UPDATE: Donald Trump’s Colorado co-conspirators loom large in today’s indictment:
NEW: The Trump indictment’s “Co-Conspirator 2” appears to be John Eastman, the former CU visiting prof and newly-hired attorney for the @cologop. The description of Co-Conspirator 2’s actions mirrors testimony about Eastman’s role in trying to overthrow the election. #copolitics pic.twitter.com/R2IUkPtLbo
— Kyle Clark (@KyleClark) August 1, 2023
—–
As the Washington Post reports this afternoon, Stormy Daniels is now the least of ex-President Donald Trump’s problems:
A grand jury has indicted former president Donald Trump for a raft of alleged crimes stemming from his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election…
About 5 p.m., reporters observed a prosecutor with special counsel Jack Smith’s office and the foreperson of a grand jury that has been active for many months examining the events surrounding Jan. 6 deliver the indictment to a magistrate judge in federal court in Washington, D.C.
That grand jury panel gathered Tuesday, and left the courthouse in the afternoon. The indictment is the first known charge or charges to be filed in the special counsel probe of the machinations that led up to the Jan. 6, 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol, and its aftermath.
The first charges, but very likely not the last:
A key area of interest for Smith has been the conduct of a handful of lawyers who sought to turn Trump’s defeat into victory by trying to convince state, local, federal and judicial authorities that Biden’s 2020 election win was illegitimate or tainted by fraud.
Investigators have sought to determine to what degree these lawyers — particularly Rudy Giuliani, Jenna Ellis, John Eastman, Kurt Olsen and Kenneth Chesebro, as well as then-Justice Department lawyer Jeffrey Clark — were following specific instructions from Trump or others, and what those instructions were…
Colorado-licensed attorney Jenna Ellis was censured by regulators earlier this year as part of an agreement that allowed her to keep her license to practice law in exchange for frank admissions to making “reckless, knowing, or intentional misrepresentations” about the 2020 presidential election. The judge in the case wrote in his opinion that Ellis made these false statements so “with a mental state that was ‘at least reckless,’” and that she “undermined the American public’s confidence in the presidential election.” Rudy Giuliani and former CU conservative scholar John Eastman are both embroiled in disbarment proceedings, with Giuliani’s law license already suspended.
Now it looks like censure and/or disbarment may not be the end of the road for Trump’s Colorado-heavy legal team.
But for today, it’s all about Trump. The previous criminal indictments against Trump over hush money payments to Stormy Daniels, followed by the much more substantive yet still debatable indictments over Trump’s handling of classified documents after leaving office, both pale in terms of historical significance before criminal charges that Trump attempted to overturn American democracy, and remain in office after losing the 2020 presidential election. These are the charges that Americans have waited over two years to see brought while the January 6th rioters Trump incited to violence were methodically pursued and charged for their crimes. With every conviction of a January 6th insurrectionist, the failure to charge the highest levels of the conspiracy became a glaring contradiction.
No longer, folks. We have finally arrived at the moment of accountability the whole world has been waiting for since the violence in the halls of Congress on January 6th, 2021 laid bare the fragility of our democratic institutions. For the sake of the nation’s future, it’s the case among all of these that must not fail.
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Another day, another indictment. <sigh>
I expect F.D.F.Q. to rattle his tin cup, demand more money, and do his best rendition of Christ on the Cross, exhorting his followers by shouting out,
"Forgive them Father for they know not what they do""MAGAdonians, I will be your retribution!"I predict a modest bump in his polling numbers over the next week.
And Co-Conspirator # 3 sounds like that Kraken Crackpot.
Dear GOPers,
Yet another 4-count reason to keep stuffing your 2024 campaign contributions into the bottomless tangerine diaper bin . . .
PS. but, there are alternatives . . .
Running their government campaign just like a 1%er business (. . . hoping for yuge bailouts and subsidies)!
Conservative must mean just keep throwing money at the problems and hope that someday someone will finally come up with better candidates?
It seems that special counsel Jack Smith is being very cautious — two of the statutes he's citing only carry penalties of up to 5 years. The third statute does allow a sentence of up to 20 years, however.
I guess charging Trump with sedition would have been seen as piling on, even if it was a more apt description of the crimes committed.
Sedition would be a hard charge to prove against trump. I think the charges brought make sense based on the evidence described in the indictment.
True — I suppose if he had directed one of his minions to participate in the riot, that would be sufficient. But his perceived encouragement of the Proud Boys comes awfully close.
Here is an excellent article that elaborates on our discussion https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/02/opinion/jack-smith-trump-indictment.html?unlocked_article_code=wyemh0MPGW3oljz5zug9-3KSYlJ8uiLbJfrbhpQTdWpZRCmCCRQ9MgHgPwzU9XHxSia5NHtoLrYcAj_fD44w9ZuMJyN7TwIrjq8Zgoj8rSDVpwA4cTMr6ZJc267bHdfNr8KypBO5MPIeQUOTwLaqQ9YyTFX-k0uj4Izhc4DD-EIsSdGavej8U0QGu9Mi8tj50VLvH6ika0HpRH3KiOwyhbxeCk5nH5zasT6jSBsarM3Da22Kfx7TgPn9QUbdX-9GIBrLfd3YZUFLLeBVJ-7X2u9QbosaiutwF0HaOXXST3kFF6MJi2WbJryfYUia8ImEP673eaawDGEbCbN3rGoQaU-JHYha&smid=url-share
Sorry. This is not a substantive issue until the tweet from Congresswoman "Boogaloo" Boebert is produced and received (sarcasm).
re: "The previous criminal indictments against Trump over hush money payments to Stormy Daniels,"
might you be willing to more accurately describe what those 34 counts in New York actually are?
Bragg's announcement said the charges were for "falsifying New York business records in order to conceal damaging information and unlawful activity from American voters before and after the 2016 election. " Instances included payments to Stormy Daniels — but also involved payments to reimburse AMI for "catch and kill" efforts on the doorman's story about another Trump child and money to "Woman #1" who alleged a sexual relationship. The announcement clarifies "AMI, which later admitted its conduct was unlawful in an agreement with federal prosecutors, made false entries in its business records concerning the true purpose of the $150,000 payment" to repay them for Woman #1.
Lawrence O’Donnell pointed out that the earliest Fat Donnie would go to prison would be 4 years from now after appeals.
I doubt Trump ever goes to prison for any of this. It seems Smith and DOJ's game is to convince him it will be too expensive to stay in the race for POTUS.
Handing down more and more indictments keeps jacking up the legal fees. At some point, even Trump is smart enough to see the declining ROI.
That presumes he would be allowed to stay out of prison pending an appeal. Possible, but not guaranteed.
Finally finished reading the indictment. It is a substantive 45 pages. I can feel the weight of proof behind every word.
It's heartbreaking that half our country just doesn't care.
So many good quotes; so little time: ‘Conspiracy Shit Beamed Down From The Mothership’. TPM for the Win.
Extremely Damning
Considering how far they went in the impeachment, I am surprised and relieved that when this moment came, Cipollone and Philbin did their jobs as legal counsel for the office of the White House and not its occupant.
Oops! Responded to the wrong post!
The Structure of the Indictment. Marcy Wheeler.
That all looks spot-on except #6, who I'm pretty sure is Boris Epshteyn.
Why oh why is a certain member of Congress who tweeted out "today is 1776," and shrilly announced to Congress on Jan. 6 that she had constituents outside, and tweeted out that Pelosi had been removed from the House Chambers, not something like co-conspirator #7 (or probably a bit lower)?
Day ain't over.
Well, at least I got a Pols diary written out of posting this, that oughta count for something!
Pence will be a star prosecution witness against trump. Perhaps that will be his great revenge for trump trying to get him killed.
Not only that but apparently, they have Trump as saying to, "You're too damned honest."
So, the defendant vouches for the credibility of one of the prosecution's star witnesses.
Yep. And Pence took contemporaneous notes of their conversations, and those notes will likely be admitted at trial (over a hearsay objection by trump). The public may get a good lesson about the hearsay rule and some of its exception. Nerdy goodness for the good of the nation.