A report by special counsel Jack Smith into Donald Trump‘s alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election result has been released, despite efforts by Trump’s lawyers to keep it suppressed.
Newsweek sought email comment from Trump’s attorney on Tuesday.
Why It Matters
The report contains fresh revelations about the lengths Trump was willing to go to allegedly overthrow Joe Biden‘s win in 2020 and to circumnavigate the democratic wish of the American public.
Special Counsel Jack Smith delivers remarks on a recently unsealed indictment against Donald Trump, Aug, 2023. The Justice Department has released Smith’s report on his indictment of Trump for election fraud.
Drew Angerer/Getty Images
What To Know
The report includes some shocking allegations against Trump, including:
Attempts To Keep Vice President Mike Pence Mentally Isolated
The report claims that Trump tried to keep vice president Mike Pence isolated from everyone else, so that Trump alone could work on him psychologically.
The report claims that Trump then began berating Pence that hundreds of thousands of people “would hate his guts” unless he refused to certify Joe Biden’s win in the presidential election.
This is because the vice president is automatically president of the Senate and Pence had the task, on January 6, 2021, of officially confirming the result of a presidential election.
“Mr. Trump wanted no one else speaking with Vice President Pence because he and co-conspirators were already implementing a secret plan to use Mr. Pence’s ministerial role as President of the Senate to Mr. Trump’s advantage,” the report states.
“In the weeks before the certification, Mr. Trump began pressuring Mr. Pence to cooperate, both directly and by mobilizing Mr. Trump’s supporters.”
“In repeated conversations, day after day, Mr. Trump pressed Mr. Pence to use his ministerial position as President of the Senate to change the election outcome, often by citing false claims of election fraud as justification; he even falsely told Mr. Pence that the ‘Justice Department [was] finding major infractions.’
Mr. Trump told him that ‘hundreds of thousands’ of people would think Pence was ‘stupid,’ and Trump complained that Mr. Pence was ‘too honest.’
Secret Communications With Justice Department Official, Jeffrey Clark
In total violation of Justice Department rules, Justice Department official, Jeffrey Clark, allegedly engaged in secret communication with Trump about how to undermine the election result.
As a reward, Trump allegedly threatened to fire the Justice Department chief and replace him with Clark, who is identified in the report as Co-Conspirator 4.
Newsweek sought email comment from Clark’s attorney on Tuesday.
The report states that in one post-election discussion, when the acting attorney general advised Mr. Trump that the Justice Department could not just “snap its fingers” and change the election outcome, Trump told the acting Attorney General and acting deputy attorney general that they should “just say that the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressmen,” the report states.
“In the same call, alluding to replacing Justice Department leadership if they did not do as he directed, Mr. Trump also said, “people tell me [Jeffrey Clark] is great. I should put him in.”
The report claims that Trump had been secretly engaging with Clark, “who was communicating with Mr. Trump in contravention of policies designed to protect the independence of the Justice Department.”
Racist Threats To Judge Tanya Chutkan
After Trump was indicted for election fraud in Judge Tanya Chutkan‘s court in Washington, D.C., Trump made “threatening public statements” about those involved in the case, the report states.
Chutkan, who is black, received racist threats after his comments, the report alleges.
“The day after his arraignment, for example, Mr. Trump posted on the social media application Truth Social, “IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I’M COMING AFTER YOU!”
The next day, one of his supporters called the district court judge’s chambers and said: ‘Hey, you stupid slave n[*****]. If Trump doesn’t get elected in 2024, we are coming to kill you, so tread lightly b[****].
‘You will be targeted personally, publicly, your family, all of it.'”
Trump’s Control Over The January 6 Rioters
During the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, “Mr. Trump’s supporters continued to heed his words,” the report states.
“Video evidence from that afternoon shows rioters, in real time, crediting Mr. Trump for their presence and conduct at the Capitol.”
“For example, as the crowd sought to push past officers protecting the Capitol’s East Front, one rioter shouted: ‘We were invited here! We were invited by the President of the United States!’
‘Inside, another rioter yelled at officers to ‘stand down. You’re outnumbered. There’s a fucking million of us out there. And we’re listening to Trump, your boss.’
“As the day wore on, rioters continued to obey Mr. Trump’s commands. At 4:25 p.m.-just eight minutes after Mr. Trump’s video Tweet telling supporters that they were ‘very special’ but should ‘go home now’. Rioter Edward Vallejo, a member of the Oath Keepers, posted to a group Signal chat that ‘our commander in chief has just ordered us to go home,'” the report states.
Trump’s Educated Women Problem
Trump allegedly tried to lean on Michigan Republicans to certify that he won the state in 2020.
However, one prominent legislator told Trump face-to-face that he lost the election because of a lack of support from educated women, not because of Democratic Party election rigging.
The report states: “Mr. Trump also pressed state legislators in Michigan by inviting them to the White House on November 20, raising false claims of election fraud, and bringing Co-Conspirator 1 [Rudy Giuliani] into the meeting by phone.
“Michigan’s Senate Majority Leader told Mr. Trump that he had lost the election not because of fraud, but because he had underperformed with educated females-an assessment that displeased Mr. Trump,” the report states.
Newsweek sought email comment from Giuliani’s spokesman on Tuesday.
Trump Fails To Present Evidence Of Fraud In Arizona
On November 22, 2020, Trump and Giuliani called the Speaker of the Arizona House of Representatives, whom Newsweek has identified as Rusty Bowers. The report states that they “used false fraud claims to try to convince the Speaker to call the state legislature into session and replace Arizona’s legitimate electors with Mr. Trump’s illegitimate ones.”
Giuliani allegedly “tried to coerce the Arizona Speaker, including by telling him, ‘we’re all kind of Republicans and we need to be working together.’
Bowers “refused to do what he was asked” and requested that Giuliani provide evidence to support his fraud claims.
Giuliani “not only failed to ever provide such evidence, but he conceded to the Arizona Speaker at an in-person meeting a week later that ‘[ w ]e don’t have the evidence, but we have lots of theories.'”
“Despite this lack of fraud evidence, Mr. Trump and others continued to pressure the Arizona Speaker to overturn the election results,” the report states.
What People Are Saying
In the report, Smith reveals that he moved quickly to indict Trump so as not to cause any embarrassment on the run-up to the 2024 election, which is consistent with Department of Justice police.
“Because of the Office’s deep familiarity and experience with these policies, it focused on completing both of its investigations promptly and making timely charging decisions, long before the election,” Smith explains.
What Happens Next
A copy of the report has been sent to Congress, but with a Republican majority in the Senate and House, chances of Trump being impeached are almost at zero.
There is a separate Smith report into the indictment of Trump for allegedly hoarding presidential records in Florida. However, the Department of Justice is not releasing that report so as not to prejudice the case against two of Trump’s co-accused.
It will likely be released after their cases have been completed.
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