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The congressional attempt to expose any direct role that Donald Trump and his top associates played in the January 6th assault on the U.S. Capitol is intensifying. This week, the House select committee investigating the attack issued subpoenas to sixteen former senior Trump Administration and campaign officials, including the former White House adviser Stephen Miller and the former press secretary Kayleigh McEnany. A federal judge roundly dismissed Trumps effort to block his allies from having to testify before the committee, including his erstwhile strategist Steve Bannon. Legal experts suggested that the judges ruling could prompt Attorney General Merrick Garland to criminally prosecute Bannon for refusing to testify, a step that may induce others to coperate. And, late on Thursday, the committee threatened to hold Trumps former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, who spent hours with Trump on January 6th, in contempt if he does not testify on Friday morning.

Meanwhile, in a speech in New Hampshire, Liz Cheney, the committees vice-chair and one of the few Republicans daring to challenge Trump while seeking relection, said that the nation is confronting a domestic threat that weve never faced before: a former President whos attempting to unravel the foundations of our constitutional republic, aided by political leaders who have made themselves willing hostages to this dangerous and irrational man. She added, Political leaders who sit silent in the face of these false and dangerous claims are aiding a former President who is at war with the rule of law and the Constitution.

The political reality, though, is that Trumps hold on the Republican Party remains iron. A recent Morning Consult / Politico poll found that sixty-seven per cent of Republicans want Trump to run for President in 2024, a slight increase from several months ago. Other surveys showed similar numbers. The Republican nomination would likely be his for the taking, Nathaniel RakichandMackenzie Wilkes wrote on FiveThirtyEight. He remainsextremelypopular among Republicans.And opinion polls suggest that three-quarters of Wyoming Republicans plan to oppose Cheney when a Trump-backed candidate challenges her in the 2022 primary. Hours after Cheneys speech, Trump declared, in trademark Orwellian fashion, She is a threat to Free and Fair elections, adding that the 2020 election had been stolen from him in the Crime of the Century.

The situation is unprecedented. A former American President refuses to concede that he lost the election. He has launched a public effort to drive the state election officials who certified his defeat from office. He continues to employ the lies and rhetoric that helped incite violence on January 6th. And this week an independent review alleged that thirteen former Trump Administration officialsincluding Meadows and Trumps son-in-law, Jared Kushnercampaigned illegally for him in the final weeks of the 2020 election. Its increasingly clear to many observers that Trump plans to make every attempt to insure that he or an acolyte wins the 2024 election at any cost. On Wednesday, a hundred former national-security officials, Republicans and Democratsincluding Christopher Krebs, the former director of the Department of Homeland Securitys cybersecurity agency, who was hired and fired by the Trump Administrationpublished an open letter to Congress, warning that partisan interference, intimidation campaigns, and disinformation are rapidly undermining American democracy. In the course of our careers, many of us have analyzed the threats posed by unstable democracies elsewhere, never imagining we would begin to see similar threats at home, they wrote. Sadly, that moment has arrived.

Democrats focus on the fact that, among Americans as a whole, Trump remains broadly unpopular, with fifty-three per cent viewing him unfavorably and forty-one per cent seeing him favorably. Bidens numbers, though, arent much better, with fifty-one per cent approving of his performance in office and forty-three per cent disapproving. While political analysts and legal experts lose sleep over Trumps continued claims that he won in 2020, most Americans, according to Gallup polling, see COVID, the economy, and poor leadership as the countrys three most important problems. Only one per cent cited the need for election reform. If Republicans win control of the House in the 2022 midterm elections, they would almost certainly disband the January 6th committee and end its investigation.

Members of the committee vow to achieve results before then. The panel plans to produce a definitive account of Trumps actions and to propose laws that will prevent future Presidents from interfering in the Electoral College vote count. In a court hearing last week, Douglas Letter, a lawyer for the committee, said that investigators are seeking White House documents dating back to April, 2020, to help determine whether Trump engaged in a months-long effort to discredit the results if he lost. We think, maybe, this all ties in with... the fomenting of it, building a groundswell of feeling that this election was going to be tainted, Letter said. Timothy Mulvey, the committees communications director, told me that most witnesses called are coperating. Even among former Administration officials, he said, very few have flatly refused to comply with a subpoena. He added, about Trumps legal attempts to block the investigation, The former Presidents aim is to delay and impede our probe, but the committees work willnonethelesscontinue to move forward quickly.

Stephen Gillers, a professor of law at New York University, said that Attorney General Garland may wait for higher courts to rule on Trumps legal claims, but he believes that Garland will eventually prosecute Bannon. Gillers pointed out that if Bannon is not charged, those who were subpoenaed this week might be encouraged to try waiting out the investigation. Garland knows that, Gillers said, adding, Everything we know about his devotion to the rule of law makes me confident that hewill not allow that to happen.

Ilya Somin, a libertarian legal scholar at George Mason University, predicted that the higher courts will uphold the committees right to subpoena individuals significantly involved in the events leading up to January 6th. It seems to me that it should be a no-brainer, that Congress should be able to subpoena witnesses, he said, particularly those who may have played a role in an attack on Congress. Somin doubts that the committees investigation will produce conclusive evidence of seditious acts by Trump. I think sedition is a high hill to climb, unless the committee uncovers some dramatic new information, he said. The broader political challenge is the countrys seemingly intractable polarization. Like the two impeachment trials of Trump, the January 6th probe may simply harden existing divisions rather than ease them. Barring some dramatic revelation, Im not sure it will fundamentally change anything, he said.

Cheney, in her speech, said that the country is in a time of testing and implored political leaders to recognize the fragility of American democracy. Will we defend our Constitution? Will we stand for truth? Will we put duty to our oath above partisan politics? she asked. Or will we look away from the danger, ignore the threat, embrace the lies and enable the liar? There is no gray area when it comes to that question. When it comes to this moment, there is no middle ground.She is right that Americas drift toward authoritarianism continues, but it is not inevitable.

Originally posted here:
The January 6th Investigation Gets Closer to Donald Trump - The New Yorker

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Corey Lewandowski, who served as former President Donald Trump's 2016 campaign manager, said that Trump knew the 2020 election was over when the major news networks projected his loss, but wanted to sow doubt about the results so he could say "he didn't lose," according to a new book by ABC News correspondent Jonathan Karl.

Lewandowski, who was also an aide to Trump in 2020, made the comments during a phone call with Karl just days after President Joe Biden was declared the winner of the election last November. Trump had not conceded and continued to baselessly claim that the election was stolen from him. Karl asked Lewandowski for his thoughts on how the situation would play out.

"He knows it is over," Lewandowski told Karl about Trump. "He just wants to create enough doubt about Biden's victory so that when he leaves he can say he didn't lose and that it was stolen from him."

The conversation is reported in Karl's forthcoming book, "Betrayal: The Final Act of the Trump Show," which comes out on Tuesday. Insider obtained an early copy of the book.

In the months leading up to Election Day, Trump repeatedly claimed without evidence that voting by mail would lead to fraud. Election officials and experts rejected the statements as misinformation, and millions of Americans securely cast their ballots by mail in the 2020 election.

After Trump lost, he elevated conspiracy theories that the election was "stolen" from him and "rigged" against him because of widespread voter fraud. Election officials again said the claims were false and there was no evidence of fraud. Trump's own Department of Homeland Security said the election "was the most secure in American history."

Still, Trump continued to spread falsehoods about the election. In December 2020, a Gallup poll found that only 17% of Republicans said reports about Biden's victory were accurate.

Trump acknowledged that a new administration would be inaugurated during a farewell speech he gave a day before he left the White House, but he did not formally concede or admit he lost the election.

Now, more than a year after the election, Trump continues to cling to this narrative and several recent polls have shown that a majority of Republicans are still convinced the election was stolen from him.

Most Republicans overall said they don't trust elections in the country, according to an NPR poll in November.

Lewandowski did not immediately return Insider's request for comment.

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Corey Lewandowski said Trump knew the election was over but wanted to sow doubt: book - Business Insider

Cheney has to beat Trump's hold on the GOP to keep her seat in Wyoming

Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney soured GOP voters when she turned on Donald Trump; now she faces his endorsed candidate and his hold on the Republican Party.

Hannah Gaber, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., rejoined her battle with Donald Trump on Tuesday, condemning Republican leaders for following a"dangerous and irrational man" who is at "war with the rule of law and the Constitution."

Noting that public officials swear an oath to defend the U.S. Constitution, Cheney told a crowd at a speaking eventin New Hampshire that "too many political leaders seem to have forgotten the sacred nature of that oath" in failing to speak against Trump's lies regarding the outcomeof the 2020 presidential election.

Cheney said the nation is confronting "a domesticthreat that we've neverfaced before:A former president who's attempting to unravel the foundations of our constitutional republic, aided by political leaderswho have made themselves willing hostages to this dangerous and irrational man."

More: Liz Cheney vs. Trump: The feud forcing Wyoming to ask hard questions

More: 'Just the Trump party:' Liz Cheney's demotion proves Trump still rules Republican politics, experts say

Cheney noted that Trump delivered a keynote address at a House Republican campaign fundraiser on Monday night. Trump, she said,repeated his false claims about voter fraud and claimedthat the real insurrectionwas on Election Day in November, while theJan. 6 riot was a justified protest.

"Political leaders who sit silent in the face of these false and dangerous claims are aiding a former president who is at war with the rule of law and the Constitution," she said, and are risking more violence in the future.

Trump is has made Cheney a top political target after she and nine other House Republicans voted to impeach him for inciting the Jan. 6 riot. Trump is supporting a primary challenger to Cheney in Wyoming.

In a series of statements, Trump described Cheney as a "war monger" and a "lap dog" to House Democrats. "To look at her is to despise her," he said on Oct. 20.

More: Donald Trump endorses Wyoming lawyer Harriet Hageman in GOP primary against Liz Cheney

More: 'I will not sit back': In fiery speech, Rep. Liz Cheney calls Trump a 'threat'

Cheney is also battling House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and other GOP members who voted to remove her from her congressional leadership position because of her criticism of Trump.

Cheney, one of two Republican members of the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot, continues to seek national forums to critique the former Republican president. Her speech Tuesday came at a free speech awards ceremony hosted bythe Nackey Loeb School of Communications in Manchester, N.H.

New Hampshire, as always, is expected to hold the first Republican primary of the 2024 presidential campaign. Cheney has not said whether she plans to run for president.

Next year, Cheney is scheduled to give a speech on the future of the Republican Party, part of a speakers series sponsored by theRonaldReaganPresidential Foundation & Institute.

In her remarks in New Hampshire, Cheney said too many people were downplaying the violence of Jan. 6 by saying that the "institutions held." The nation may not be so lucky if there is a next time, she said.

"Our institutions do not defend themselves," Cheney said. "We the people defend them."

Continue reading here:
Liz Cheney hits fellow Republicans for following 'dangerous and irrational' Donald Trump - USA TODAY

The conventional wisdom after the tight gubernatorial races in Virginia and New Jersey and as the congressional midterm contests get underway in earnest is that Democratic candidates who focus their upcoming campaigns on attacking Donald Trump are unlikely to be elected.

Instead, they have to talk about the issues that actually matter to voters. High gas prices, say, and climbing inflation. Or old standbys like decent schools and usable roads. Or the persistence of COVID-19.

Waving ones arms and screaming about Jan. 6 and the zombie-like return of the fearsome orange-haired ogre simply will not be sufficient.

Opinion Columnist

Nicholas Goldberg

Nicholas Goldberg served 11 years as editor of the editorial page and is a former editor of the Op-Ed page and Sunday Opinion section.

Yelling Trump, Trump, Trump when Mr. Trump is not on the ballot or in office is no longer a viable campaign strategy, wrote veteran Democratic pollster Mark Penn and former Democratic politician Andrew Stein in an op-ed last week in the New York Times.

Terry McAuliffe and the Democrats tried to run against Trump in Virginia, but their strategy backfired, tweeted an exultant Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel.

This discussion of campaign tactics matters. A lot. The Senate is currently controlled, just barely, by Democrats, thanks only to the tiebreaking vote of Vice President Kamala Harris. If even one seat were to flip to the Republicans in November, it would shift the balance.

In the House, there are eight more Democrats than Republicans, but since World War II the presidents party has lost more than two dozen seats on average during midterm elections.

Control of Congress is absolutely necessary if President Biden is to achieve even a fraction of his agenda. Losing even one house would likely lead to complete legislative paralysis.

So winning these coming campaigns is tremendously important for Democrats, and Im in no position to second-guess the strategists. If they say dont make Trump the focus, they may well be right.

But forgive me if I take a moment to raise a scream of agony to the heavens: What in the world is wrong with the voters?

Why isnt Trump the issue?

Isnt the anti-Trump argument really the only argument that matters? At this particular moment in American history, doesnt almost every other issue pale in comparison? Republican and Democratic voters alike ought to recognize the dangers that face the country if this dishonest, anti-democratic, twice-impeached demagogue returns to power. They should demand that the midterm candidates for House and Senate declare whether theyre with the former president or, as they should be, against him.

Republican officeholders who have sold their souls by cravenly capitulating to Trump and his falsehoods about the 2020 election should be voted out of Congress. Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Bakersfield) and his ilk have shown themselves to be dangerous and unprincipled, and they should pay for their irresponsibility.

I know there are plenty of Republicans who think that people like me are still in the grip of some sort of Trump derangement syndrome. But in my view, a second Trump term in office would be catastrophic for the United States, its reputation, its moral standing, its democratic process and its peace and security not to mention for the future of the climate and the planet.

The mere possibility of a Trump restoration in 2024 should have voters of all parties leaping from their couches as if stung and running for the polls to vote no.

Sure, issues matter. It would be highly presumptuous of me to suggest voters shouldnt be concerned about taxes and inflation and schools and all the other matters that make life easier or harder to live day-to-day. Democratic incumbents of course must persuade voters that theyre making progress fulfilling the promises they made during the last campaign.

But honestly, with the exception of climate change, its hard to think of any single issue that matters as much as the possibility of Trumps return. And empowering his sycophants and enablers in the midterm empowers Trump himself two years later.

When I think that 74 million people voted for Trump in November 2020 even after seeing how he behaved in his first four-year term, I worry for the soul of the nation. Even more distressing is that so many continued to support him after he demonstrated his utter disdain for fair elections, democratic institutions and the rule of law after he lost the race.

Today, most Republicans say they believe Trump actually won the 2020 election, as he keeps claiming. And 44% of Republicans want him to run again in 2024.

Ive lived under other Republican presidents: Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush. I disagreed with them, often strongly, but I didnt dread them. I didnt believe they would put their own desire for power over the rule of law or the good of the country.

Well, maybe Nixon. But even he wasnt as reprehensible as Trump.

Today, its possible that voters have put Trump out of their minds, and are focused on gas prices and the like. If so, by all means Democratic candidates need to speak to those subjects in their campaigns. If the price of defeating Trumpism is ignoring Trump, I can live with that.

But Im under no illusions: Hes the real threat behind the scenes, and he must not be allowed to return to office. That struggle begins now.

@Nick_Goldberg

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Nicholas Goldberg: Experts tell Democrats not to focus on Trump. But hes still the real issue - Los Angeles Times

Michael Flynn, Donald Trumps first national security adviser, was widely condemned after calling for the establishment of one religion in the US.

Religious freedom is enshrined in the first amendment to the US constitution, which says Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.

Regardless, at a rally staged in San Antonio on Saturday by the Christian nonprofit news media network American Faith, Flynn said: If we are going to have one nation under God, which we must, we have to have one religion. One nation under God and one religion under God.

In response, the Minnesota Democrat Ilhan Omar, one of the first Muslim women elected to Congress, said: These people hate the US constitution.

Mark Hertling, a retired general and media commentator, called Flynn, himself a retired general, an embarrassment to the US army.

His words are disgusting, Hertling said.

On Sunday, the veteran reporter Carl Bernstein told CNN that Flynn, as one of the knaves and fools and dangerous authoritarian figures with whom Trump surrounded himself in and out of office, was saying out loud things that have never been said by an aide or close associates to the president of the United States.

Bernstein added: It should be no surprise to know that Michael Flynn is saying the kind of things that he is saying, but whats most significant here is that much of the Republican party something like 35% in in exit polls said they favour Trump because Christianity is being taken away from them.

So Michael Flynn is not that far away from huge numbers of people in this country.

Flynn is no stranger to controversy. Fired from a senior intelligence role by Barack Obama, he became a close aide to Trump before resigning as national security adviser after less than a month in the role, for lying to the FBI about contacts with Russians.

Flynn pleaded guilty to one criminal charge under Robert Muellers investigation of Russian election interference and links between Trump and Moscow, a plea he sought to withdraw before receiving a pardon from Trump.

He has since emerged as an influential figure on the far right, linked to the QAnon conspiracy theory and appearing to advocate armed insurrection.

In San Antonio, Flynn called the indictment of another Trump ally, Steve Bannon, over the investigation of the Capitol attack, an abuse of freedom of speech another first amendment freedom.

The Capitol was attacked on 6 January by Trump supporters seeking to overturn his election defeat. Flynn is himself the subject of a subpoena from the investigating House committee. On Friday, he told Fox News he had nothing to hide.

In Texas, Flynn called the House investigation a crucifixion of our first amendment freedom to speak, freedom to peacefully assemble.

His remarks about religion attracted support from a prominent contender in a vicious party fight for a Republican Senate nomination in Ohio.

Josh Mandel, a former Ohio state treasurer, tweeted: We stand with General Flynn.

Mandels own religion has been the subject of debate and controversy. In September, the Forward published an op-ed which asked if he was obscuring his Jewishness in order to appeal to far-right Christian voters.

In response, Mandel described himself as a Proud American. Proud Jew. Proud Marine. Proud Zionist. Everything Democrats hate.

Mandels religion was the subject of a controversial attack ad from another Republican hopeful, Mark Pukita, who denied charges of antisemitism.

Amid criticism of his support for Flynn, Mandel said freedom of religion [is not equal to] freedom FROM religion. He also said: America was not founded as a secular nation.

Link:
Trump ally Michael Flynn condemned over call for one religion in US - The Guardian