spread false claims about the last election — while he and his followers put in place assurances that they will ‘succeed in 2024 where they failed in 2020.”

Expert voices

Elizabeth Wydra, Constitutional Accountability Center president: “It was really just an avalanche of evidence that the election fraud claims that President Trump kept making repeatedly after the election were, in the words of Attorney General Bill Barr, ‘complete nonsense,’ ‘silly,’ ‘bogus,’ ‘not meritorious.’ Over and over again, these very clear statements that President Trump’s lies about the election were just that, lies.” Fox Live Now 

Ryan Goodman, Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz professor of law at New York University: “Key mens rea evidence #January6thCommitteeHearings: Barr on Trump: ‘NEVER AN INDICATION OF INTEREST in what the actual facts were’ in assessing fraud allegations. Barr later: “After the election [Trump] didn’t seem to be listening” to advisors with facts of no fraud.” Tweet 

Barbara McQuade, former US Attorney: “While it’s important for J6C to tell the whole story, a criminal case could be as simple as this: Trump knew he lost the election and pressured Pence to steal it for him. That’s conspiracy to defraud US, 18 USC 371, and conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, 18 USC 1512.” Tweet 

Laura Coates, former federal prosecutor: “Every time you heard about… him claiming fraud or searching for fraud against all rational thought, he was essentially committing overt acts and furtherance of fraud – defrauding the United States by deceptive action. There is every inference he was aware that he was no longer the president of the United States…They have laid out the basic tenets of establishing defrauding the government of the United States. Trying to stop an electoral college certification by deceit and corrupt means.” CNN’s Hearing Special Coverage 

Joyce Vance, former US Attorney: “Prosecutors don’t have to prove motive but it can help make the evidence more compelling: Trump continued with the big lie after repeatedly being advised he’d lost & there wasn’t fraud because he made money off of it. & he funneled that money to people & businesses close to him.” Tweet 

Harry Litman, former US Attorney, and Deputy Assistant Attorney General: “Here you go:  normally no litigation would occur past 12/14, but they continued to do it b/c they were able to raise millions of dollars from it.  b/t Election Day and jan 6, campaign sent up to 20 emails/day to supporters. soliciting to a non-existent fund. Raised $250 million!” Tweet 

Heather Cox Richardson, professor of history at Boston College: “Across the country, Republicans have rewritten election laws to prevent another “stolen” election, even though they know there was no such thing. As leading Republican election lawyer Benjamin Ginsberg said today, “The 2020 election was not close.” Nonetheless, leading Republicans are willing to embrace the Big Lie in order to skew our election system to keep those like Trump in power.” Letters from An American 

Neal K. Katyal, former acting solicitor general: “But the only way we as Americans have control over the decisions of elected bodies and the president in each of these areas is through our votes. If an incumbent president can use the machinery of government to orchestrate a way to throw our votes out, the foundations of our democracy will have crumbled.” New York Times  

Brendan Nyhan, American political scientist at Dartmouth College: “The GOP whip laying the groundwork for overturning the 2024 election. Happening right in front of us. ‘And GOP Whip Steve Scalise explained his objection vote at a presser: ‘You saw some states not follow their state-passed legislation. I mean, the Constitution doesn’t say states determine how to pick electors, it says state legislatures determine how to pick electors,’ he said.” Tweet 

NYT’s Spencer Bokat-Lindell on the recent Brookings “Trump on Trial” report: “But it’s also conceivable that they would have to prove that Trump knew with certainty that those efforts were illegal. Some legal experts believe that prosecutors could meet even that higher burden. In a new report for Brookings, Bookbinder, Norman Eisen, Donald Ayer, Joshua Perry, and E. Danya Perry note that Trump was repeatedly told by trusted advisers, experts, and courts that his claims of election fraud were unfounded, and that he attempted to coerce Georgia state officials to ‘find’ just enough votes for him to win — a request plainly inconsistent with the desire to legally contest the falsely alleged fraud.” New York Times 

Noah Bookbinder, president of CREW: “This hearing is in the weeds, but here’s the bottom line, which is important: everyone involved knew that the strategy John Eastman and Donald Trump were pushing was against the law. They went ahead with it anyway. That goes to criminal intent and a naked desire to retain power.” Tweet 

Jason Stanley, Yale University philosophy professor: “The Jan 6 Committee showed that everyone in DC, including all those close to Trump, knew that Biden won the election. So, all those GOP Senators and Congresspeople who voted not to certify the election knew they were attempting to overthrow US democracy. This is about them too.” Tweet 

Ryan Goodman, co-editor-in-chief of Just Security and NYU law professor: “Devastating #January6thHearings
Trump knew Pence had no legal authority
Trump knew was a powder keg
Trump tweets Pence betrayed them ‘poured gasoline on the fire’ (WH aide)
Aware of chants to hang Pence, Trump: ‘Maybe our supporters have the right idea.’ Pence ‘deserves it.’” Tweet