Daily Archives: February 6, 2021

BuzzFeed News; Saul Loeb / AFP via Getty Images

The Trump Organization negotiated on behalf of then-president Donald Trump to make Parler his primary social network, but it had a condition: an ownership stake in return for joining, according to documents and four people familiar with the conversations. The deal was never finalized, but legal experts said the discussions alone, which occurred while Trump was still in office, raise legal concerns with regards to anti-bribery laws.

Talks between members of Trumps campaign and Parler about Trumps potential involvement began last summer, and were revisited in November by the Trump Organization after Trump lost the 2020 election to the Democratic nominee and current president, Joe Biden. Documents seen by BuzzFeed News show that Parler offered the Trump Organization a 40% stake in the company. It is unclear as to what extent the former president was involved with the discussions.

The never-before-reported talks between Trumps business organization and Parler, a social media network that promises less moderation than mainstream sites and is embraced by the far right, provide more insight into the frantic last weeks of Trumps presidency. Until the Jan. 6 insurrection, after which Facebook and Twitter suspended or banned him for continuing to sow discord about the election, Trump used those internet platforms to peddle baseless conspiracy theories. While doing so, his representatives actively negotiated to bring him to Parler, which sought to make the president a business partner who would help it compete with Twitter and Facebook by getting him to post his content on its platform first.

Former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale raised the idea to Trump of taking an ownership stake in Parler during a meeting last year at the White House, according to a source familiar with the negotiations. Parscale had taken an early interest in Parler, and reportedly considered creating an account for Trump on the site in 2019 as a bulwark against Twitter and Facebook.

Brad Parscale, former manager of President Donald Trump's reelection campaign, in Des Moines, Iowa, Jan. 30, 2020

Four sources told BuzzFeed News that Parscale and Trump campaign lawyer Alex Cannon met with Parler CEO John Matze and shareholders Dan Bongino and Jeffrey Wernick at Trumps Florida club Mar-a-Lago in June 2020 to discuss the idea. But the White House counsels office soon put a stop to the talks, one person with knowledge of the discussions said, ruling that such a deal while Trump was president would violate ethics rules.

The president was never part of the discussions, Parscale told BuzzFeed News. The discussions were never that substantive. And this was just one of many things the campaign was looking into to deal with the cancel culture of Silicon Valley.

Parscale was replaced as the Trump campaign manager in July.

Discussions were revived in the weeks following the election, according to two people involved, but the deal fell apart after the Capitol invasion. Following that event, Apple and Google removed Parler from their app stores, and Amazon kicked the company off its cloud hosting service, forcing the site offline. The tech giants determined that Parler had not done enough to moderate hate speech and calls for violence on its platform before, during, and after the Jan. 6 insurrection.

When reached by phone on Friday, Wernick, who called himself an adviser to the company, said that there had been discussions with the Trump Organization about bringing Trump onto the platform, but that the former president had not been involved in those conversations. He also said there were inaccuracies in what BuzzFeed News was reporting, but did not provide specifics on what, if anything, was inaccurate.

We have spoken to several people about potential stakes in the company for producing certain things, Wernick said. He declined to get into the specifics of negotiations citing nondisclosure agreements he said were in place between Parler and the Trump Organization.

Cannon and Matze declined to comment. Bongino and a Parler spokesperson did not respond to emailed requests for comment.

A Trump Organization spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

John Matze during an appearance on Tucker Carlson Tonight

Founded in 2018 by former college roommates John Matze and Jared Thomson, and Rebekah Mercer, the right-wing political donor and daughter of hedge fund magnate Robert Mercer, Parler focused on building a social network that would serve as an alternative to Facebook and Twitter by taking a more lax approach to content moderation. It billed itself as a site that allowed free expression.

While it struggled to gain traction in its early months, it soon became a home for conservative and far-right personalities who had been suspended or banned from mainstream social media. By late 2020, it had become a go-to online gathering place for hate groups, conspiracy theorists, and believers in the QAnon mass delusion, as well as prominent Republican lawmakers, including Sen. Ted Cruz and Rep. Devin Nunes.

On Wednesday, Matze told the Wall Street Journal that the site had 15 million users, including the former presidents sons, Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr., as well as various current and former members of Trumps staff.

Donald Trump, however, never maintained a verified account on that platform, and preferred to keep his daily missives to Twitter and Facebook, where his audience was much larger. He had 88 million followers on Twitter and more than 35 million followers on Facebook before his Twitter ban and indefinite Facebook suspension last month. Trumps son-in-law, Jared Kushner, intervened to keep him off Parler during his last days in office, according to Bloomberg News.

However, in negotiations with the Trump Organization, Parler offered a 40% stake in the company, according to a December document seen by BuzzFeed News and two people with direct knowledge of the proposed deal. Upon completion of that deal, half of that stake would have been given immediately to the Trump Organization, while the other half would have been doled out in tranches over the 24-month period of the agreement.

The Trump Organization, which oversees Trumps brand and real estate interests, is a collection of hundreds of businesses that are owned or controlled by Donald Trump.

As part of the agreement, Parler wanted Trump to make it his primary social network. According to the documents, Trump would have had to post all his social content including daily posts, video, and livestreaming on Parler for at least four hours before putting it on any other platform.

As part of the deal, Parler also asked that Trump link back to Parler when posting to other social media sites or emailing his supporters, and to allow the company to use his email lists to promote its platform. In addition, Parler wanted Trump to make introductions to any potential investors or advertisers.

People familiar with the discussions said they were unclear if Trump was involved with negotiations, which were led from Parlers side by two shareholders, Wernick and Bongino, a popular right-wing personality with close ties to Trump.

Kathleen Clark, a law professor at the Washington University in St. Louis, said that, had the deal gone through while Trump was still in office, both Parler and the president could have been in violation of anti-bribery laws. Because the former president often used his Twitter and Facebook accounts to make official communications for example, announcing the firings of government officials seeking to gain something in exchange for making posts exclusive to another platform could be illegal.

I think it would have actually violated the bribery statute in that he would have been offered something of value a stake in this company in exchange for influencing an official act the act of where to publish his official comments, Clark said.

Scott Amey, general counsel at the Project on Government Oversight, a nonpartisan watchdog group, said the news warranted an immediate criminal investigation. A companys mere act of offering a stake for the presidents participation looks unethical and deserves further scrutiny, he noted.

While then-president Trump bragged that ethics rules didnt apply to him, bribery laws do apply, and courts have held that Trumps social media posts constituted official business while he was in office, Amey said. His posts were a preferred method for the White House to communicate with the public. If the offer included anything of value, and Trump planned to post on a social media platform while he was still in office, that would almost certainly be illegal, and he should be held accountable.

Discussions to bring Trump onto Parler were ultimately derailed by the events of Jan. 6. After months of casting doubt on election results and calling for violence on social media platforms, the presidents supporters stormed the US Capitol. Some posted pictures or videos of their exploits to Parler, which had become a breeding ground for organizing hate and threats ahead of the riot.

The blowback for the company came fast, culminating in Parlers removal from Apple and Googles app stores and Amazon Web Services.

Rebekah Mercer attends the Time 100 Gala at Jazz at Lincoln Center on April 25, 2017, in New York City.

Matze, who said he was fired as Parler CEO last week by Mercer, told the Journal that before he was fired he had tried to implement more content moderation so that Apple and Google would allow the app back into their app stores. He said his suggestion to ban groups based on affiliations with designated domestic terrorism organizations was ultimately resisted by the board.

In a press statement on Thursday, Amy Peikoff, Parlers chief policy officer, called Matzes characterization of his termination misleading but did not say what exactly was inaccurate.

The owners and managers of the company worked tirelessly to build a resilient, non-partisan platform dedicated to freedom of expression, civil discourse, and user privacy, she said in the statement.

With Parlers management in flux, its unclear when the app will come back online. With Matze gone, Mercer who maintains majority control has reportedly designated responsibilities to Matthew Richardson, a British lawyer, and Mark Meckler, a former tea party activist, according to a source.

Mercer, Richardson, and Meckler did not respond to requests for comment.

The company also recently attempted to raise funding, including from Narya Capital, the venture capital firm of J.D. Vance, the author of the popular memoir Hillbilly Elegy. Two sources told BuzzFeed News that Vance has also advised Mercer on matters regarding Parler.

J.D. Vance in Sun Valley, Idaho, July 12, 2017

Vance did not provide a comment for this story.

With no major social media outlet, Trump, who was impeached for his role in inciting the insurrection and will face a Senate trial next week, has been communicating with the public largely through the email list for his post-presidency office. Parler remains dormant, with a note that reads, We will resolve any challenge before us and plan to welcome all of you back soon.

On Friday, Wernick said he believes Parler will be up by next week and that the company has an executive team in place that has stepped up.

For now, the most recent post on the site is a Jan. 26 meme from Matze. It features a photo of a masked and gloved Bernie Sanders from Bidens inauguration with superimposed text that says, I wish that John guy would hurry up already.

Here is the original post:

Donald Trumps Business Sought A Stake In Parler Before He Would Join - BuzzFeed News

This less well-known section of the amendment that also gave people due process and equal protection under the Constitution after the Civil War has gotten a lot of attention of late. Some commentators have suggested that Section 3 could be invoked to bar Trump from future office regardless of the outcome of impeachment. But its procedurally tricky. And if it is to work, as many are suggesting, it may require that Congress shore it up statutorily so that it might survive the scrutiny that it needsand would undoubtedly getif Section 3 were ever employed against Trump.

The last time it was invoked was in 1919. That year, the House of Representatives refused to seat the first Socialist elected to Congress, Victor Berger, on Section 3 grounds. Berger actively opposed U.S. participation in World War I, and was prosecuted and convicted under the Espionage Act. The House of Representatives referred his case to a special committee for investigation, concluded that he was ineligible for membership and refused to seat him. If Trump were to run successfully for Congress, a Democratic majority in either chamber could presumably follow suit and vote to preclude him from taking office. But that option doesnt address a possible 2024 presidential bid, which is perhaps foremost among concerns of Democratsand many Republicans, too.

Alternatively, the current Democratic-controlled Congress could simply declare Trump in violation of Section 3 in due course, but whether that declaration would be enforceable in a future election is hard to tell.

There are few reported judicial opinions that even mention Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, and none from the U.S. Supreme Court. The primary case appears to be the 1871 opinion in United States v. Powell, in which Amos S.C. Powell was indicted for accepting public office after the Civil War. Before the war, he had held the office of constable, which was such an office as rendered those who had held it engaged in the Rebellion against the Union. As a result, the court explained, Powell was deemed ineligible to any office now, by the provisions of the 3d section of the 14 amendment.

To bring this aspect of the 14th Amendment up to date, and to make it useful in a modern political context, Congress likely needs to pass a new law. Somewhat surprisingly, the Constitutions terms are not self-executingthat is, for an individual to seek judicial enforcement of the Constitution, Congress generally must have passed a statute giving litigants a cause of action.

Congress has done this as a matter of criminalbut not civillaw for Section 3. To enable judicial enforcement of Section 3 the 14th Amendment, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1870 (also known as the Enforcement Act or the First Ku Klux Klan Act), among other laws. Section 15 of that act makes it a misdemeanor to run for office when ineligible to do so under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, punishable by up to a year in prison. Section 14 of the same law also allows a federal prosecutor to forcibly remove an offender from office. (Congress later passed the Amnesty Act of 1872, which lifted political barriers for senior members of the former Confederacy.)

Whether the Department of Justice under President Joe Biden would have an appetite to indict Trump for a misdemeanor under the 1870 statute is highly dubious. When the act was drafted, everyone knew precisely what sections 14 and 15 were aimed at: former members of the Confederacy, whom Congress wanted to keep out of public office during Reconstruction. The actand thus Section 3 itselfis outmoded.

Congress can enhance the enforceability of the 14th Amendments ban on certain individuals holding public office by permitting private citizens to bring lawsuits for alleged violations of Section 3. Of course, theres plenty of precedent for statutes authorizing judicial causes of action.

For example, in order to bring a lawsuit against a state or local police officer for allegedly violating the 4th Amendments ban on unreasonable searches and seizures and other constitutional rights, a plaintiff must invoke 42 U.S.C. 1983a statute passed in 1871 after the Civil War to implement the Reconstruction amendments to the Constitution. In 1961, the Supreme Court prominently brought that statute to life in Monroe v. Pape, which allowed a homeowner to use the act to sue individual Chicago police officers for money damages in connection with a warrantless search.

In theory, a law passed by Congress to implement Section 3 of the 14th Amendment could give a competing candidate for the same office the necessary standing to bring a civil lawsuit. If Trump were to run in 2024 and a plaintiff brought a suit to enjoin his campaign, the constitutionality of the legislation would undoubtedly wind up before the U.S. Supreme Court, with unpredictable results.

But this route would at least avoid criminal prosecution and thus the perception that the Department of Justice under a Democratic administration was trying to silence a political enemy. It would also shore up Congress role as a co-equal branch charged with ensuring that Oval Office occupants remain accountable for wrongdoing in officea constitutional obligation that a second impeachment acquittal would largely disavow.

Not since the Civil War has America seen a violent insurrection the likes of Jan. 6. Nor has it seen a president as cynically prone to undermining the Constitution and the rule of law as Donald Trump. If Senate Republicans arent willing to risk their own political relevance for the sake of the republic come Feb. 9, then the rest of those members who swore an oath to the Constitution should take steps to give it meaning through Congress legislative prerogative.

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Opinion | Congress Still Has One More Way to Ban Trump from Future Office - POLITICO

Former President Donald Trump made his social media comeback on Friday with a post on Gab in which he called his second impeachment a "public relations stunt."

In his firstpost to the site since January 8, Trump put up a letter addressed to Democratic Congressman Jamie Raskin, who recently called on the former president to testify at his second impeachment hearing next week.

The letter, which Trump's attorneys David Schoen and Bruce Castor Jr signed, read: "We are in receipt of your latest public relations stunt. Your letter only confirms what is known to everyone: you cannot prove your allegations against the 45th President of the United States, who is now a private citizen."

"The use of our Constitution to bring a purported impeachment proceeding is much too serious to try to play these games," they added.

Read more: How Google finally decided to remove Parler after months of flagging the app's harmful content

Here is a screenshot of the post.

Screenshot of the Donald J. Trump post on Gab. Gab

Trump is in the midst of a second impeachment over his role in stirring up a mob of supporters that stormed the US Capitol on January 6.

Trump's return to Gab comes after reports that the ex-president was still so frustrated by being barred from Twitter that he is writing down insults and trying to get aides to post them from their own accounts.

The former president was permanently suspended from Twitter in the wake of the insurrection, which resulted in five people's deaths. He was also blocked on YouTube.

Gab is a social networking website that is popular among far-right supporters. It rose to infamy following the Tree of Life synagogue massacre in Pittsburgh when it was discovered the shooter had posted anti-Semitic comments on the platform.

It was launched by "Christian technology entrepreneur" Andrew Torba following what he says was the rise of big tech censorship during the 2016 election, according to the company's website.

Trump joined the site in August 2016, shortly before he was elected.

Originally posted here:

Trump breaks silence with post on Gab denouncing impeachment trial - Business Insider - Business Insider

Donald Trump attends a rally in support of ultimately unsuccessful Georgia Republicans David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler on December 5, in Valdosta, Georgia.

Donald Trumps reelection campaign, which never received a cent from the former president, moved an estimated $2.8 million of donor money into the Trump Organizationincluding at least $81,000 since Trump lost the election.

In addition, one of the campaigns joint-fundraising committees, which collects money in partnership with the Republican Party, shifted about $4.3 million of donor money into Trumps business from January 20, 2017, to December 31, 2020at least $331,000 of which came after the election.

The money covered the cost of rent, airfare, lodging and other expenses. All the payments are laid out in filings the campaign submitted to the Federal Election Commission. Representatives for the Trump Organization, the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Two days after the election, on November 5, the joint-fundraising committee paid $11,000 to Trumps hotel empire. A week laterafter the Associated Press, Fox News and other major media outlets had already called the race for Joe Bidenthe same committee put another $294,000 into Trumps hotel business to rent space, order catering and pay for lodging. The campaign pitched in additional change$110 that had been earmarked for recount efforts on November 16, another $220 the following day and $189 more the day after that.

On November 19, the campaign paid $31,000 for air travel to a company named DT Endeavor LLC. Five days later, the joint-fundraising committee paid the same entity $39,000. Forbes did not include those payments in its overall total of money moving into Trumps empire, since its not 100% clear that the former president owns DT Endeavor LLC. There are strong indications that he does, though. The federal filings list the address for the DT Endeavor LLC as Trump Tower in one spot and Mar-a-Lago in another. Trump also owns an aviation company with an almost identical name, DT Endeavor I LLC.

Whether or not Trump owns DT Endeavor LLC, he certainly controls several other companies collecting money from the campaign. On November 20, one of Trumps joint-fundraising committees paid $20,000 to his hotel outfit.

Less than a week after that, the campaign paid $3,000 in rent to Trump Restaurants LLC, which the former president owns outright. That company appears to be connected to a souvenir stand in the basement of Trump Tower.

On December 1, nearly a month after the election, the campaign handed over $38,000 in rent to Trump Tower Commercial LLC, the company through which Trump owns his stake in the famous Fifth Avenue tower. Fifteen days later, the campaign sent another $3,000 to Trump Restaurants LLC and added $38,000 more for Trump Tower Commercial LLC. In all, the postelection payments from the campaign and its joint-fundraising committee add up to $413,000or $484,000, if you include the money that flowed into DT Endeavor LLC, according to a review of the filings.

Thats not a life-changing amount of money for Trump, who is worth an estimated $2.5 billion. But it would be for most people, including many of the donors who chipped in to support Trumps campaign.

Read more here:

Trump Shifted Campaign-Donor Money Into His Private Business After Losing The Election - Forbes

The question of Donald Trumps relationship with the Kremlin has surfaced once again, this time in a new book by veteran US journalist Craig Unger. The book, American Kompromat, claims that the former US commander-in-chief was cultivated as a Russian intelligence asset for more than four decades.

Its not the first time this has been reported. In 2017 the former Moscow correspondent for The Guardian Luke Harding published a book: Collusion: Secret Meetings, Dirty Money, and How Russia Helped Donald Trump Win, which propounded roughly the same idea that Trump had been courted for years after marrying his first wife, Ivana Zelnickova, a model from Czechoslovakia. And then theres the Christopher Steele dossier, published in 2017 with its allegations of honey-trap blackmail and bizarre sexual practices. Although this came with a big handle-with-care caveat.

Could it really be true that one of Washingtons bitterest adversaries would have a stooge at the very top of its ranks? To consider this question its important to understand the distinction between an asset and an agent (or spy).

Former KGB major, Yuri Shvets, who appears to be Ungers key source, compares Trump to the infamous Cambridge Five a group of ideologically motivated agents in the heart of the British establishment, who willingly and systematically supplied the Soviet Union with state secrets over several decades to advance the communist cause. When you compare their story with that of the former US president, something looks wrong.

During Trumps tenure, NATO turned its heels towards Russia, and the Magnitsky Act has made life very difficult for a lot of powerful Russians by targeting their assets in the west. British intelligence has reclassified Russia as a tier one threat, putting it on at least equal footing to transnational terrorism.

Meanwhile, in 2018, the US expelled more than 60 Russian officials after identifying them as intelligence officers. To put it bluntly, any gains Russia might have achieved through Trumps good offices are far outweighed by the strategic, economic, and counterintelligence realities that have emerged during his presidency.

Assets in intelligence jargon, can mean anything from full-blown agents (people who knowingly offer their countrys secrets to a foreign intelligence agency) to those who might serve some use along the way. But they are far more likely to be at the more casual end of that spectrum. To identify and handle agents, intelligence officers need to expand their social circles (to meet more people in sensitive positions), find private safe houses and develop plausible cover stories to explain why they are meeting.

On the other hand, making friends with a masseuse who gives massages to oligarchs while they gossip about Kremlin affairs could represent a perfect asset. An elderly babushka who attends dissident rallies and owns a private B&B? Perfect asset. An overworked secretary who arranges scientific conferences in China? Perfect asset.

Few assets ever become spies proper. The simple proposition would you like to work for our intelligence agency? is never an easy sell. If a source panics or overreacts, they might tell the authorities. At which point, that relationship is either swiftly ended, or the asset becomes a counterintelligence pawn, playing the intelligence officer at his or her own game. When one overly eager Russian officer tried to recruit an American diplomat a few years ago, he made the mistake of playing his cards too early. The result? The diplomat reported the encounter, and the FBI then set up their own meeting with the Russian, turning the game back on him.

As such, an intelligence officer never asks a useful asset to become an agent unless theyre confident of a positive answer. In many cases, an asset doesnt even know theyre an asset. In whats known as tradecraft in the world of espionage, its often better to let assets exist in blissful ignorance of the intelligence officers intentions, trading friendly favours and gossip. That isnt really espionage, its just business.

Just look at Carter Page, one of Trumps former foreign policy advisers. Despite his strong pro-Kremlin views, despite living in Moscow in 2004, and despite being a target of Russian intelligence, there is no evidence that Page crossed the threshold. Russian intelligence officers certainly attempted to cultivate Page, but even the Mueller report couldnt determine whether or not he was a full-blown agent.

But why should he be? Carter was a fan of Putin, so Russian officers could bank on him taking the Kremlins interests straight to Trumps team even without explicit instruction. He neednt be anything more than a friend, and the Russians neednt risk asking for anything more.

Now compare this to the allegations levied against the 45th president. According to Unger, once Trump came on to the KGBs radar in 1977, he was fed a cocktail of flattery and subtle manipulation, which is nothing new for asset cultivation. The Steele dossier, largely discredited, made allegations of blackmail, which fits within the Russian proclivity for seeking out compromising information about their targets.

But any Russian intelligence officer would need to consider whether Trump really cares enough about kompromat and Russian money. Indeed, why enrol him as an agent of influence a move that carries enormous consequences for both parties when Russia could opt for a convenient friend in Washington?

In reality, even if Russia sees Trump as an asset, were not talking about Trump being a new Kim Philby (of Cambridge Five fame). Were talking about Trump being a self-interested businessman whos happy to do a favour if it works to his own best interests and that includes staying out of jail. Theres no evidence that Trump knowingly associated with any Russian intelligence officers. And theres a big distinction between making the wrong kind of friends and committing treason.

Simply put, an agent is a partner for life, whereas an asset is a friend with benefits. And, most likely, if Trump has been one of the two, its the latter.

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Donald Trump spying allegations: more likely useful idiot than Putin's agent - The Conversation UK

Trump planned to pull out about 9,500 of the roughly 34,500 US troops stationed in Germany.

The German government on Friday welcomed President Joe Bidens decision to formally halt the planned withdrawal of US troops from Germany, arguing the troops stationing there is in our mutual interest.

Last year, then-President Donald Trump announced he was going to pull out about 9,500 of the roughly 34,500 US troops stationed in Germany, but the withdrawal never actually began.

Biden said Thursday the pullout would be halted until defence secretary Lloyd Austin reviews Americas troop presence around the globe.

The German government welcomes this announcement, Chancellor Angela Merkels spokesman, Steffen Seibert, told reporters in Berlin. He said: We will remain in contact with the new American administration on its further plans.

We have always been convinced that the stationing of American troops here in Germany serves European and transatlantic security, and so is in our mutual interest, Seibert said. We very much value this close, decades-long cooperation with the Americans forces that are stationed in Germany.

Asked whether Germany would make any concrete offers to persuade the US not to withdraw troops, Seibert said Berlin will follow developments but how these reviews go is an internal American matter.

The US has several key military facilities in Germany, including Ramstein Air Base, the headquarters for US European Command and US Africa Command, and Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, the largest American military hospital outside the United States.

Trumps order met resistance from Congress as well as from within the military, which has long relied on Germany as a key ally and base of operations.

Trump announced the troop cuts after repeatedly accusing Germany of not paying enough for its own defence, calling the longtime NATO ally delinquent for failing to spend 2 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) on defence, a benchmark that alliance members have pledged to work towards.

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Germany hails Bidens move to halt Trump-ordered troop cuts - Al Jazeera English

President Donald Trump speaks during a press conference at the White House on Feb. 16, 2017. Trump berated the media repeatedly, calling CNN, The New York Times and other outlets "dishonest" and "very fake news" for reporting unfavorable stories about him. (Photo by Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

[Editors Note: STEVEN HARPER is a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers]

Opening Statement

The answer led the House of Representatives to impeach then President Donald Trump by the largest bipartisan vote in American history. Today we continue the process of holding him accountable for incitement of insurrection against the government of the United States. The Trump Insurrection led directly to at least five deaths, injuries to 140 law enforcement officers and a scar on the heart of our democracy.

So that we all operate from the same set of indisputable facts, lets watch four short videos overviewing the events of January 6, starting with Just Securitys 10-minute excerpt of Trumps 70-minute speech, which ignited an insurrection that Trump had fomented for months. Notice the mobs reaction as Trump spoke line after incendiary line.

The second video is the Washington Posts 14-minute encapsulation of the 41 minutes that followed Trumps diatribe.

RELATED: Democracy & Government

BY Steven Harper | February 1, 2021

The third video, taken by a reporter for The New Yorker, is a view from inside the mob.

The fourth and final video comes from the bodycam of a law enforcement officer trying to protect the citadel of democracy that day. Watch the mob beat him with hockey sticks and flagpoles ripped from the temporary presidential inauguration structure.

Everything that you just saw and heard actually indisputably happened on January 6, 2021 in the United States of America. How did it come to this?

The story begins six months earlier.

Let the evidence speak for itself.

But Trump wasnt willing to abide by the judicial branchs reaffirmation of his election loss. As court after court rejected his claims, he was pursuing a final backup plan an attack on the legislative branch that, if successful, would nullify the will of the voters and all of his courtroom losses. The Trump Insurrection targeted January 6 when a joint session of Congress would certify President-elect Joseph Bidens win.

In mid-December, Trump began actively promoting the Save America Stop the Steal rally. Look at this sample of his tweets:

Trying desperately to create a false cloud over the election outcome in at least one swing state, Trump focused on Georgia. On January 2, he called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger a Trump supporter who had contributed to the campaign. Listen as he pressured Raffensperger to reverse the will of Georgia voters and threatened criminal prosecution if Raffensperger failed to comply:

And now lets listen to what Raffensperger a Trump supporter told him.

Getting nowhere with Raffensperger, the Trump Insurrection plan moved forward. On January 3, the day after his call with Raffensperger, he replied to a #StoptheSteal tweet from one of the rally organizers.

At the same time, Trump was pressuring Vice President Mike Pence relentlessly. He wanted Pence to defy the Constitution and, as presiding officer of the January 6 joint session, block final congressional certification of the election.

Danger was in the air. As Trump was tweeting on January 3, the US Capitol Police warned of the potential for violence at the rally, with Congress itself as the target.

On January 4, the National Park Service increased the crowd estimate on the rally permit from 5,000 to 30,000. The US Capitol Police chief asked for permission to put the National Guard on emergency standby, but was denied.

And take a look at the unusual memo that Acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller whom Trump had installed shortly after every major news organization had called the election in Bidens favor issued that day to his secretary of the army. It required Millers personal authorization before the DC National Guard could employ riot control agents and other tactics, including ballistic protection equipment such as helmets and body armor.

January 5 was a busy day:

On the morning of January 6 Trump Insurrection Day he got an early start with a tweet at 8:17 a.m. that put Pence in the crosshairs.

Later that morning, Pence told Trump that he would not comply with his unconstitutional demand to overturn the election. As Trump prepared to speak at the rally, his surrogates warmed up the crowd actively promoting insurrection. Look at the video:

Now that you have the context of the timeline, lets watch and listen to key excerpts from Trumps speech again. It began shortly before noon.

At 1:26 p.m. less than 30 minutes after Trumps speech had ended his mob had already reached the Capitol and the US Capitol Police ordered the evacuation of the complex.

At 1:34 p.m. DC Mayor Muriel Bowser asked the secretary of the army for more federal help to deal with the mob. Almost an hour later, Acting Defense Secretary Miller still had not approved the request.

At 1:49 p.m. Trump was so proud that his incitement had succeeded, he retweeted a video of his speech.

Trump didnt appear publicly until 4:17 p.m. three hours after the attack began. Rather than condemn his insurrectionists, he tweeted a video to the mob, saying: I know your pain. I know youre hurt. We had an election that was stolen from us. It was a landslide election and everyone knows it, especially the other sideIts a very tough period of time. Theres never been a time like this where such a thing happened where they could take it away from all of us from me, from you, from our country. This was a fraudulent election, but we cant play into the hands of these people. We have to have peace. So go home. We love you. Youre very special. Youve seen what happens. You see the way others are treated that are so bad and so evil.

And at 6:01 p.m. Trump tweeted: These are the things and events that happen when a sacred landslide election victory is so unceremoniously & viciously stripped away from great patriots who have been badly & unfairly treated for so long. Go home with love & in peace. Remember this day forever!

Now lets hear live testimony from law enforcement witnesses:

Mike Pence didnt have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution, giving States a chance to certify a corrected set of facts, not the fraudulent or inaccurate ones which they were asked to previously certify. USA demands the truth!

Heres a clip showing the crowd chanting Hang Mike Pence, the mobs makeshift gallows, and Goodmans heroism.

Lets also hear from these elected representatives and their staffs:

At 7:00 p.m., dozens of police officers had been injured in the Trump Insurrection, and people had died when Sen. Lee got another call intended for Sen. Tuberville. This time, Rudy Giuliani called the same wrong number that Trump had called when he mistakenly reached Sen. Lee five hours earlier. Giuliani left this message on Sen. Lees phone:

Sen. Tuberville? Or I should say Coach Tuberville. This is Rudy Giuliani, the presidents lawyer. Im calling you because I want to discuss with you how theyre trying to rush this hearing and how we need you, our Republican friends, to try to just slow it down so we can get these legislatures to get more information to you. I know theyre reconvening at 8 tonight, but itthe only strategy we can follow is to object to numerous states and raise issues so that we get ourselves into tomorrow ideally until the end of tomorrow.

Now lets hear from elected representatives reflecting on what happened that day:

Lets look at a video excerpt of his January 19 speech from the Senate floor:

The mob was fed lies. What were the lies? And since he used the passive voice, who fed those lies to the mob?

They were provoked by the president and other powerful people. How did Trump provoke the mob? And who are the other powerful people he referenced?

And they tried to use fear and violence to stop a specific proceeding of the first branch of the federal government which they did not like. Is that how American democracy is supposed to work after an election?

What blowback has he received from Trump and fellow Republicans after making that statement?

On January 6, 2021 a violent mob attacked the United States Capitol to obstruct the process of our democracy and stop the counting of presidential electoral votes. This insurrection caused injury, death and destruction in the most sacred space in our Republic.

Much more will become clear in coming days and weeks, but what we know now is enough. The President of the United States summoned this mob, assembled the mob, and lit the flame of this attack. Everything that followed was his doing. None of this would have happened without the President. The President could have immediately and forcefully intervened to stop the violence. He did not. There has never been a greater betrayal by a President of the United States of his office and his oath to the Constitution.

What blowback has she received from Trump and fellow Republicans after telling the truth and voting to impeach Trump?

What recriminations have the other nine Republicans in the House endured since joining with Rep. Cheney in voting to impeach Trump?

This time the Trump Insurrection failed. But America cant risk a sequel. After a successful attack on democracy, no one is left to hold the perpetrators accountable.

So now you know the answer to the question How did this happen in America? But you also know that theres a more urgent one: Are there enough Republicans in the Senate willing to keep it from happening again?

Listen to Steven Harper and Bill Moyers in Conversation. December 10, 2020

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Other staff members, including those brought in to help with executions, also spread tips to their colleagues about how they could avoid quarantines and skirt public health guidance from the federal government and Indiana health officials.

The executions at the end of Donald Trumps presidency, completed in a short window over a few weeks, likely acted as a superspreader event, according to the records reviewed by AP. It was something health experts warned could happen when the Justice Department insisted on resuming executions during a pandemic.

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Its impossible to know precisely who introduced the infections and how they started to spread, in part because prisons officials didnt consistently do contact tracing and havent been fully transparent about the number of cases. But medical experts say its likely the executioners and support staff, many of whom traveled from prisons in other states with their own virus outbreaks, triggered or contributed both in the Terre Haute penitentiary and beyond the prison walls.

Of the 47 people on death row, 33 tested positive between Dec. 16 and Dec. 20, becoming infected soon after the executions of Alfred Bourgeois on Dec. 11 and Brandon Bernard on Dec. 10, according to Colorado-based attorney Madeline Cohen, who compiled the names of those who tested positive by reaching out to other federal death row lawyers. Other lawyers, as well as activists in contact with death row inmates, also told AP they were told a large numbers of death row inmates tested positive in mid-December.

In addition, at least a dozen other people, including execution team members, media witnesses and a spiritual adviser, tested positive within the incubation period of the virus, meeting the criteria of a superspreader event, in which one or more individuals trigger an outbreak that spreads to many others outside their circle of acquaintances. The tally could be far higher, but without contact tracing its impossible to be sure.

Active inmate cases at the Indiana penitentiary also spiked from just three on Nov. 19 the day Orlando Cordia Hall was put to death to 406 on Dec. 29, which was 18 days after Bourgeois execution, according to Bureau of Prisons data. The data includes the inmates at the high-security penitentiary, though the Bureau of Prisons has never said whether it included death row inmates in that count.

In all, 726 of the approximately 1,200 inmates at the United States Penitentiary at Terre Haute have tested positive for COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic, according to Bureau of Prisons data. Of them, 692 have recovered.

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Advocates and lawyers for the inmates, a Zen Buddhist priest who was a spiritual adviser for one prisoner, and even the families of some of the victims fought to delay the executions until after the pandemic. Their requests were rebuffed repeatedly and their litigation failed. And some got sick.

Witnesses, who were required to wear masks, watched from behind glass in small rooms where it often wasnt possible to stand six feet apart. They were taken to and from the death-chamber building in vans, where proper social distancing often wasnt possible. Passengers frequently had to wait in the vans for an hour or more, with windows rolled up and little ventilation, before being permitted to enter the execution-chamber building. And in at least one case, the witnesses were locked inside the execution chamber for more than four hours with little ventilation and no social distancing.

Prison staff told their colleagues they should first get on planes, go back to their homes and then they could take a test, according to two people familiar with the matter. If they were positive, they said, they could just quarantine and wouldnt be stuck in Terre Haute for two weeks, said the people, who could not publicly discuss the private conversations and spoke to AP on condition of anonymity.

Following Halls execution in November, only six members of the execution team opted to get coronavirus tests before they left Terre Haute, the Justice Department said in a court filing. The agency said they all tested negative. But days later, eight members of the team tested positive for the virus. Five of the staff members who had tested positive were brought back to Terre Haute for more executions a few weeks later.

Yusuf Ahmed Nur, the spiritual adviser for Hall, stood just feet away inside the execution chamber when Hall was executed on Nov. 19. He tested positive for the virus days later.

Writing about the experience, Nur said he knew he would be putting himself at risk, but that Hall had asked him to be at his side when he was put to death. He, and Halls family, felt obliged to be there.

I could not say no to a man who would soon be killed, Nur wrote. That I contracted COVID-19 in the process was collateral damage of executions during a pandemic.

Later, two journalists tested positive for the virus after witnessing other executions in early December, then had contact with activists and their own loved ones, who later tested positive as well. Despite being informed of the diagnoses, the Bureau of Prisons knowingly withheld the information from other media witnesses and decided not to initiate any contact tracing efforts.

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By mid-December, prison officials said that both Corey Johnson and Dustin Higgs were sick. They were the last two prisoners to be executed, just days before President Joe Biden took office.

Death row was put on lockdown after their results, inmates told Ashley Kincaid Eve, a lawyer and anti-death penalty activist. But even though they had also tested positive, she said Higgs and Johnson were still moved around the prison potentially infecting guards accompanying them so they could use phones and email to speak with their lawyers and families as their execution dates approached. Eve said prisons officials may have worried a court would delay the executions on constitutional ground if that access was denied.

In response to questions from the AP, the Bureau of Prisons said staff members who dont experience symptoms are clear to work and that they have their temperatures taken and are asked about symptoms before reporting for duty. (The AP has previously reported that staff members at other prisons were cleared with normal temperatures even when thermometers showed hypothermic readings.)

The agency said it also conducts contact training in accordance with federal guidance and that if staff are circumventing this guidance, we are not aware.

Officials said staff members were required to participate in contact tracing if they met the criteria for it and agency officials couldnt compel employees to be tested.

We cannot force staff members to take tests, nor does the CDC recommend testing of asymptomatic individuals, an agency spokesperson said, referring to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The union for Terre Haute employees declined to comment, saying it did not want to get into the public fray of this whole issue.

Elsewhere, union officials have long complained about the spread of the coronavirus through the federal prison system, as well as a lack of personal protective equipment and room to isolate infected inmates. Some of those issues have been alleviated, but containing the virus continues to be a concern at many facilities.

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No more executions have yet been scheduled under Biden. The Bureau of Prisons has repeatedly refused to say how many other people have tested positive for the coronavirus after the last several executions. And the agency would not answer questions about the specific reasoning for withholding the information from the public, instead directing the AP to file a public records request.

The Bureau of Prisons said it also took extensive efforts to mitigate the transmission of the virus, including limiting the number of media witnesses and adding an extra van for the witnesses to space them out.

It has argued witnesses were informed social distancing may not be possible in the execution chamber and that witnesses and others were required to wear masks and were offered additional protective equipment, like gowns and face shields. The agency also refused to answer questions about whether Director Michael Carvajal or any other senior leaders raised concerns about executing 13 people during a worldwide pandemic that has killed more than 450,000 in the U.S.

Still, it appears their own protocols werent followed. After a federal judge ordered the Bureau of Prisons to ensure masks were worn during executions in January, the executioner and U.S. marshal in the death chamber removed their masks during one of the executions, appearing to violate the judges order. The agency argued they needed to do so to communicate clearly and that they only removed their masks for a short time and disputes that it violated the order.

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In a Nov. 24 court filing on the spread of COVID at Terre Haute, Joe Goldenson, a public health expert on the spread of disease behind bars, said hundreds of staff participated in one way or another at each execution, including around 40 people on execution teams and those on 50-person specialized security teams who traveled from other prisons nationwide. He said he had warned earlier that executions were likely to become a superspreader.

Medical and public health experts repeatedly called on the Justice Department to delay executions, arguing the setup at prisons made them especially vulnerable to outbreaks, including because social distancing was impossible and health care substandard.

These are the type of high-risk superspreader events that the (American Medical Association) and (the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) have been warning against throughout the pandemic, James L. Madara, the executive vice president of the AMA, wrote to the Department of Justice on Jan. 11, just before the last three federal executions were carried out.

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Tarm reported from Chicago and Sisak reported from New York.

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On Twitter, follow Michael Tarm at twitter.com/mtarm, Michael Balsamo at http://www.twitter.com/MikeBalsamo1 and Michael Sisak at twitter.com/mikesisak.

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Federal executions at end of Donald Trumps term were likely COVID-19 super-spreading events - The Boston Globe

WASHINGTON (AP) Former President Donald Trump has parted ways with his lead impeachment lawyers just over a week before his Senate trial is set to begin, two people familiar with the situation said Saturday.

Butch Bowers and Deborah Barbier, both South Carolina lawyers, are no longer with Trumps defense team. One of the people described the parting as a mutual decision that reflected a difference of opinion on the direction of the case. Both insisted on anonymity to discuss private conversations.

One said new additions to the legal team were expected to be announced in a day or two.

The upheaval injects fresh uncertainty into the makeup and strategy of Trumps defense team as he prepares to face charges that he incited the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. However, all but five Senate Republicans this week voted in favor of an effort to dismiss the trial before it even started, making clear a conviction of the former president is unlikely regardless of his defense team.

Greg Harris and Johnny Gasser, two former federal prosecutors from South Carolina, are also off the team, one of the people said.

According to a different person with knowledge of the legal hires, Bowers and Barbier left the team because Trump wanted them to use a defense that relied on allegations of election fraud, and the lawyers were not willing to do so. The person was not authorized to speak publicly about the situation and requested anonymity.

Trump has struggled to find attorneys willing to defend him after becoming the first president in history to be impeached twice. He is set to stand trial the week of Feb. 8 on a charge that he incited his supporters to storm Congress before President Joe Bidens inauguration in an attempt to halt the peaceful transition of power.

After numerous attorneys who defended him previously declined to take on the case, Trump was introduced to Bowers by one of his closest allies in the Senate, South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham.

Bowers, a familiar figure in Republican legal circles, had years of experience representing elected officials and political candidates, including then-South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford against a failed impeachment effort that morphed into an ethics probe.

Bowers and Barbier did not immediately return messages seeking comment Saturday evening.

Republicans and Trump aides have made clear that they intend to make a simple argument in the trial: Trumps trial is unconstitutional because he is no longer in office.

While Republicans in Washington had seemed eager to part ways with Trump after the deadly events of Jan. 6, they have since eased off of their criticism, weary of angering the former presidents loyal voter base.

CNN was first to report the departure of the lawyers.

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Associated Press writer Meg Kinnard in Columbia, South Carolina, contributed to this report.

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Trump parts with impeachment lawyers a week before trial - The Associated Press