Trump news: Rattled Trump lashes out as Jan 6 panel finishes investigation and tax return release looms

Publication of House committee’s Jan 6 report comes as information on former president’s tax returns released earlier in week

January 6 panel chair says Trump ‘broke the faith’ of US elections in final session

The House committee investigating the 6 January 2021 Capitol riot released its final report late on Thursday night, outlining why it has recommended Donald Trump and others face criminal charges over the insurrection.

Over 845 pages, the damning report details how the former president and his allies engaged in at least 200 acts attempting to overturn the 2020 election. The committee calls for him to never be allowed to hold office again.

“That evidence has led to an overriding and straightforward conclusion: the central cause of January 6th was one man, former President Donald Trump, whom many others followed,” the report states.

“None of the events of January 6th would have happened without him.”

Among its other recommendations: swift passage of the Electoral Count Act; a series of disciplinary and criminal referrals; a whole of government strategy to counter violent extremism; and the reform of security arrangements and criminal statutes to include harsher penalties for threats to election workers and the peaceful transfer of power.

The publication of the report caps off another terrible week for Mr Trump that also included a vote by another House committee to release six years’ worth of his tax returns.

Key points

• January 6 report: Key findings from the House committee investigation
• Report recommends barring Trump from holding office again
• Pro-Trump lawyer Kenneth Chesebro architect of fake electors plot, report says
• Trump lashes out with election fraud conspiracies
• McConnell says Trump’s influence is ‘diminshed'

[23 December 2022 06:30 · Oliver O'Connell]

Supermarket heiress tried to invoke four different amendments in Jan 6 interview

Julie Fancelli, the Publix supermarket chain heiress who funded bus transport for hundreds of Trump supporters who attacked the Capitol on 6 January 2021, attempted to avoid answering questions before the House January 6 select committee by citing a litany of – occasionally irrelevant – amendments to the US constitution, as well as her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.

Andrew Feinberg took a look at her evasive testimony.

[23 December 2022 07:00 · Sravasti Dasgupta]

Report says William Barr was 'forced to knock down one lie after another'

While former Attorney General William Barr, and the Justice Department (DOJ), were publicly silent for weeks after the 2020 election, the Jan 6 committee report has claimed that the official was trying to contain former president Donald Trump’s “conspiracy-mongering”.

The report states that Mr Barr and DOJ were “forced to knock down one lie after another” and that the Justice Department was “trying to contain the president’s conspiracy-mongering”, reported NBC.

FILE- (L-R) U.S. Attorney General William Barr and U.S. President Donald Trump (Getty Images)

[23 December 2022 07:30 · Oliver O'Connell]

Voices: My big prediction about US politics this year came true. Here’s what I got wrong

Eric Garcia writes:

Senator Raphael Warnock’s victory in Georgia officially bookended perhaps the most topsy-turvy midterm election cycle of my lifetime.

The day afterward, I did a little obligatory gloating, tweeting about how I predicted the final results of his race against Herschel Walker to an accuracy of less than a point. After initially screwing up the math, I thought that Walker would keep it much tighter than expected, given that national and state Republicans were campaigning for him. But I failed to see how that could overcome Warnock’s significant advantage with early voting.

I was pretty proud of that one. But the truth is that for every outcome I correctly predicted, I whiffed far more races.

Read on:

[23 December 2022 08:00 · Sravasti Dasgupta]

Proud Boys members texted Alex Jones during the attack, report says

The Jan 6 committee report has revealed that prominent members of the Proud Boys were in touch with Info Wars host Alex Jones during the 6 January attack and in the days following it, reported NBC.

Citing records from Proud Boys member Enrique Tarrio’s phone, the report stated that he texted with Jones three times and Jones’ Info Wars co-host Owen Shroyer five times during the riot.

Another Proud Boys member, Ethan Nordean, exchanged 23 texts with Mr Shroyer between 4-5 January.

The two also spoke by phone on each of those days.

A crowd of Trump supporters prepares to march on the Capitol on 6 January 2021 (EPA-EFE)

[23 December 2022 08:30 · Oliver O'Connell]

Here’s what the silence of 34 Trump supporters showed when they pleaded the Fifth in Jan 6 interviews

Gustaf Kilander writes:

While the witnesses in general chose not to go along with the committee’s questioning, the published transcripts reveal the sheer amount of evidence the panel has collected and some new aspects of how the investigators went about their work.

[23 December 2022 09:30 · Oliver O'Connell]

Hutchinson under pressure

Cassidy Hutchinson was placed under pressure from her Trumpworld-financed lawyer to downplay her role at the White House and leave out details of what she saw and heard relating to January 6. Here’s a selection of the examples she gave to the House select committee.

[23 December 2022 09:55 · Rachel Sharp]

Jan 6 report finds Trump and his allies engaged in 200 acts attempting to overturn election

The House select committee investigating the January 6 Capitol riot released its bombshell 845-page report late on Thursday night, where it detailed how Donald Trump and his allies engaged in at least 200 acts attempting to overturn the 2020 presidential election and called for him never to be allowed to enter office again.

The damning report marks the culmination of a 17-months-long investigation into the events leading up to and including January 6 2021, when a mob of Mr Trump’s supporters stormed the US Capitol to try to overturn the election.

It places the blame for the Capitol riot – a violent insurrection that left five people dead and dozens of law enforcement officers injured – squarely on the shoulders of “one man”: former president Mr Trump.

It finds that he acted illegally by taking part in a “multi-part conspiracy” to overturn the election results – a conspiracy that culminated in the events of that day.

The Independent’s Rachel Sharp has the full story:

[23 December 2022 10:15 · Rachel Sharp]

Donald Trump takes to Truth Social to fume over Jan 6 report

The House select committee investigating the January 6 Capitol riot released its bombshell 845-page report late on Thursday night, where it detailed how Donald Trump and his allies engaged in at least 200 acts attempting to overturn the 2020 presidential election and called for him never to be allowed to enter office again.

Mr Trump reacted furiously to the report, taking to his platform Truth Social almost as soon as it was released to once again label the investigation a “witch hunt”.

“The highly partisan Unselect Committee Report purposely fails to mention the failure of Pelosi to heed my recommendation for troops to be used in D.C., show the “Peacefully and Patrioticly” words I used, or study the reason for the protest, Election Fraud. WITCH HUNT!” he wrote.

[23 December 2022 10:35 · Rachel Sharp]

DC National Guard ‘strongly’ considered sending troops without Trump’s approval, Jan 6 report reveals

The House select committee investigating the January 6 Capitol riot released its bombshell report late on Thursday night.

As well as the actions of Donald Trump and his inner circle in the lead-up to January 6, the report also provides new details about the day itself – and the former president’s refusal to try to stop the insurrection.

When his supporters broke into the Capitol, Mr Trump watched it on TV and “did not contact a single top national security official during the day”.

“Not at the Pentagon, nor at the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Justice, the F.B.I., the Capitol Police Department, or the D.C. Mayor’s office,” the report states, adding that he didn’t even try to contact Mr Pence to see if he was safe.

With no action coming from the head of state, the report revealed that the commander of the DC National Guard “strongly” considered going ahead and sending troops to the US Capitol without waiting for approval.

Major General William Walker was aware that doing so would mean he may have to resign from his role but, after waiting for hours with no order from officials, he considered doing it anyway, the report finds.

“Major General Walker himself understood he had to wait for approval from Secretary (Ryan) McCarthy to deploy his forces. But as he waited on that video call for hours, he did strongly consider sending them anyway,” the report states.

“He turned to his lawyer and said, ‘Hey, you know what? You know, we’re going to go, and I’m just going to shoulder the responsibility.’”

[23 December 2022 10:50 · Oliver O'Connell]

Trump reacts furiously to Jan 6 report

Donald Trump has reacted furiously to the release of the full report from the House select committee investigating the January 6 Capitol riot, which found that he engaged in a “multi-part conspiracy” to overturn the 2020 presidential election and called for him to never be allowed to take office again.

Here’s what he had to say on Truth Social:

Rachel Sharp filed this full report: