Tag: national security

Takeaways from the arraignment of Donald Trump in the special counsel’s election subversion case | CNN Politics

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CNN
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Former President Donald Trump pleaded not guilty in a Washington, DC, federal courthouse Thursday to federal criminal charges stemming from his plots to overturn the 2020 election, in a 27-minute proceeding where the first flashes of the defense’s tactics emerged.

It was the third occasion that Trump was arraigned on criminal charges this year, and the hearing marked the public debut of the team of lawyers in special counsel Jack Smith’s office who will be leading the prosecution.

Here are takeaways from the hearing:

In the classified documents case that Smith has also brought against the former president in June, the Trump team has sought to slow-walk the schedule for the proceedings. There were hints of a similar strategy in the first hearing in the election subversion case.

Much of Thursday’s hearing was staid and to-script. But the tone sharpened when the judge said the prosecutors should file recommendations for the trial date and length in seven days, and that the Trump team should respond within seven days after that.

Trump attorney John Lauro told the judge that they would need to look at the amount of evidence they’ll be receiving from the government – which he said could be “massive” — before they could address that question.

“There is no question in our mind, your honor, that Mr. Trump is entitled to a fair and just trial,” Lauro said, nodding both to Trump’s right to a speedy trial as well as his right to due process.

Prosecutor Thomas Windom previewed that the special counsel would propose this case unfolding under a normal timeline under the Speedy Trial Act, which sets a time limit – unless certain exemptions are sought – for criminal cases to go to trial.

Judge Tanya Chutkan intends to schedule a trial date at an August 28 hearing, a magistrate judge said Thursday. Before the trial, Chutkan may need to preside over disputes over whether the case should be dismissed to do legal flaws, when the trial should start and what evidence can be presented to a jury.

Trump may argue that a trial should wait until after the 2024 election, an argument his legal team made unsuccessfully in the classified documents case, and his lawyers have also previewed efforts to seek a change of venue for the case, with claims that the DC jury pool is politically biased against the former president and 2024 Republican front-runner.

There’s likely to be more added to the pile of legal problems on the former president’s plate.

In Georgia, in the coming weeks, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is expected to bring charges in her election subversion probe and it’s possible that Trump will be indicted in that.

And then there’s the other case from Smith alleging Trump mishandled classified documents from his White House and then obstructed the probe into the materials. That case is currently scheduled to go trial next May, and there will be regular pre-trial proceedings (at which, Trump is not required to appear) before that. There’s also the criminal case that Manhattan prosecutors brought against Trump for a 2016 campaign hush money scheme, currently slated for trial in March.

Additionally there’s number of civil lawsuits he faces, including a second defamation case brought by E. Jean Carroll, well as the New York attorney general’s civil fraud case against his family and businesses.

This court calendar is overlaid against his 2024 campaign schedule as well. The first Republican presidential debate, for instance, is on August 23.

Though Trump will not be required to appear in court for hearings on pre-trial matters, he may seek to do so, if he embraces a strategy of making a spectacle out of the election subversion case. Speaking on the airport tarmac, Trump made brief remarks that the prosecution was political after Thursday’s hearing, and he routinely fundraises off of every new development putting him in deeper legal trouble.

Thursday marked the public debut of the Smith team that will handle the election subversion prosecution. (Some of the special counsel lawyers who are leading the classified documents case were previously involved in the public proceedings stemming from the lawsuit Trump filed last year challenging the FBI’s search of Mar-a-Lago).

Smith himself attended the hearing, as he did for Trump’s first appearance in the classified documents case in Florida earlier this year. As the courtroom waited for the hearing to start, Smith and Trump occasionally looked over at one another – Smith looking towards Trump more often than Trump looked over to him.

Windom – who moved from the US attorney’s office in Maryland to play a central role in the federal election subversion investigation, spoke on behalf of the government Thursday. Also at the prosecutors’ table was Molly Gaston, an alum of the DC US attorney’s public integrity section, which handles some of the most politically sensitive cases for the Justice Department.

Gaston was a lead prosecutor on last year’s contempt of Congress case against ex-Trump adviser Steve Bannon, and also worked on the prosecutions of Rick Gates – a former Trump campaign aide – and Paul Manafort, Trump’s 2016 campaign chairman. Gaston was also present in the courtroom Tuesday when the foreperson of the grand jury for the 2020 election probe returned the indictment against Trump.

Trump was represented by Lauro and Todd Blanche at Thursday’s hearing. Lauro is a relatively recent addition to the Trump legal team and is handling the 2020-election related matters.

Blanche, meanwhile, has been across several Trump cases. He is representing Trump in Smith’s classified documents prosecution as well is in the 2016 campaign hush money case brought by Manhattan’s district attorney.

Evan Corcoran, who has not formally entered an appearance in the case, attended the hearing, sitting on the row in the courtroom well behind the defense table.

Lauro did the talking for the defense at Thursday’s hearing. He’s also made himself a prominent defender of the former president in the public arena, with multiple appearance in recent days on CNN and other networks.

While the defense lawyers were mostly there Thursday to walk Trump through the steps of a first appearance and arraignment, Lauro had the opportunity to show the vigor with which he’ll argue on behalf of his client. He didn’t get into the substantive defense arguments that he has previewed in TV hits, but his insistence that the Trump team may need more time before nailing down a trial schedule was emphatic.

“All that we would ask, your honor, is the time to fairly defend our client. And to do that we need a little time,” he said.

While Trump’s hearing Thursday largely followed the script of the arraignments he’s had in the classified documents and the 2016 hush money criminal cases against him. But it was happening in a courthouse that has had to constantly had to process and re-process the violence of January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol that his election lies helped provoke.

For the last two-and-a-half years since the attack, the former president has been a stalking horse in the DC courthouse, which has hosted the proceedings for more than 1,000 Trump supporters who have been have been charged for the riot.

Judges have obliquely acknowledged the role the former president played in egging on the mob, while recounting the direct view they had to the violence that day. Defense attorneys and prosecutors have argued over how much of the blame should be placed on him. Metropolitan and Capitol police officers are frequently seen in the courthouse to testify about the physical and psychological trauma they suffered from the riot. And defendants and their families, in their pleas for mercy, have invoked Trump as well.

In the election subversion case, Trump’s attorneys have previewed arguments that the case should be moved elsewhere, given the city’s political bent. But the DC federal courthouse is where hundreds of his supporters have received fair trials, with some securing acquittals, in the Capitol mob cases.

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August 3, 2023
21 Donald Trump election lies listed in his new indictment | CNN Politics

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Washington
CNN
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Special counsel Jack Smith said Tuesday that the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol was “fueled by lies” told by former President Donald Trump. The indictment of Trump on four new federal criminal charges, all related to the former president’s effort to overturn his defeat in the 2020 election, lays out some of those lies one by one.

Even in listing 21 lies, the 45-page indictment does not come close to capturing the entirety of Trump’s massive catalogue of false claims about the election. But the list is illustrative nonetheless – highlighting the breadth of election-related topics Trump was dishonest about, the large number of states his election dishonesty spanned, and, critically, his willingness to persist in privately and publicly making dishonest assertions even after they had been debunked to him directly.

Here is the list of 21.

1. The lie that fraud changed the outcome of the 2020 election, that Trump “had actually won,” and that the election was “stolen.” (Pages 1 and 40-41 of the indictment)

Trump’s claim of a stolen election whose winner was determined by massive fraud was (and continues to be) his overarching lie about the election. The indictment asserts that Trump knew as early as 2020 that his narrative was false – and had been told as such by numerous senior officials in his administration and allies outside the federal government – but persisted in deploying it anyway, including on January 6 itself.

2. The lie that fake pro-Trump Electoral College electors in seven states were legitimate electors. (Pages 5 and 26)

The indictment alleges that Trump and his alleged co-conspirators “organized” the phony slates of electors and then “caused” the slates to be transmitted to Vice President Mike Pence and other government officials to try to get them counted on January 6, the day Congress met to count the electoral votes.

3. The lie that the Justice Department had identified significant concerns that may have affected the outcome of the election. (Pages 6 and 27)

Attorney General William Barr and other top Justice Department officials had told Trump that his claims of major fraud had proved to be untrue. But the indictment alleges that Trump still sought to have the Justice Department “make knowingly false claims of election fraud to officials in the targeted states through a formal letter under the Acting Attorney General’s signature, thus giving the Defendant’s lies the backing of the federal government and attempting to improperly influence the targeted states to replace legitimate Biden electors with the Defendant’s.”

4. The lie that Pence had the power to reject Biden’s electoral votes. (Pages 6, 32-38)

Pence had repeatedly and correctly told Trump that he did not have the constitutional or legal right to send electoral votes back to the states as Trump wanted. The indictment notes that Trump nonetheless repeatedly declared that Pence could do so – first in private conversations and White House meetings, then in tweets on January 5 and January 6, then in Trump’s January 6 speech in Washington at a rally before the riot – in which Trump, angry at Pence, allegedly inserted the false claim into his prepared text even after advisors had managed to temporarily get it removed.

5. The lie that “the Vice President and I are in total agreement that the Vice President has the power to act.” (Page 36)

The indictment alleges that the day before the riot, Trump “approved and caused” his campaign to issue a false statement saying Pence agreed with him about having the power to reject electoral votes – even though Trump knew, from a one-on-one meeting with Pence hours prior, that Pence continued to firmly disagree.

6. The lie that Georgia had thousands of ballots cast in the names of dead people. (Pages 8 and 16)

The indictment notes that Georgia’s top elections official – Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger – a republican – explained to Trump in a phone call on January 2, 2021 that this claim was false, but that Trump repeated it in his January 6 rally speech anyway. Raffensperger said in the phone call and then in a January 6 letter to Congress that just two potential dead-voter cases had been discovered in the state; Raffensperger said in late 2021 that the total had been updated and stood at four.

7. The lie that Pennsylvania had 205,000 more votes than voters. (Pages 8 and 20)

The indictment notes that Trump’s acting attorney general Jeffrey Rosen and acting deputy attorney general Richard Donoghue had both told him that this claim was false, but he kept making it anyway – including in the January 6 rally speech.

8. The lie that there had been a suspicious “dump” of votes in Detroit, Michigan. (Pages 9 and 17)

The indictment notes that Barr, the attorney general, told Trump on December 1, 2020 that this was false – as CNN and others had noted, supposedly nefarious “dumps” Trump kept talking about were merely ballots being counted and added to the public totals as normal – but that Trump still repeated the false claim in public remarks the next day. And Barr wasn’t the only one to try to dissuade Trump from this claim. The indictment also notes that Michigan’s Republican Senate majority leader, Mike Shirkey, had told Trump in an Oval Office meeting on November 20, 2020 that Trump had lost the state “not because of fraud” but because Trump had “underperformed with certain voter populations.”

9. The lie that Nevada had tens of thousands of double votes and other fraud. (Page 9)

The indictment notes that Nevada’s top elections official – Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske, also a Republican – had publicly posted a “Facts vs. Myths” document explaining that Nevada judges had rejected such claims.

10. The lie that more than 30,000 non-citizens had voted in Arizona. (Pages 9 and 11)

The indictment notes that Trump put the number at “over 36,000” in his January 6 speech – even though, the indictment says, his own campaign manager “had explained to him that such claims were false” and Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers, a Republican who had supported Trump in the election, “had issued a public statement that there was no evidence of substantial fraud in Arizona.”

11. The lie that voting machines in swing states had switched votes from Trump to Biden. (Page 9)

This is a reference to false conspiracy theories about Dominion Voting Systems machines, which Trump kept repeating long after it was thoroughly debunked by his own administration’s election cybersecurity security arm and many others. The indictment says, “The Defendant’s Attorney General, Acting Attorney General, and Acting Deputy Attorney General all had explained to him that this was false, and numerous recounts and audits had confirmed the accuracy of voting machines.”

12. The lie that Dominion machines had been involved in “massive election fraud.” (Page 12)

The indictment notes that Trump, on Twitter, promoted a lawsuit filed by an alleged co-conspirator, whom CNN has identified as lawyer Sidney Powell, that alleged “massive election fraud” involving Dominion – even though, the indictment says, Trump privately acknowledged to advisors that the claims were “unsupported” and told them Powell sounded “crazy.”

13. The lie that “a substantial number of non-citizens, non-residents, and dead people had voted fraudulently in Arizona.” (Page 10)

The indictment alleges that Trump and an alleged co-conspirator, whom CNN has identified as former Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani, made these baseless claims on a November 22, 2020 phone call with Bowers; the indictment says Giuliani never provided evidence and eventually said, at a December 1, 2020 meeting with Bowers, “words to the effect of, ‘We don’t have the evidence, but we have lots of theories.”

14. The lie that Fulton County, Georgia elections workers had engaged in “ballot stuffing.” (Pages 13 and 14)

This is the long-debunked lie – which Trump has continued to repeat in 2023 – that a video had caught two elections workers in Atlanta breaking the law. The workers were simply doing their jobs, and, as the indictment notes, they were cleared of wrongdoing by state officials in 2020 – but Trump continued to make the claims even after Raffensperger and Justice Department officials directly and repeatedly told him they were unfounded.

15. The lie that thousands of out-of-state voters cast ballots in Georgia. (Page 16)

The indictment notes that Trump made this claim on his infamous January 2, 2021 call with Raffensperger, whose staff responded that the claim was inaccurate. An official in Raffensberger’s office explained to Trump that the voters in question had authentically moved back to Georgia and legitimately cast ballots.

16. The lie that Raffensperger “was unwilling, or unable,” to address Trump’s claims about a “‘ballots under table’ scam, ballot destruction, out of state ‘voters’, dead voters, and more.” (Page 16)

In fact, contrary to this Trump tweet the day after the call, Raffensperger and his staff had addressed and debunked all of these false Trump claims.

17. The lie that there was substantial fraud in Wisconsin and that the state had tens of thousands of unlawful votes. (Page 21)

False and false. But the indictment notes that Trump made the vague fraud claim in a tweet on December 21, 2020, after the state Supreme Court upheld Biden’s win, and repeated the more specific claim about tens of thousands of unlawful votes in the January 6 speech.

18. The lie that Wisconsin had more votes counted than it had actual voters. (Page 21)

This, like Trump’s similar claim about Pennsylvania, is not true. But the indictment alleges that Trump raised the claim in a December 27, 2020 conversation with acting attorney general Rosen and acting deputy attorney general Donoghue, who informed him that it was false.

19. The lie that the election was “corrupt.” (Page 28)

The indictment alleges that when acting attorney general Rosen told Trump on the December 27, 2020 call that the Justice Department couldn’t and wouldn’t change the outcome of the election, Trump responded, “Just say that the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressmen.” (Deputy attorney general Donoghue memorialized the reported Trump remark in his handwritten notes, which CNN reported on in 2021 and which were subsequently published by the House committee that investigated the Capitol riot.)

20. The lie that Trump won every state by hundreds of thousands of votes. (Page 34)

The indictment says that, at a January 4, 2021 meeting intended to convince Pence to unlawfully reject Biden’s electoral votes and send them back to swing-state legislatures, Pence took notes describing Trump as saying, “Bottom line-won every state by 100,000s of votes.” This was, obviously, false even if Trump was specifically talking about swing states won by Biden rather than every state in the nation.

21. The lie that Pennsylvania “want[s] to recertify.” (Page 38)

Trump made this false claim in his January 6 speech. In reality, some Republican state legislators in Pennsylvania had expressed a desire to at least delay the congressional affirmation of Biden’s victory – but the state’s Democratic governor and top elections official, who actually had election certification power in the state, had no desire to recertify Biden’s legitimate win.

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August 2, 2023
Two Proud Boys sentenced for roles in Capitol attack on January 6 | CNN Politics

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CNN
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A federal judge handed down hefty sentences against two members of the Proud Boys for their role in attacking the Capitol on January 6, 2021, one who broke open a window to the building and another who took over the leadership role of the group that day.

Their sentences, both among the longest yet of the over 1,000 people charged as part of the riot, are emblematic of how judges are working to separate key figures who furthered the violence that day from those who were swept up in the crowd.

“If we don’t have the peaceful transfer of power, I don’t know what we have,” District Judge Timothy Kelly said during one of the hearings Friday. “Because that is the reflection of when we go to the ballot box, when we exercise the right to vote. That is the manifestation of that. And so, if we don’t have that, we don’t have anything.”

Kelly continued, “that didn’t honor the founders, it was the kind of thing they wrote the constitution to prevent.”

The first man to be sentenced Friday, Dominic Pezzola, was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Pezzola smashed through a window to the US Capitol with a police riot shield on January 6, allowing the first wave of rioters to storm the building as members of Congress were being evacuated. Pezzola quickly became a symbol of the violence that day.

Ethan Nordean, a Proud Boy from Washington State who took over leading the group after longtime Proud Boys chairman Enrique Tarrio was arrested on his way to Washington, DC, days before the January 6 riot, was sentenced to 18 years in prison.

Nordean’s 18-year prison sentence is tied for the longest handed down in connection with the January 6 insurrection. Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes was also sentenced to 18 years in prison for seditious conspiracy.

Images of Pezzola, nicknamed “Spazzolini,” using the police riot shield to first breach the Capitol building quickly became a symbol of the violence that day.

“The reality is you were the one who did it,” Kelly said during his sentencing hearing Friday. “You were the one who smashed that window in and let people begin to stream into the Capitol building and threaten the lives of our lawmakers. It is not something I would have ever dreamed I’d see in our country.”

“You were really, in some ways, the tip of the spear,” the judge said.

Before leaving the courtroom, Pezzola, with a raised fist, shouted, “Trump won!” just minutes after Kelly – who had already left the courtroom – said he hoped Pezzola had turned a corner.

Pezzola was the only one of the five Proud Boys defendants not convicted of seditious conspiracy. Pezzola joined the Proud Boys shortly before January 6, according to evidence shown at trial, and was praised by the organization’s leadership for his violent actions at a separate rally weeks before the Capitol riot.

The New York native was convicted of multiple other charges including assaulting or resisting a police officer, robbery of a police shield, destruction of government property and obstructing an official proceeding.

In the at times rambunctious trial, which spanned several months, prosecutors argued that Pezzola’s co-defendants, leaders of the Proud Boys, pushed lower-level members like Pezzola to be on the front lines of the violence at the Capitol.

In a written statement read aloud by prosecutors earlier this week, former Capitol police officer Mark Ode, who was assaulted by Pezzola, recounted being attacked by the mob and feeling like his life was leaving his body.

Ode wrote that he was haunted by the memory of being “pinned down by multiple assailants, being pinned down by all of their weight, while simultaneously being choked by the chinstrap of my helmet.”

“[I] felt my life fleeing my body,” Ode wrote, adding that he had “the most vivid visual of my own funeral.”

During Friday’s sentencing hearing, prosecutor Erik Kenerson said that “many Americans will approach the ballot box in 2024 with trepidation” and “will go to bed on January 5, 2025 afraid of what might happen the next day. Mark Ode certainly will.”

Pezzola, dressed in an orange jumpsuit, addressed the court during Friday’s hearing, while his wife, mother, daughter and a friend who served with him in the military sat in the courtroom.

“I need to extend my sincere apology to Officer Ode,” Pezzola said, “and if he were here, I would look him in the eyes and apologize for all the grief I caused him.” Pezzola also apologized to his wife and children and the country, adding that “the events of J6 have crumbled the reputation of the nation I served in the Marine corps.”

His wife, Lisa, told Kelly how her daughters have suffered through depression and been bullied at school since their father was arrested, saying that it “is very hard as a mother – to not be able to protect them from the outside world.”

“In no way am I making excuses for Dominic’s actions that day. As I said on the stand, he was a f**king idiot,” she said through tears.

Pezzola’s youngest daughter, Angelina, also spoke to the judge, saying that she was “everything good that my father has done” and that it’s because of him she’s a successful college student.

“I hope you give him some mercy so he can see me graduate college, so he can see me get my first home, my first job,” she said as her father sobbed at the defense table.

“All I crave is a hug from my father.”

Nordean – who goes by the moniker “Rufio Panman” after a member of Peter Pan’s Lost Boys – rose to prominence within the organization in 2017 after a video of him knocking out an anti-fascist protester with one punch went viral online.

On the morning of January 6, Nordean and his co-defendant Joseph Biggs, led a group of approximately 100 Proud Boys towards the Capitol, donning walkie-talkie style radios and leading chants over a bullhorn.

Standing before the judge late Friday afternoon, Nordean apologized for his actions during the riot and said that “for a long time I thought of myself merely as an individual, comparing my actions that day to others… but I had to face the sobering truth: I didn’t come to January 6 as an individual, I came as a leader.”

“The truth is I did help lead a group of men back to the Capitol,” Nordean said. “I had ample opportunity to deescalate… and I did nothing.’

Defense attorney Nicholas Smith noted repeatedly Friday that Nordean “consumed at least six alcoholic beverages” on his way to the Capitol on January 6 and that his pockets were filled with empty containers. His wife and sister also addressed the judge, pleading for Nordean to be allowed to return home to his daughter.

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August 2, 2023
Biden says border walls don’t work as administration bypasses laws to build more barriers in South Texas | CNN Politics

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Washington
CNN
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President Joe Biden said Thursday that he doesn’t believe border walls work, even as his administration said it will waive 26 laws to build additional border barriers in the Rio Grande Valley amid heightened political pressure over migration.

According to a notice posted to the Federal Register Wednesday, construction of the wall will be paid for using already appropriated funds earmarked specifically for physical border barriers. The administration was under a deadline to use them or lose them. But the move comes at a time when a new surge of migrants is straining federal and local resources and placing heavy political pressure on the Biden administration to address a sprawling crisis, and the notice cited “high illegal entry.”

Biden – who, as a candidate, vowed that there will “not be another foot” of border wall constructed on his watch – defended the decision to reporters Thursday, saying that he tried to get the money appropriated for other purposes but was unsuccessful.

“I’ll answer one question on the border wall: The border wall – the money was appropriated for the border wall. I tried to get them to reappropriate it, to redirect that money. They didn’t, they wouldn’t. And in the meantime, there’s nothing under the law other than they have to use the money for what it was appropriated. I can’t stop that,” Biden told reporters in the Oval Office.

Asked whether he believes the border wall works, Biden answered, “No.”

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas stated forcefully that there had been no change to the administration’s policy at a news conference in Mexico City on Thursday.

“I want to address today’s reporting relating to a border wall and be absolutely clear: There is no new administration policy with respect to the border wall,” Mayorkas said. “Allow me to repeat that: There is no new administration policy with respect to the border wall.”

“We have repeatedly asked Congress to rescind this money, but it has not done so, and we are compelled to follow the law,” he said.

Border Patrol reported nearly 300,000 encounters in the Rio Grande Valley sector between last October and August, according to federal data. Last month, Border Patrol apprehended more than 200,000 migrants crossing the US-Mexico border, the highest total this year.

Biden has been plagued by issues on the border since his first months in office, when the US faced a surge of unaccompanied migrant children that caught officials flatfooted. Over the last two years, his administration has continued to face fierce pushback from Republicans – and at times, Democrats – over his immigration policies.

But a new surge of migrants has placed additional pressure on federal resources and tested Biden’s latest border policies only months after going into place, prompting fresh criticism from Republicans and concern within the administration over a politically delicate issue.

Migration along the southern border has been a relentless focus of the Republican presidential primary field and conservative media, and leading Democrats, including the mayors of New York and Chicago, have begun publicly demanding stronger efforts by the federal government to provide resources to accommodate arrivals.

The Department of Homeland Security had concluded “it is necessary to waive certain laws, regulations, and other legal requirements in order to ensure the expeditious construction of barriers and roads” in Starr County, Texas, along the US border with Mexico, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in the filing posted in the US Federal Registry.

“There is presently an acute and immediate need to construct physical barriers and roads in the vicinity of the border of the United States in order to prevent unlawful entries into the United States in the project areas,” Mayorkas said in the notice.

Construction of the wall will be paid for through a 2019 appropriations bill that funneled money specifically to a “border barrier” in the Rio Grande Valley, and according to Mayorkas, “DHS is required to use those funds for their appropriated purpose.” The funds needed to be spent by the end of fiscal year 2023, prompting the administration to choose to move forward this year with construction in south Texas, according to a source familiar.

US Customs and Border Protection had previously announced plans to design and construct up to 20 miles of new border barrier systems in Starr County, including light poles and lighting, gates, cameras and access roads, among other systems. CBP sought public input between August and September, according to the agency.

Among the laws the Biden administration is bypassing to build the wall are several of the same statutes the administration has in the past moved to protect, including: the National Environmental Policy Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act and the Clean Air Act.

A CBP spokesperson said the agency “remains committed to protecting the nation’s cultural and natural resources” while implementing “sound environmental practices” to build the border barriers.

Migrant crossings at the US-Mexico border are expected to remain high in the near term, a senior US Customs and Border Protection official recently told CNN, though additional commitments from Mexico are expected to help eventually drive down numbers.

This week, Mayorkas, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Attorney General Merrick Garland and White House Homeland Security adviser Dr. Liz Sherwood-Randall will meet with their Mexican counterparts in Mexico City for annual security talks.

Migration is expected to be a topic of discussion. Senior administration officials maintain that the US has been in regular touch with Mexico over the situation at the US southern border, including commitments to shore up enforcement.

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said constructing a new border wall is a “regression” that won’t resolve the immigration problem. During his daily press conference, he criticized “right-wing Republicans” for pressing the immigration and drug trafficking problem for political purposes.

“So, they are acting very irresponsibly, and they are putting very hard pressure on the president, who will always count on our support,” Lopez Obrador said. “But that authorization for the construction of the wall is a setback. Because that doesn’t solve the problem, that doesn’t solve the problem. The causes must be addressed.”

This story has been updated with additional information.

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August 2, 2023
Bob Graham Fast Facts | CNN Politics

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CNN
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Here’s a look at the life of Bob Graham, former United States senator and Democratic governor of Florida.

Birth date: November 9, 1936

Birth place: Coral Gables, Florida

Birth name: Daniel Robert Graham

Father: Ernest “Cap” Graham, Florida state senator, dairy farmer and cattle rancher

Mother: Hilda (Simmons) Graham, teacher

Marriage: Adele (Khoury) Graham (1959-present)

Children: Kendall, Suzanne, Cissy and Gwen

Education: University of Florida, B.A., 1959; Harvard Law School, LL.B., 1962

Graham’s family operates dairy, beef cattle and pecan farms in Florida and Georgia.

Was a primary author of portions of the Patriot Act that dealt with improving and sharing intelligence between US and foreign agencies.

Co-chaired the congressional investigation into the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

Voted against going to war with Iraq in 2003.

Graham’s daughter, Gwen, represented Florida’s 2nd Congressional District (Tallahassee), 2015-2017.

1966-1970 – Member of the Florida House of Representatives.

1970-1978 – Member of the Florida Senate.

1979-1987 – Governor of Florida.

January 3, 1987-January 3, 2005 – US Senator representing Florida.

2001-2003 – Chairman of the US Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.

January 31, 2003 – Undergoes heart surgery to repair a valve.

February 27, 2003 – Files papers to form a presidential campaign committee.

May 6, 2003 – Formally launches his presidential campaign.

October 6, 2003 – Announces he is dropping out of the presidential race.

November 3, 2003 – Announces that he will not seek reelection to the Senate in 2004.

September 2004 – Graham’s book “Intelligence Matters: The CIA, the FBI, Saudi Arabia, and the Failure of America’s War on Terror,” written with Jeff Nussbaum, is published.

2005-2006 – Senior Research Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University.

2006 – The Bob Graham Center for Public Service at the University of Florida is established.

May 16, 2008 – Congressional leaders appoint Graham to chair the Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism. In December 2008, the commission issues a report, saying it is likely a WMD attack will occur somewhere in the world by 2013 if nothing is done to enhance security.

2009 – Graham’s book “America, The Owner’s Manual: Making Government Work for You,” written with Chris Hand, is published.

May 2010 – President Barack Obama establishes a commission led by Graham and former Environmental Protection Agency Commissioner William Reilly on the BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill and offshore drilling. The commission ends its work in January 2011.

June 2011 – Graham’s first novel, “Keys to the Kingdom,” is published.

September 2012 – Graham calls for the investigation into the September 11 terrorist attacks be reopened. He asserts that Saudi Arabia’s involvement in the attacks has been covered up.

January 2014 – Graham visits Cuba as part of a group sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations in order to investigate Cuban plans to drill for oil offshore.

September 9, 2016 – Graham has an op-ed in The New York Times calling for the release of more documents related to the September 11 terrorist attacks.

November 24, 2020 – Graham’s children’s book, “Rhoda the Alligator,” is published.

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August 2, 2023
Rand Paul Fast Facts | CNN Politics

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CNN
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Here’s a look at the life of Rand Paul, US senator from Kentucky.

Birth date: January 7, 1963

Birth place: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Birth name: Randal Howard Paul

Father: Ron Paul, former presidential candidate and retired US representative from Texas

Mother: Carol (Wells) Paul

Marriage: Kelley (Ashby) Paul

Children: Robert, Duncan and William

Education: Attended Baylor University, 1981-1984; Duke University School of Medicine, M.D., 1988

Religion: Christian

Practiced as an ophthalmologist for 18 years.

Former president and longtime member of the Lions Club International.

Was active in the congressional and presidential campaigns of his father, Ron Paul.

1993 – Completes his ophthalmology residency at Duke University Medical Center.

1994 – Founds grassroots organization Kentucky Taxpayers United, which monitors state taxation and spending. It is legally dissolved in 2000.

1995 – Founds the Southern Kentucky Lions Eye Clinic, a non-profit providing eye exams and surgeries to those in need.

August 5, 2009 – Announces on Fox News that he is running as a Republican for the US Senate to represent Kentucky.

May 18, 2010 – Defeats Secretary of State Trey Grayson in the Kentucky GOP Senate primary.

May 19, 2010 – In interviews with NPR and MSNBC, while answering questions about the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Paul expresses strong abhorrence for racism, but says that it is the job of communities, not the government, to address discrimination. Paul later releases a statement saying that he supports the Civil Rights Act and would not support its repeal.

November 2, 2010 – Paul is elected to the Senate, defeating Jack Conway.

January 5, 2011 – Sworn in for the 112th Congress. It is the first time a son joins the Senate while his father concurrently serves in the House. Ron Paul retires from the House in 2013.

January 27, 2011 – Participates in the inaugural meeting of the Senate Tea Party Caucus with Senators Mike Lee and Jim DeMint.

February 22, 2011 – Paul’s book “The Tea Party Goes to Washington” is published.

September 11, 2012 – Paul’s book “Government Bullies: How Everyday Americans Are Being Harassed, Abused, and Imprisoned by the Feds” is published. He is later accused of plagiarism in some of his speeches and writings, including in “Government Bullies.” Paul ultimately takes responsibility, saying his office had been “sloppy” and pledging to add footnotes to all of his future material.

February 12, 2013 – Delivers the Tea Party response to President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address.

March 6-7, 2013 – Paul speaks for almost 13 hours, filibustering to stall a confirmation vote on CIA Director nominee John Brennan.

February 12, 2014 – Paul and the conservative group FreedomWorks file a class-action lawsuit against Obama and top national security officials over the government’s electronic surveillance program made public by intelligence leaker Edward Snowden. The lawsuit is later dismissed.

December 2, 2014 – Paul announces his bid for a second term in the Senate.

April 7, 2015 – Paul announces his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination during an event in Louisville, Kentucky.

May 20, 2015 – After 10 hours and 30 minutes, Paul ends his “filibuster” over National Security Agency surveillance programs authorized under the Patriot Act. Paul’s speech wasn’t technically a filibuster because of intricate Senate rules, but his office insists it was a filibuster.

August 5, 2015 – The Justice Department indicts two officials from a Rand Paul Super PAC for conspiracy and falsifying campaign records. During the 2012 presidential primary season, Jesse Benton and John Tate allegedly bribed an Iowa state senator to get him to endorse Ron Paul. Benton and Tate go on to help run one of the Super PACs supporting Rand Paul, America’s Liberty PAC. Both men are later convicted.

February 3, 2016 – Announces that he is suspending his campaign for the presidency.

November 8, 2016 – Wins a second term in the Senate, defeating Democrat Jim Gray.

November 3, 2017 – A neighbor assaults Paul at his home in Bowling Green, Kentucky, which results in six broken ribs and a pleural effusion – a build-up of fluid around the lungs. The attorney representing Paul’s neighbor, Rene Boucher, later says that the occurrence had “absolutely nothing” to do with politics and was “a very regrettable dispute between two neighbors over a matter that most people would regard as trivial.” Boucher, who pleaded guilty to the assault, is sentenced in June 2018 to 30 days in prison with a year of supervised release.

August 2018 – Goes to Moscow and meets with Russian lawmakers, extending an invitation to visit the United States. While abroad, Paul tweets that he delivered a letter to Russian leader Vladimir Putin from US President Donald Trump. A White House spokesman later says that Paul asked Trump to provide a letter of introduction. After he returns, Paul says that he plans to ask Trump to lift sanctions on members of the Russian legislature so they can come to Washington for meetings with their American counterparts.

January 29, 2019 – A jury awards him more than $580,000 in his lawsuit against the neighbor who attacked him in 2017. The amount includes punitive damages and payment for pain and suffering as well as medical damages.

August 5, 2019 – Paul says part of his lung had to be removed by surgery following the 2017 attack by Boucher.

March 22, 2020 – Paul announces that he has tested positive for the novel coronavirus, becoming the first US senator to test positive for coronavirus.

August 10, 2021 – Paul is suspended from YouTube for seven days over a video claiming that masks are ineffective in fighting Covid-19, according to a YouTube spokesperson.

November 8, 2022 – Wins reelection to the Senate for a third term.

October 10, 2023 – Paul’s book “Deception: The Great Covid Cover-Up” is published.

Rand Paul’s political life

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August 2, 2023
Sen. Tim Kaine says ‘powerful argument’ 14th Amendment could disqualify Trump | CNN Politics

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CNN
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Virginia Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine said Sunday “there’s a powerful argument to be made” for barring Donald Trump from the presidential ballot based on the 14th Amendment’s ban on insurrectionists holding public office.

“My sense is it’s probably going to get resolved in the courts,” Kaine said on “ABC This Week,” adding that Democrats’ focus should be on winning in 2024.

Legal experts have pointed to the 14th Amendment as a potential long-shot avenue to keep Trump from becoming president. The amendment includes a post-Civil War “disqualification clause” that bars anyone from holding public office if they “have engaged in insurrection or rebellion.” The Constitution does not, however, spell out how to enforce this ban and it has only been applied twice since the late 1800s, when it was used extensively against former Confederates.

Election officials in battleground states, including attorneys general in Michigan and New Hampshire, have said they’re anticipating outside groups to file lawsuits on the matter, and are studying the legality of the provision and how it may disqualify Trump from appearing on ballots in their states.

Liberal activists have championed the 14th Amendment’s disqualification clause and have already vowed to file suits to disqualify the former president, a tactic they have used against other elected officials to little success – though some prominent conservative legal scholars have recently endorsed the idea.

Does the 14th Amendment make Trump ineligible? Hear what law professor thinks

Kaine voiced support for the idea, saying, “The language (of the amendment) is specific: If you give aid and comfort to those who engage in an insurrection against the Constitution of the United States — it doesn’t say against the United States, it says against the Constitution. In my view, the attack on the Capitol that day was designed for a particular purpose … and that was to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power as is laid out in the Constitution.”

Kaine also said that he had discussed using the provision with fellow senators during Trump’s second impeachment in 2021, remarking that he thought it would “have been a more productive way to go to do a declaration under that section of the 14th Amendment.”

He floated the idea of a censure vote in Congress under the 14th Amendment as an alternative way of holding Trump accountable and keeping him from holding public office again after the Senate acquitted the former president in a failed impeachment vote. Seven GOP senators joined the chamber’s 50 Democratic and Independent members in finding Trump guilty of inciting a riot on January 6.

Kaine noted that Virginia will host its own races later this year to decide the makeup of its split legislature in an election that will act as a window into the state of politics in the battleground state ahead of next year’s presidential race.

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August 2, 2023
Condoleezza Rice Fast Facts | CNN Politics

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Here’s a look at the life of Condoleezza Rice, former US secretary of state.

Birth date: November 14, 1954

Birth place: Birmingham, Alabama

Birth name: Condoleezza Rice

Father: John Wesley Rice Jr., minister and dean

Mother: Angelena (Ray) Rice, a high school teacher

Education: University of Denver, B. A., 1974; University of Notre Dame, Master’s degree, 1975; University of Denver, Ph.D., 1981

Name is from the Italian “con dolcezza” meaning “with sweetness.”

She enrolled in the University of Denver at the age of 15, and graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. at the age of 19.

At the University of Denver, she studied under Josef Korbel, the father of Madeleine Albright.

Has served on the boards of Dropbox, Chevron, Charles Schwab, the University of Notre Dame, and the Rand Corporation, among others.

She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

As a professor at Stanford, she won the 1984 Walter J. Gores Award for Excellence in Teaching and the 1993 School of Humanities and Sciences Dean’s Award for Distinguished Teaching.

1981 – Appointed to the faculty of Stanford University as a professor of political science.

1986 – Serves as Special Assistant to the Director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, while also an international affairs fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations.

1989 – Appointed Special Assistant to President George H. W. Bush for National Security Affairs.

March 1991 – Resigns as Senior Director of Soviet and East European Affairs in the National Security Council, and as Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs.

1993 – Becomes the first woman and the first African-American to become provost of Stanford University. She was also the youngest person ever appointed provost.

June 1999 – Resigns as Provost of Stanford University but remains a faculty member.

January 22, 2001-2005 – National Security Adviser to President George W. Bush. She is the first woman to hold this post.

October 5, 2003 – The White House announces the formation of the Iraqi Stabilization Group, headed by Rice. The group will consist of four coordinating committees: counter-terrorism, economic development, political affairs, and media relations. The committees will be headed by four of Rice’s deputies and will include representatives from the CIA and the under-secretaries from the State, Defense and Treasury Departments.

April 8, 2004 – Rice testifies in public, under oath before the 9-11 Commission after weeks of requests for her to do so. She has previously met with the Commission in private.

November 16, 2004 – President Bush announces his nomination of Rice as secretary of state.

November 20, 2004 – Rice is released from Georgetown University Hospital in Washington, DC., after undergoing a uterine fibroid embolization the day before.

2004-2007 – Time Magazine names Rice as one of the World’s Most Influential People.

January 26, 2005 – Confirmed as US secretary of state by a vote of 85 to 13 in the Senate. She is the first African-American woman to hold this position.

January 28, 2005-January 20, 2009 – Serves as the 66th US Secretary of State.

July 24, 2006 – Arrives in the Middle East to discuss a peace plan between Israel and Lebanon after violence erupts.

August 16, 2008 – Oversees a cease-fire agreement between Russia and Georgia.

September 5, 2008 – Meets with Moammar Gadhafi in Libya, the first visit by a US secretary of state to Libya since 1953.

January 28, 2009 – Stanford University announces that Rice will return “as a political science professor and the Thomas and Barbara Stephenson Senior Fellow on Public Policy at the Hoover Institution.”

February 2009 – Agrees to a three-book deal with Crown Publishers starting with a memoir about her years in the George W. Bush Administration.

November 2009 – Is a founding partner of the RiceHadley Group (now Rice, Hadley, Gates & Manuel LLC), an advisory firm, along with former George W. Bush Administration National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley.

July 28, 2010 – Plays the piano during a performance with the “Queen of Soul,” Aretha Franklin and the Philadelphia Orchestra for a charity event to raise money for inner city music education.

October 12, 2010 – Rice’s memoir, “Extraordinary, Ordinary People,” is released. The book details Rice’s childhood in segregated Alabama.

November 1, 2011 – Rice’s memoir, “No Higher Honor: A Memoir of My Years in Washington,” is published.

August 20, 2012 – Along with financier Darla Moore, becomes the first woman admitted as a member to Augusta National Golf Club.

October 16, 2013 – Rice is announced as one of 13 members of the College Football Playoff selection committee.

May 3, 2014 – Rice declines to speak at Rutgers University’s May 18th commencement after students and faculty opposed her support of the Iraq war.

May 9, 2017 – Rice’s book, “Democracy: Stories from the Long Road to Freedom,” is published.

October 11, 2017 – It is announced that Rice has agreed to chair the NCAA’s Commission on College Basketball.

May 2018 – Rice and co-author Amy Zegart’s book, “Political Risk: How Businesses and Organizations Can Anticipate Global Insecurity,” is published.

January 28, 2020 – Rice announces she will be the next director of Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, a public policy think tank.

September 1, 2020 – Rice assumes her position as director of the Hoover Institution.

July 11, 2022 – The Denver Broncos announce Rice is joining the NFL team’s new ownership group.

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August 2, 2023
Who are the Trump co-conspirators in the 2020 election interference indictment? | CNN Politics

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CNN
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The historic indictment against Donald Trump in the special counsel’s probe into January 6, 2021, and efforts to overturn the 2020 election says that he “enlisted co-conspirators to assist him in his criminal efforts.”

The charging documents repeatedly reference six of these co-conspirators, but as is common practice, their identities are withheld because they have not been charged with any crimes.

CNN, however, can identify five of the six co-conspirators based on quotes in the indictment and other context.

They include:

Among other things, the indictment quotes from a voicemail that Co-Conspirator 1 left “for a United States Senator” on January 6, 2021. The quotes in the indictment match quotes from Giuliani’s call intended for GOP Sen. Tommy Tuberville, as reported by CNN and other outlets.

Ted Goodman, a political adviser to Giuliani, said in a statement that “every fact Mayor Rudy Giuliani possesses about this case establishes the good faith basis President Donald Trump had for the actions he took during the two-month period charged in the indictment,” adding that the indictment “eviscerates the First Amendment.”

Among other things, the indictment says Co-Conspirator 2 “circulated a two-page memorandum” with a plan for Vice President Mike Pence to overturn the 2020 election while presiding over the Electoral College certification on January 6, 2021. The indictment quotes from the memo, and those quotes match a two-page memo that Eastman wrote, as reported and published by CNN.

Charles Burnham, an attorney for Eastman, said the indictment “relies on a misleading presentation of the record,” and that his client would decline a plea deal if offered one.

“The fact is, if Dr. Eastman is indicted, he will go to trial. If convicted, he will appeal. The Eastman legal team is confident of its legal position in this matter,” Burnham said in a statement.

The indictment says Co-Conspirator 3 “filed a lawsuit against the Governor of Georgia” on November 25, 2020, alleging “massive election fraud” and that the lawsuit was “dismissed” on December 7, 2020. These dates and quotations match the federal lawsuit that Powell filed against Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp.

An attorney for Powell declined to comment.

The indictment identifies Co-Conspirator 4 as “a Justice Department official.” The indictment also quotes an email that a top Justice Department official sent to Clark, rebutting Clark’s attempts to use the department to overturn the election. The quotes in that email directly match quotes in an email sent to Clark, according to a Senate report about how Trump tried to weaponize the Justice Department in 2020.

CNN has reached out to an attorney for Clark.

Among other things, the indictment references an “email memorandum” that Co-Conspirator 5 “sent” to Giuliani on December 13, 2020, about the fake electors plot. The email sender, recipient, date, and content are a direct match for an email that Chesebro sent to Giuliani, according to a copy of the email made public by the House select committee that investigated January 6.

CNN has reached out to an attorney for Chesebro.

The indictment says they are “a political consultant who helped implement a plan to submit fraudulent slates of presidential electors to obstruct the certification proceeding.” The indictment also further ties this person to the fake elector slate in Pennsylvania.

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August 2, 2023
US says airstrike kills 5 al-Shabaab terrorists in Somalia | CNN Politics

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The US military conducted an airstrike killing five al-Shabaab terrorists on Tuesday, US Africa Command said in a statement.

The airstrike was carried out in support of Somali National Army forces “in a remote area near Cali Heele, approximately 244 kilometers North East of Mogadishu, Somalia.” The initial assessment showed that no civilians were killed in the airstrike, AFRICOM said.

“Somalia remains key to the security environment in East Africa. US Africa Command’s forces will continue training, advising and equipping partner forces to give them the tools that they need to degrade al-Shabaab,” the statement says.

The US has provided ongoing support to the Somali government since President Joe Biden last year approved a Pentagon request to redeploy US troops to the area in an attempt to counter the terrorist group.

The approval to send fewer than 500 troops was a reversal of then-President Donald Trump’s 2020 decision to withdraw nearly all US troops from the country.

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August 2, 2023
Fox executives encourage Trump to participate in first GOP presidential primary debate | CNN Politics

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Former President Donald Trump on Tuesday dined with top Fox executives at his Bedminster golf club, during which Fox News president Jay Wallace and the network’s chief executive, Suzanne Scott, encouraged him to participate in the first presidential debate the network is hosting later this month, two sources with knowledge told CNN.

Trump, who earlier in the evening had been indicted for a third time, did not commit to participating in the debate, which will take place in Milwaukee.

Fox News did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The New York Times first reported on the dinner.

Trump has privately and publicly floated skipping either one or both of the first two Republican presidential primary debates, and pointed to his commanding lead in the polls as one reason he is hesitant to share the stage with his GOP challengers.

“Why would we debate? That would be stupid to go out there with that kind of lead,” one Trump adviser previously told CNN. However, not all of Trump’s allies feel this way. Some worry that an absent Trump would give an opportunity for a lower tier candidate to have a breakout moment.

Trump’s dinner comes after RNC chairwoman Ronna McDaniel and David Bossie, who is in charge of the debate committee, visited Trump at Bedminster in recent weeks to encourage him to participate, according to a Trump adviser. Trump was also noncommittal on his plans during this meeting.

Over the last year, Trump has trashed Fox News and Rupert Murdoch, the Fox Corporation chairman and controlling shareholder of the company, for not being sufficiently supportive of him.

Murdoch, who privately holds disdain for Trump, attempted early on in the 2024 campaign to shine a bright light on Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis while casting the former president on the sidelines. The hope appeared to be to seduce the Fox News audience into falling for another Republican candidate.

But the DeSantis campaign has struggled since it officially got off the ground this year. Last month, Murdoch debuted a new Fox News lineup comprised of pro-Trump propagandists, a move that seemed to acknowledge Trump’s likely selection as the Republican Party’s presidential nominee.

Trump has also sharply criticized the way in which Murdoch has approached his legal problems, blasting the right-wing media mogul for not doubling down on his lies while in court.

Trump tried to call into Fox News after his supporters attacked the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, but the network refused to put him on air, according to court filings from Dominion Voting Systems in its defamation case against the company.

Still, Fox has amplified Trump’s lies about the validity of the 2020 election, even though Murdoch has said he did not believe Trump’s false statements, according to damning private messages revealed in the Dominion case. Murdoch floated the idea of having his influential hosts appear together in prime time to declare Joe Biden as the rightful winner of the election. Such an act, Murdoch said, “Would go a long way to stop the Trump myth that the election stolen.”

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August 2, 2023
Former Trump adviser Peter Navarro convicted of contempt of Congress | CNN Politics

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Former Donald Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro has been convicted of contempt of Congress for not complying to a subpoena from the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol.

Navarro is the second ex-aide to the former president to be prosecuted for his lack of cooperation with the committee. Steve Bannon was convicted last year on two contempt counts. Bannon’s case is currently on appeal.

Navarro pledged to appeal based on executive privilege issues.

“We knew going in what the verdict was going to be. That is why this is going to the appeals court,” he told reporters outside the courthouse. “And we feel – look, I said from the beginning this is going to the Supreme Court. I said from the beginning I’m willing to go to prison to settle this issue, I’m willing to do that.”

Hear from ex-Trump aide after guilty of contempt verdict

Asked by CNN if he’s spoken with the former president or reached out for help on legal bills, Navarro called Trump “a rock,” but did not elaborate on any communications.

“President Trump has been a rock in terms of assistance. We talk when we need to talk,” Navarro said. “He will win the presidential race in 2024, in November. You know why? Because the people are tired of Joe Biden weaponizing courts like this and the Department of Justice.”

After the verdict was read, Navarro’s lawyers sought a mistrial, raising concerns about any influence alleged protestors may have had when jurors took a break outdoors Thursday afternoon. US District Judge Amit Mehta did not immediately rule on the motion.

The judge scheduled Navarro’s sentencing for January 12, 2024.

Tim Mulvey, former spokesperson for House January 6 committee, celebrated the verdict.

“His defiance of the committee was brazen. Like the other witnesses who attempted to stonewall the committee, he thought he was above the law. He isn’t. That’s a good thing for the rule of law. I imagine that those under indictment right now are getting a good reminder of that right now,” Mulvey told CNN in a statement.

Prosecutors told the jury during closing arguments Thursday that Navarro “made a choice” not to comply with a February 2022 subpoena.

Justice Department attorney Elizabeth Aloi said that government only works if people play by the rules and are held accountable if they don’t.

“The subpoena – it is not hard to understand,” she said, adding that Navarro knew “what he was required to do and when he was required to do it.”

Navarro’s attorney Stanley Woodward contested the idea that the subpoena was simple, staying that the subpoena did not specify where in the Capitol complex Navarro was supposed to show up for his deposition.

He also said that prosecutors failed to prove that Navarro was willful in his failure to comply with the subpoena, arguing that prosecutors hadn’t established that his non-compliance with the demand for testimony was not the result of a mistake or accident.

“Why didn’t the government present evidence to you about where Dr. Navarro was or what he was doing” on the day of the scheduled deposition, Woodward asked the jury. “Something stinks.”

Prosecutor John Crabb responded: “Who cares where he was. What matters is where he wasn’t.”

Crabb repeatedly referred to Navarro as “that man’ while pointing to him, telling the jury at one point, “that man thinks he is above the law.”

The gestures elicited strong reactions from Navarro, who at times threw up his hand, shook his head or laughed. Woodward eventually jumped up and whispered to his client, and the two stood quietly together for the remainder of the proceeding.

The jury was attentive during closing arguments, watching carefully as lawyers presented their final case. Navarro stood directly across the room with his hands clasped and stared at jurors intently.

After the jury was dismissed, Woodward told the judge that the defense was seeking a mistrial because they had learned the jury had taken an outdoor break shortly before rendering the verdict and that during that break, they were around a “number” of January 6-related protestors demonstrating and chanting outside of the court.

“It’s obvious the jury would have heard those protestors,” Woodward said. “It’s impossible for us to know what influence that would have” on their verdict.

Crabb challenged the idea that there were protestors in the park next to the courthouse where the jurors took their break. Woodward countered that Navarro himself had been “accosted” earlier in the day by a protestor when he was coming through that park.

Mehta said he knew that jurors had asked to take their break outside, where they were accompanied by a court security officer, but that he was not aware that protestors were in the park. He told Woodward that he was not going to rule on the mistrial request without receiving more briefing and evidence.

Navarro was briefly interrupted by protesters when he left the courthouse after the verdict was read Thursday.

It’s a “sad day for America, not ‘cause … they were guilty verdicts, because I can’t come out and have an honest, decent conversation with the people of America,” Navarro said.

“People of America, I want you to understand that this is the problem we have right here – this kind of divide in our country between the woke Marxist left and everybody else here. And this is nuts,” he added.

Navarro joined the Trump White House to advise on trade and became a well-known face of the Trump administration, while earning a reputation for sparring behind the scenes with his White House colleagues.

He played a prominent role in the administration’s Covid-19 response as well. He led some of the efforts to speed up the deployment of medical supplies and also was a defender of fringe Trump views about the virus, including the former president’s advocacy of the controversial drug hydroxychloroquine.

Navarro was still working at the White House in the period after the 2020 election and lost a pre-trial fight to argue to the jury that Trump asserted an executive privilege that shielded him from the subpoena, and he and his attorneys have signaled that, if convicted, he will raise that and other legal issues on appeal.

“So today’s ‘Judgment Day,’” Navarro told reporters as he walked into the courthouse Thursday.

“I have been stripped, stripped of virtually every defense by the court and yet there is some defense left and the reality here is the government has not proved his case,” he said. “Please understand that the Biden-weaponized Department of Justice is the biggest law firm in the world. That’s what I’m fighting against.”

The trial itself moved forward this week with notable speed and simplicity. It took less than a day for the jury to hear all the evidence in the case.

Prosecutors put just three witnesses on the stand, all former staff members of the House January 6 committee. The Justice Department used their testimony to make the case that the committee had good reason to subpoena Navarro and that he was informed repeatedly of its demands.

In her closing argument, prosecutor Aloi told the jury that Navarro “had knowledge about a plan to delay the activities of Congress on January 6.”

“The defendant was more than happy to share that knowledge” in television interviews and in other public remarks, Aloi said, “except to the congressional committee that could do something about” preventing a future attack.

Woodward sought to paint the mention about the attack on the Capitol and the disruption of the peaceful transfer of power as a distraction.

“This case is not about what happened on January 6,” Woodward said in his closing argument.

Navarro’s defense team engaged in only brief cross examination, questioning just one of the government’s witnesses. His lawyers were focused on the element of the charge that requires a showing that Navarro was willful and deliberate in his decision not to comply with the subpoena – meaning that his lack of compliance was not the result of an inadvertent mistake or accident.

The defense did not put on any witnesses of their own, having abandoned a plan to call an FBI agent who worked on the Justice Department probe into Navarro for questioning on the lack of DOJ investigating into Navarro’s whereabouts on the day his committee deposition was scheduled.

Navarro’s service as a Trump White House aide has generated continuing legal troubles for the former trade adviser – troubles that go beyond the criminal case.

The Justice Department brought a civil lawsuit against him to obtain government records from Navarro’s personal email account that were withheld from the National Archives upon his departure from government. He has appealed the ruling against him in that case.

This story has been updated with additional developments.

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August 2, 2023
US intel agencies hunt for evidence of Iranian role in Hamas attack on Israel | CNN Politics

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Washington
CNN
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The US intelligence community is digging through its stores of data and tasking the nation’s spy agencies to hunt for fresh clues to determine whether Iran played a direct role in Saturday’s deadly attack on Israel by Hamas, a senior Biden administration official said Tuesday.

Even as the US believes Iran is “complicit” in the attack, given its years of support to the Palestinian militant group, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Tuesday that the administration still does not have direct evidence linking Tehran to the planning and execution of the assault.

“We’re looking to acquire further intelligence,” Sullivan told reporters at the White House. “But as I stand here today, while Iran plays this broad role – sustained, deep and dark role in providing all of this support and capabilities to Hamas – in terms of this particular gruesome attack on October 7, we don’t currently have that information.”

Privately, multiple intelligence, military and congressional officials with access to classified intelligence tell CNN the same thing that Sullivan said publicly: No direct evidence has been found indicating Iran was directly involved.

“Waiting to see if we get a smoking gun in the intel,” said one military official.

Israeli intelligence is also going back and examining previous evidence, a senior Israeli official told CNN.

“I doubt that Iran had no knowledge whatsoever,” the official said. “We’ve seen meetings and we’ve seen the close coordination between them.”

US and Israeli intelligence had no advance warning of the attack – something US officials say is stunning given the scale of the assault – and now, the Biden administration is treading cautiously.

Iran has for years been Hamas’ chief benefactor, providing it with tens of millions of dollars, weapons and components smuggled into Gaza, as well as broad technical and ideological support.

Hamas maintains a degree of independence from the Iranian regime. Tehran doesn’t have advisers on the ground in blockaded Gaza, according to former security officials and other regional analysts, and it doesn’t command the group’s activities.

But the unprecedented scale of the weekend’s attack – combined with analysts’ broad belief that Iran sees the attack as a net positive for its interests in the region – have fueled questions of whether Hamas could have pulled off such a sophisticated operation without direct Iranian assistance.

“We spend a lot of time and resources worrying about what Iran is doing and how to counter what Iran is doing,” a State Department official said. “This certainly opens up a new chapter in that discussion.”

In 2022, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said publicly that the group had received about $70 million from Iran that year and that it used the money to build rockets. A State Department report from 2020 found that Iran provided about $100 million annually to Palestinian terrorist groups, including Hamas.

Former US officials say there is little question the massive stockpile of weapons used in Saturday’s attack was acquired and assembled with help from Iran.

“Hamas didn’t build the guidance system and those missiles in Gaza,” said retired Gen. Frank McKenzie, the former commander of US Central Command. “They got them from somewhere. And the technology assistance to put it together certainly came from Iran – where else would it have come from?”

Still, the Biden administration has for days stopped short of attributing a role in the tactical planning and execution of the attack to Tehran, and current and former US intelligence analysts who spoke to CNN cautioned that past Iranian support to the group isn’t enough evidence to prove its direct involvement.

“Even if they didn’t give the instruction, you see it in the support,” said Zohar Palti, the former head of the Political-Military Bureau at Israel’s Ministry of Defense. “Is Hamas a complete Iranian proxy that does everything Iran wants? No. But the relationship is much closer than it was even three years ago.”

Tehran has denied any involvement in the attack, even as it has lauded it publicly. Israel has also expressed caution publicly.

“We have no evidence or proof” that Iran was behind the attack, Maj. Nir Dinar, a spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces, told Politico on Monday. “We are 100 percent sure that the Iranians were not surprised.”

Privately, some US officials believe it’s likely Iran had at least some involvement in the planning of the attack. But those personal assessments are largely based on the belief that Iran would likely look for any opportunity to disrupt the fragile negotiations that had been in the works to normalize relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel. Saturday’s attack is widely seen as having endangered those talks.

Other analysts say it’s equally likely that Iran would have wanted to maintain its distance from any Hamas operation against Israel — even if it was aware of the attack in advance.

It is not in Iran’s interest to have more direct involvement, said Norm Roule, the former national intelligence manager for Iran at the CIA.

“Iran identifies regional proxies and then provides them with the political, financial and security support to dominate their particular geography,” Roule said. “Iran encourages military operations, but its proxies manage those actions.”

It’s possible that Iran provided some operational and planning support in advance of the attack, but that it told Hamas, “You’re on your own once it happens,” said Mike Knights, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute who specializes in Iran-backed proxy groups.

“This looks like Hamas learned some very significant new tricks from someone else and that may well have been the Iranians,” Knights said. “But that doesn’t necessarily mean that Iran is up for broadening the war.”

The relationship between Iran and Hamas has evolved over the years. In the early days of the Syrian civil war a decade ago, Hamas and Iran found themselves on opposite sides of the conflict.

For years, the two had a fraught relationship driven by two different Islamist ideologies: Sunni Muslim Hamas and Shia Muslim Iran. But Hamas saw Iran’s influence expanding in the region, especially as America’s shrinking role in the Middle East created a power vacuum for Tehran to exploit, according to Michael Milshtein, the former head of the Department for Palestinian Affairs in the Israeli military’s intelligence directorate.

More recently, Tehran has stepped up the training assistance it provides Hamas inside Iran, according to a former Western defense official. “Iran was being more proactive in logistics and training of these people,” the former official said. “They’ve gone full on in last few years … with explicit desire to destabilize” the region.

According to Knights, the closest relationship that Shia Iran now has with any Sunni group is Hamas. Tehran has “provided Hamas with precision loitering munitions drone systems that it has not even provided the Iraqi militias, (with) which it has had relationships since the 1980s.”

“This suggests a level of actual operational arming, training, equipping that we’ve only previously seen with Lebanese Hezbollah, and then with the Houthis in Yemen,” Knights said.

But Hamas is not a proxy of Iran, Milshtein said. Unlike terror groups such as Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Gaza or Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas maintains a large degree of independence from Tehran, even as the assistance has dramatically expanded.

“Hamas became comfortable getting close to Iran,” Milshtein said, but the relationship remains largely based on military cooperation. Hamas received Iranian weapons and military technology, and learned from the Iranians about planning operations. But the power to make a decision remained with Hamas’ leadership.

“Everything we have seen in the last four days, we can’t say it’s an Iranian plan or an Iranian effort,” Milshtein said. “It’s a Hamas plan that got Iranian help.”

US intelligence officials are also working to understand Hamas’ immediate motivation for launching the attack. Unlike the Palestinian Authority, the militant group does not recognize Israel and is committed to the destruction of the Jewish state.

Broadly, the more than 2 million residents of the Gaza Strip live in crowded and substandard conditions, partly as a result of a yearslong Israeli blockade and recurring airstrikes on the densely populated enclave.

McKenzie and others said Hamas was likely motivated by its own parochial cause more than it was by any interest in disrupting normalization talks.

“I think the Hamas calculation is very little on normalization,” McKenzie said. “I think it’s less the larger geostrategic things in the theater.

“It’s the Hamas-Israeli relationship, not the larger, ‘What does this mean to Saudi Arabia?’”

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August 2, 2023
FBI searching for Proud Boy after he disappears days before January 6 sentencing | CNN Politics

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Christopher Worrell, a member of the Proud Boys who was convicted in a bench trial on seven charges related to his actions during the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol, was scheduled to be sentenced in federal court in Washington on Friday but is now missing, according to court records and the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia.

“We are interested in hearing from any members of the public who might have information regarding Mr. Worrell’s whereabouts,” Patty Hartman, a spokesperson for the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia, told CNN in a statement.

The FBI has released a wanted poster for Worrell, 52, saying he “violated conditions of release pending sentencing.”

“Christopher John Worrell is wanted for violating conditions of release pending sentencing on federal charges related to the violence at the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C., on January 6, 2021,” the poster states. “A federal arrest warrant was issued for Worrell in the United States District Court, District of Columbia, Washington, D.C., on August 15, 2023.”

Worrell’s attorneys declined to comment.

Worrell has been under house arrest in Florida. His case had become a cause célèbre in right-wing circles because of his health issues while in jail and claims that officials had dragged their feet in getting him medical treatment for a broken finger. He is also diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and at one point he contracted Covid-19 while at the jail.

Worrell’s sentencing was canceled on Tuesday and a bench warrant for his arrest was issued, according to court records.

Federal prosecutors were seeking a 14-year sentence for Worrell, according to the government’s sentencing memorandum which was submitted on Sunday.

“Worrell was found guilty, after a bench trial in which he perjured himself, of assaulting a group of police officers with a deadly and dangerous weapon in order to thwart Congress’s certification of the 2020 electoral vote and the peaceful transition of power,” prosecutors wrote in the memorandum.

The FBI asked that anyone with information on Worrell’s whereabouts contact their local FBI office or the nearest American embassy or consulate.

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August 2, 2023
Republican congressman says Tuberville’s hold on military nominations is ‘paralyzing’ and a ‘national security problem’ | CNN Politics

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House Foreign Affairs Chairman Mike McCaul, a Republican, told CNN’s Jake Tapper on Sunday that GOP Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s hold on military nominations is “paralyzing” and a “national security problem.”

“The idea that one man in the Senate can hold this up for months … is paralyzing the Department of Defense,” McCaul said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

“I think that is a national security problem and a national security issue,” the Texas congressman said.

Tuberville, of Alabama, has delayed the confirmations of more than 300 top military nominees over his opposition to the Pentagon’s policy of reimbursing service members and their families who have to travel to receive abortion care. Tuberville says the Pentagon’s reproductive health policies violate the law, but Pentagon officials have pointed to a Justice Department memo that says the policies are lawful.

A spokesperson for Tuberville said McCaul’s view “just isn’t accurate.”

“No one can stop (Senate Majority Leader) Chuck Schumer from holding votes on these nominations. He just doesn’t want to,” spokesperson Steven Stafford wrote in an email to CNN. “It’s also inaccurate because acting officials are in all of these roles. In some cases these acting officials are the nominees for permanent roles. No jobs are open or going undone right now.”

One senator can hold up nominations or legislation in the chamber, and Tuberville’s stance has left three military services to operate without a Senate-confirmed leader for the first time in history.

It’s possible to confirm each nominee one by one, but Senate Democrats have argued that would take up valuable floor time – despite a five-week recess in August.

McCaul said on Sunday that he wishes Tuberville would reconsider his stance and that the Republican Party is working on the abortion travel policy issue through the National Defense Authorization Act.

“But to hold up the top brass from being promoted … I think is paralyzing our Department of Defense,” he said.

The hold on promotions, which began in March, has been a growing source of public scrutiny. The three US military service secretaries told CNN last week that Tuberville’s blockage is aiding communist and autocratic regimes, and is being used against the US by adversaries such as China.

In July, active-duty military spouses hand-delivered a petition to Schumer, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Tuberville signed by hundreds of military family members who were “deeply concerned and personally impacted by Senator Tuberville blocking confirmation of senior military leaders.”

Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley told CNN’s Tapper on Sunday that if elected president, she would put an end to the reimbursement policy for travel for abortion care. Haley, whose husband is in the South Carolina Army National Guard, said military families should not be used as political pawns.

“I’m not saying that Sen. Tuberville is right in doing this, because I don’t want to use them as pawns. But if you love our military and are so adamant about it, then go and make Congress, Republicans and Democrats, have to go through person by person,” the former South Carolina governor and United Nations ambassador said.

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August 2, 2023
EU launches probe into disinformation campaigns as X says ‘hundreds’ of Hamas-affiliated accounts removed | CNN Business

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X says it has removed “hundreds of Hamas-affiliated accounts” and taken down thousands of posts since the attack on Israel by the Palestinian militant group, even as the European Commission formally opened an investigation into X after a previous warning about disinformation and illegal content on its platform linked to the Israel-Hamas war.

The platform, formerly known as Twitter, was given 24 hours by the European Union earlier this week to address illegal content and disinformation regarding the conflict or face penalties under the bloc’s recently enacted Digital Services Act.

CEO Linda Yaccarino responded to EU official Thierry Breton in a letter dated Wednesday that she posted to X. She said the company had “redistributed resources and refocused internal teams who are working around the clock to address this rapidly evolving situation.”

“There is no place on X for terrorist organizations or violent extremist groups and we continue to remove such accounts in real time,” Yaccarino wrote.

“X is… addressing identified fake and manipulated content during this constantly evolving and shifting crisis,” she added. The platform had “assembled a leadership group to assess the situation” shortly after news broke about the attack, Yaccarino said.

European Union officials are now assessing X’s compliance with the DSA and have asked the company to start responding to investigators by as early as Oct. 18.

The probe covers X’s “policies and practices regarding notices on illegal content, complaint handling, risk assessment and measures to mitigate the risks identified,” the Commission said in a release.

“X is required to comply with the full set of provisions introduced by the DSA since late August 2023,” the release added, “including the assessment and mitigation of risks related to the dissemination of illegal content, disinformation, gender-based violence, and any negative effects on the exercise of fundamental rights, rights of the child, public security and mental well-being.”

X didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. Beyond X, European officials have sent similar warnings to Meta and TikTok in recent days.

The announcement did not name the Israel-Hamas war. But this week, EU officials sent a letter to X owner Elon Musk warning that if an investigation finds that the company had failed to meet its legal obligations in connection with content about the war, it could face steep penalties, including billions in fines.

A slew of mischaracterized videos and other posts went viral on X over the weekend, alarming experts who track the spread of misinformation and offering the latest example of social media platforms’ struggle to deal with a flood of falsehoods during a major geopolitical event.

Since the attack on Israel, Yaccarino said X had acted to “remove or label tens of thousands of pieces of content” that break its rules on violent speech, manipulated media and graphic media. It had also responded to more than 80 “take down requests” from EU authorities to remove content.

“Community Notes” — which allow X users to fact check false posts — are visible on “thousands of posts, generating millions of impressions,” she wrote.

According to Yaccarino, notes related to the conflict take about five hours on average to show up after a post is created, a revelation that could fuel concerns that fake or manipulated content is being seen by thousands — or in some cases millions — of people before being moderated.

The DSA is one of the most ambitious efforts by policymakers anywhere to regulate tech giants and companies face billions in fines for violating the act.

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August 2, 2023
The identities behind the 30 unindicted co-conspirators in Trump’s Georgia case | CNN Politics

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Fulton County’s sweeping indictment against former President Donald Trump and 18 additional co-defendants also includes details involving 30 “unindicted co-conspirators” – people who Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis alleges took part in the criminal conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election.

Some of the co-conspirators are key Trump advisers, like Boris Epshteyn, while several others are likely Georgia officials who were the state’s fake electors for Donald Trump.

One of the unindicted co-conspirators who appears multiple times in the indictment is Georgia’s Republican Lt. Gov. Burt Jones. Willis was barred by a state judge from investigating Jones after she hosted a fundraiser last year for Jones’ Democratic opponent when he was a state senator running for lieutenant governor.

The 98-page document alleges the 30 unindicted co-conspirators, who are not named, “constituted a criminal organization whose members and associates engaged in various related criminal activities” across the 41 charges laid out in the indictment.

“Prosecutors use the ‘co-conspirator’ label for people who are not charged in the indictment but nonetheless were participants in the crime,” said Elie Honig, a CNN senior legal analyst and former federal and state prosecutor. “We do this to protect the identity and reputation of uncharged people – though they often are readily identifiable – and, at times, to turn up the pressure and try to flip them before a potential indictment drops.”

CNN was able to identify some of the co-conspirators by piecing together details included in the indictment. Documents reviewed from previous reporting also provide clues, especially the reams of emails and testimony from the House January 6 Committee’s report released late last year.

CNN has been able to identify or narrow down nearly all of the unindicted co-conspirators:

The indictment refers to Trump’s speech on November 4, 2020, “falsely declaring victory in the 2020 presidential election” and that Individual 1 discussed a draft of that speech approximately four days earlier, on October 31, 2020.

The January 6 committee obtained an email from Fitton sent on October 31 to Trump’s assistant Molly Michael and his communications adviser Dan Scavino, which says, “Please see below a draft statement as you requested.”

The statement Fitton wrote also says in part, “We had an election today – and I won.”

The indictment states that co-conspirator 3 appeared at the infamous November 19, 2020, press conference at the Republican National Committee headquarters in Washington, with Rudy Giuliani, one of the defendants in the case. Epshteyn was there.

The indictment also includes two emails between co-conspirator 3, John Eastman and Kenneth Chesebro, two lawyers who pushed the strategy of then-Vice President Mike Pence trying to overturn the election on January 6, 2021, including one with a draft memo for options of how to proceed on January 6.

According to emails released by the January 6 committee, Epshteyn was the third person on those emails.

Individual 4 received an email from co-defendant David Shafer, who was then Georgia’s Republican Party chair, on November 20, 2020, that said Scott Graham Hall, a Georgia bail bondsman, “has been looking into the election on behalf of the President at the request of David Bossie,” according to the indictment.

CNN obtained court documents that show Shafer sent this email to Sinners in November 2020: “Scott Hall has been looking into the election on behalf of the President at the request of David Bossie. I know him.” Hall is one of the 19 defendants charged in the indictment.

The indictment notes an additional email from December 12, 2020, from Shafer to Individual 4 advising them to “touch base” with each of the Trump presidential elector nominees in Georgia in advance of the December 14, 2020, meeting to confirm their attendance.

CNN reporting from June 2022 reveals an email exchange between Sinners and David Shafer on December 13, 2020, 18 hours before the group of alternate electors gathered at the Georgia State Capitol.

“I must ask for your complete discretion in this process,” Sinners wrote. “Your duties are imperative to ensure the end result – a win in Georgia for President Trump – but will be hampered unless we have complete secrecy and discretion.”

Kerik’s attorney, Tim Parlatore, confirmed to CNN that his client is the unnamed individual listed in the indictment as co-conspirator 5. The indictment refers to co-conspirator 5 taking part in several meetings with lawmakers in Pennsylvania and Arizona, states Trump was contesting after the 2020 election.

That included the meeting Kerik attended at the White House on November 25, 2020, with a group of Pennsylvania legislators, along with Trump, then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, Giuliani, Jenna Ellis and individual 6.

Parlatore took issue with Willis’ definition of co-conspirator in the case of Kerik, saying that the indictment only refers to him in the context of receiving emails and attending meetings.

The indictment says on November 25, 2020, Trump, Meadows, Giuliani, Ellis, Individuals 5 and 6 met at the White House with a group of Pennsylvania legislators.

According to the January 6 committee report, Waldron was among the visitors who were at the White House that day, along with Kerik and attorney Katherine Freiss. Cassidy Hutchinson, former aide to Meadows, explained that their conversation with the president touched on holding a special session of the Pennsylvania state legislature to appoint Trump electors.

The indictment also says on December 21, 2020, Sidney Powell, a defendant in the case, sent an email to Individuals 6, 21 and 22 that they were to immediately “receive a copy of all data” from Dominion’s voting systems in Michigan.

The Washington Post reported last August that the email stated Waldron was among the three people to receive the data, along with Conan Hayes and Todd Sanders.

Waldron is the only person who was involved in both the White House meeting and received the Powell email.

The indictment says Giuliani re-tweeted a post from co-conspirator 8 on December 7, 2020, calling upon Georgia voters to contact their local representatives and ask them to sign a petition for a special session to ensure “every legal vote is counted.” The date and content of the tweet match a tweet posted by Jones, who was at the time a state senator.

Jones, who was elected lieutenant governor in November, appears more than a dozen times throughout the indictment as co-conspirator 8, including as a fake elector.

After the 2020 election, Jones was calling for a special session of the Georgia legislature, something Gov. Brian Kemp and former Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan refused to do.

On Thursday, Pete Skandalakis, the executive director of the Prosecuting Attorneys Council of Georgia, told CNN that he will appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Jones’ role in the state’s 2020 election interference case, after a judge blocked Willis from investigating him last year.

The indictment lists several emails sent to co-conspirator 9 related to preparations for the fake electors who met on December 14, 2020, including an email from Chesebro “to help coordinate with the other 5 contested States, to help with logistics of the electors in other States hopefully joining in casting their votes on Monday.”

According to emails obtained by the January 6 committee, that email was sent to an account belong to the Georgia GOP treasurer, which at the time was Brannan.

Co-conspirator 9 is also included in the indictment as one of the 13 unindicted co-conspirators who served as fake electors.

Co-conspirators 10 and 11 are Georgia GOP officials Carolyn Fisher and Vikki Consiglio

The indictment says on December 10, 2020, Ken Chesebro sent an email to Georgia state Republican Chair David Shafer and Individuals 9, 10 and 11, with documents that were to be used by Trump electors to create fake certificates.

The January 6 committee obtained as part of its evidence an email from Chesebro sent on December 10 sent to Shafer and three other email addresses. One is for Carolyn Fisher, the former Georgia GOP first vice chair, one is for the Georgia Republican Party treasurer and one is for the Georgia GOP assistant treasurer, the role Consiglio was serving in 2020.

The email contains attachments of memos and certificates that could be used to help swap out the Biden electors with a slate of electors for Trump.

Both co-conspirators 10 and 11 also served as fake electors in Georgia.

Co-conspirators 2 and 8-19 are the fake electors

Of the 30 unindicted co-conspirators, 13 are listed as the fake electors for Donald Trump, who signed papers “unlawfully falsely holding themselves out as the duly elected and qualified presidential electors from the State of Georgia,” according to the indictment.

Three of the 16 Georgia fake electors were charged in the indictment: David Shafer, Shawn Still and Cathleen Alston Latham.

The other 13 fake electors, according to the fake electors certificate published by the National Archives, are Jones (co-conspirator 8), Joseph Brannan (co-conspirator 9), James “Ken” Carroll, Gloria Godwin, David Hanna, Mark Hennessy, Mark Amick, John Downey, Daryl Moody, Brad Carver, CB Yadav and two others who appear to be Individuals 10 and 11.

Several of the fake electors who were not charged are only listed in the indictment for their role signing on as electors for Trump, while others, like Jones, appear in other parts of the indictment as being more actively involved with the alleged conspiracy.

The indictment says Individual 20 was part of a meeting at the White House on December 18, 2020, with Trump, Giuliani and Powell, known to have discussed the possibility of seizing voting machines.

The December 18 meeting featured prominently during some of the hearings from the January 6 committee. All but two of the outside advisers who attended have been named as co-defendants in the indictment already: former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn and former Overstock.com CEO Patrick Byrne.

The meeting featured fiery exchanges between Trump’s White House lawyers and his team of outside advisers, including on whether to appoint Sidney Powell as special counsel to investigate voter fraud, according to the indictment and previous details that have been disclosed about the meeting.

The outside advisers famously got into a screaming match with Trump’s White House lawyers – Pat Cipollone and Eric Herschmann – at the Oval Office meeting. Cipollone and Herschmann, along with Meadows, pushed back intensely on the proposals, Cipollone and Herschmann testified to the January 6 committee.

Co-conspirators 21 and 22 are Conan Hayes and Todd Sanders

Co-conspirators 21 and 22 are Conan Hayes and Todd Sanders – who are both affiliated with Byrne’s America Project, a conservative advocacy group that contributed funding to Arizona’s Republican ballot audit. Hayes was a former surfer from Hawaii and Sanders has a cybersecurity background in the private sector.

The indictment says on Dec. 21, 2020, Sidney Powell sent an email to the chief operations officer of SullivanStrickler, saying that individual 6, who CNN identified as Waldron, along with individuals 21 and 22, were to immediately “receive a copy of all data” from Dominion’s voting systems in Michigan.

According to the Washington Post, Conan and Todd were the other two people listed on the email to receive the data.

The final eight co-conspirators listed in the indictment are connected to the effort to access voting machines in Georgia’s Coffee County.

Co-conspirator 25 and 29 are a Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan and analyst Jeffrey Lenberg

The indictment says that Misty Hampton allowed co-conspirators 25 and 29 to access non-public areas of the Coffee County elections office on January 18, 2021. Logan and Lenberg were the two outsiders granted access to the elections office that day by Hampton, according to surveillance video previously obtained by CNN. No one else was given access to the office that day, according to a CNN review of the footage.

The indictment also notes that co-conspirator 25 downloaded Coffee County election data that SullivanStrickler then had uploaded to a separate server. Documents previously obtained by CNN show five accounts that downloaded the data – one account belongs to Logan and none of them belong to Lenberg. Still, CNN could not definitively determine who exactly downloaded the data.

Logan and his company conducted the so-called Republican audit of the 2020 ballots cast in Arizona’s Maricopa County.

The indictment says that co-conspirator 28 “sent an e-mail to the Chief Operations Officer of SullivanStrickler LLC” directing him to transmit data copied from Coffee County to co-conspirator 30 and Powell. CNN has previously reported on emails Penrose and Powell arranged upfront payment to a cyber forensics firm that sent a team to Coffee County.

This story has been updated with additional developments.

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August 2, 2023
US military to conduct additional interviews with witnesses of Kabul airport bombing | CNN Politics

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The senior US general for the Middle East has ordered additional interviews be conducted regarding the 2021 Abbey Gate bombing in Kabul, Afghanistan, which killed 13 US service members during the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, the US military announced Friday.

The additional interviews are the result of an internal review ordered by the commander of US Central Command Gen. Michael “Erik” Kurilla, who directed US Army Central commander Lt. Gen. Pat Frank in June to review public testimony about the bombing for any new information not included in CENTCOM’s previous report.

“The purpose of these interviews is to ensure we do our due diligence with the new information that has come to light, that the relevant voices are fully heard and that we take those accounts and examine them seriously and thoroughly so the facts are laid to bare,” said a statement from CENTCOM spokesman Michael Lawhorn.

Though the interviews don’t constitute a formal reopening of the investigation into the circumstances surrounding the attack, this represents an effort by the military to re-examine testimony after members of those killed have expressed anger and dissatisfaction with the original review.

It’s unclear if the new interviews will include Afghans who witnessed the blast, which killed more than 170 Afghan civilians.

When pressed on whether the interviews would include Afghans, Lawhorn said it would be “up to the Supplementary Review Team to decide who to interview.”

“I cannot be explicit about anything that the Supplementary Review Team may or may not decide to review in the future,” Lawhorn said.

CENTCOM released a lengthy after-action review last year that included statements from more than 100 witnesses. Many service members interviewed gave conflicting recollections about the person they were on the look-out for – some said no description seemed to fit clearly, or that they didn’t see anyone fitting the description they’d been given before the blast, while others said they believed they saw the person in question in the crowd.

Among the differing recollections of what happened on August 26, 2021, is testimony from Marine Sgt. Tyler Vargas-Andrews, who was seriously injured in the blast and who has said he was not interviewed in CENTCOM’s original investigation.

Vargas-Andrews testified before Congress in March that Marines had requested permission to shoot who they believed to be the suicide bomber, but never got permission.

“Plain and simple, we were ignored. Our expertise was disregarded. No one was held accountable for our safety,” Vargas-Andrews said.

Lawhorn’s statement said that Vargas-Andrews’ public comments “made statements about his experience that contained new information not previously shared by any other witness.” Frank’s review also found that additional service members were not interviewed due to “their immediate medical evacuation in the aftermath of the attack.”

“These interviews will seek to determine whether those not previously interviewed due to their immediate medical evacuation possess new information not previously considered, and whether such new information, if any, would affect the results of the investigation, and to ensure their personal accounts are captured for historical documentation,” he added.

The news comes just weeks after Gold Star family members of some of the 13 US troops who were killed in the Abbey Gate bombing demanded answers before Congress, saying they did not feel that they’d been given the full truth about what happened to their loved ones.

Lawhorn’s statement said that the next of kin of the 13 service members who were killed “are currently being informed of the supplementary interviews.”

The process for the interviews will begin “in the coming days,” Lawhorn said. Kurilla has requested an update on those interviews within 90 days, but has directed Frank to “take whatever time is necessary to ensure each of the witnesses not interviewed as part of the investigation have an opportunity to share their experience and perspective.”

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August 2, 2023
McCarthy says defense spending bill will get a vote this week ‘win or lose’ | CNN Politics

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House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said Sunday that the Defense Department appropriations bill that was paused last week before it even made it to the floor for debate will come up for a vote this week “win or lose.”

“We will do that this week,” McCarthy said on Fox News, adding “unfortunately I had a handful of members last week that literally stopped the Department of Defense appropriations coming forward,” referring to members of his right flank who have stymied two appropriations bills thus far.

“I gave them an opportunity this weekend to try to work through this, and we’ll bring it to the floor win or lose,” McCarthy told Maria Bartiromo.

House Republican leadership was hoping to put a series of standalone spending bills on the floor to try to build consensus and unite the conference, but it’s been a gamble. Leadership was left scrambling over the defense spending bill after one member of the House Freedom Caucus, Rep. Ralph Norman of South Carolina, voted against the bill in the Rules Committee and another, Rep. Dan Bishop of North Carolina, told CNN he would vote against the rule on the floor.

Both the debate and the scheduled votes were pulled minutes before the chamber was due to gavel in Wednesday.

McCarthy on Sunday pointed a finger at the Senate, saying not only does the House have to work with the upper chamber, but that the Senate “blew up last week too. They couldn’t pass anything.”

“And unfortunately on the Senate side, the Republicans and Democrats over there are writing bills to spend more money. Ours are the most conservative, but if we don’t ask them, we’re weaker in the negotiations. So anytime a Republican wants to hold back and stop the floor from working when Republicans have the majority, that puts us in a weaker position to win in the end of the day,” he said.

But McCarthy said a government shutdown “would only give strength to the Democrats. It would give the power to Biden.”

With no serious progress on Capitol Hill as Congress stares down a spending deadline at the end of the month, lawmakers are acknowledging that at this point a government shutdown is not only possible, but may soon be inevitable.

That’s particularly true if the political dynamics at play among McCarthy, the hardliners in his conference and the US Senate don’t change fast.

“I want to make sure we don’t shut down. I don’t think that is a win for the American public and I definitely believe that will make (Republicans’) hand weaker,” McCarthy said.

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August 2, 2023
Between 100 and 300 believed killed in Gaza hospital blast, according to preliminary US intelligence assessment | CNN Politics

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The US intelligence community assesses that there likely were between 100 to 300 people killed in the blast at the Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza, and there was “only light structural damage at the hospital,” according to an unclassified intelligence assessment obtained by CNN that adds more detail to the initial assessment released Wednesday finding Israel was not responsible for the strike.

The unclassified assessment sent to Capitol Hill by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence adds more detail to the US intelligence community’s initial assessment released Wednesday that Israel was not responsible for the strike on the hospital.

“Israel Probably Did Not Bomb Gaza Strip Hospital: We judge that Israel was not responsible for an explosion that killed hundreds of civilians yesterday [17 October] at the Al Ahli Hospital in the Gaza Strip,” the assessment states. “Our assessment is based on available reporting, including intelligence, missile activity, and open-source video and images of the incident.”

The US intelligence community also estimates the number of deaths from the hospital at the “low end of the 100-to-300 spectrum,” according to the assessment, a lower number than figures initially cited by Hamas of more than 500.

The intelligence community “observed only light structural damage at the hospital,” with no observable damage to the main hospital building and no impact craters, according to the assessment.

“We see only light damage to the roofs of two structures near the main hospital building, but both structures remained intact,” the assessment states.

The US intelligence community released its initial assessment on Wednesday that Israel was not responsible after President Joe Biden stated publicly while in Israel that the strike appeared to have been “the result of an errant rocket fired by a terrorist group in Gaza.” Biden is giving a primetime address from the Oval Office on Thursday evening.

The National Security Council has said that the Biden administration plans to publicize as much intelligence as it can about the strike amid accusations that Israel was responsible for the blast.

“We will be sharing that information with our friends and partners in the region we have shared as much of that information as we can publicly,” Deputy National Security Adviser Jon Finer said on “CNN This Morning” on Thursday.

The assessment states that intelligence indicates that “some Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip assessed that the explosion was likely caused by an errant rocket or missile launch carried out by Palestine Islamic Jihad” and that the militants were still investigating.

“We continue to work to corroborate whether the explosion resulted from a failed PIJ rocket,” the ODNI assessment states.

“We are still assessing the likely casualty figures and our assessment may evolve, but this death toll still reflects a staggering loss of life,” the assessment states. “The United States takes seriously the deaths of all civilians, and is working intensively to address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.”

Finer told CNN that the assessment of the hospital strike was a warning to the danger of drawing conclusions amid the fog of war. “I think this is a cautionary note for governments in the region, and frankly for press, in responding to each and every twist and turn in a conflict,” he said.

The Biden administration has been debating how much raw intelligence to declassify underpinning its assessment that the deadly blast at the Gaza hospital was caused by an errant rocket from a Palestinian militant group — not a missile from Israel, according to a senior administration official.

The White House believes that providing a clearer assessment to the public would be useful in trying to establish a clear and accurate narrative of events, this official said, noting it hasn’t reached a conclusion about how effective raw intelligence would be in that effort.

The debate a reflects growing concern that the US and Israel have lost control of the narrative spiraling out of Gaza that Israel was to blame for those killed in the hospital blast on Tuesday evening.

Former intelligence officials and sources familiar with current US intelligence were skeptical that there was anything the US might make public that would be believed in the Arab world.

“Unfortunately, the narratives have already spread and solidified at this point,” said one US official.

Following a classified Capitol Hill briefing Wednesday afternoon, a bipartisan group of senators urged the Biden administration to make public as much of the intelligence as possible.

“A part of the focus also has to be lowering the temperatures in some of the countries that have had reasonably good relationships with Israel — think Jordan, think Egypt,” Sen. Thom Tillis, Republican from North Carolina, told reporters on Wednesday. “That’s more of the focus now.”

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August 2, 2023