The House Select Committee has used portions of each hearing to prove that Donald Trump knew of and approved whatever actions the Committee focused upon during that hearing. For example, the last hearing focused upon Eastman’s work alongside Trump regarding pressuring Pence, and that Trump knew that the scheme was illegal as he pressured Pence. Today, the Committee will focus on the fake electors scheme itself, and, according to the Guardian, the Committee will prove that Trump not only knew of the scheme but approved it and even directed portions of it, thus playing a central role. From The Guardian’s report:
The House select committee investigating the January 6 Capitol attack is expected to show at its fourth hearing on Tuesday that Donald Trump and top advisers coordinated the scheme to send fake slates of electors as part of an effort to return him to the White House.
The panel is expected to also examine Trump’s campaign to pressure top officials in seven crucial battleground states to corruptly reverse his defeat to Joe Biden in the weeks and months after the 2020 election.
At the afternoon hearing, the select committee is expected to focus heavily on the fake electors scheme, which has played a large part in its nearly year-long investigation into Trump’s effort to overturn the results of the election at the state level.
This site also reported on Adam Schiff’s statement that much of today’s hearings would focus on Mark Meadows, which is entirely consistent with the fake electors scheme.
The scheme exposes Trump, Meadows, and Eastman to considerable criminal liability. We know that fake electors gathered in Nevada, Michigan, and Pennsylvania and that Ginni Thomas was in contact with 29 legislators in Arizona trying to coordinate a similar plan of action. There is no reason to believe that Trump’s interference with Georgia’s election count differs in any significant way from organizing alternate electors from several states in an attempt to defraud the United States. Indeed U.S. District Court Judge David O. Carter from the Central District of California opined that “it is more likely than not” that Eastman and Trump engaged in a crime to obstruct Congress by organizing alternate electors.
If the Select Committee again succeeds in proving that Trump knew of and directed much of the scheme, the case for filing criminal charges against Trump only increases in its power, perhaps involving entirely new charges, such as defrauding the United States, based upon the unique scheme.
Jason Miciak believes a day without learning is a day not lived. He is a political writer, features writer, author, and attorney. He is a Canadian-born dual citizen who spent his teen and college years in the Pacific Northwest and has since lived in seven states. He now enjoys life as a single dad of a young girl, writing from the beaches of the Gulf Coast. He loves crafting his flower pots, cooking, while also studying scientific philosophy, religion, and non-math principles behind quantum mechanics and cosmology. Please feel free to contact for speaking engagements or any concerns.