January 6 Report Chapter 1: The Big Lie

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Ready to understand the truth behind the chaos of the 2020 US Presidential election? This episode uncovers hitherto unknown details, laying bare the machinations that unfolded during the aftermath. Join us as we expose the evidence of pre-planning for a false declaration of victory, bringing forth audio recordings and written communications that have been tucked away. As we delve into the roles of figures like Steve Bannon, Tom Fitton, and Roger Stone, you'll be enlightened on the strategies used to delegitimize mail-in voting and prematurely declare a victory.

The journey doesn't end there. As we dissect the web of false claims around Dominion Voting Systems, you'll gain insights into the conspiracy theories that shaped the narrative around the election results. Despite multiple debunkings, understand how these false allegations continue to be propagated, causing a ripple in public confidence. Listen closely as we dissect the 62 lawsuits lodged between November 4, 2020, and January 6, 2021, and gain a clearer understanding of the legal challenges that arose and the theories that were put forth.

In the last segment, we explore the enduring 'big lie' of election fraud that was promoted for months. Hear how the false claims about Dominion voting machines, suitcases of ballots, more votes than voters, and votes cast by non-citizens were used as a weapon to pressurize state and local officials. This chapter is a comprehensive exploration of the events leading up to the certification of Vice President Biden's victory and the subsequent fallout. If you thought you knew the whole story, think again. The truth is far more intricate, and it's time to uncover it all. Tune in for an eye-opening journey into the untold narratives of the 2020 US Presidential election.

Chapters

• 0:01 The Big Lie
• 5:35 Ch 1.1: The Big Lie Reflected Deliberate Exploitation of the “Red Mirage”
• 9:00 Ch 1.2 Trump’s Pre-Election Plans to Declare Victory
• 12:15 Ch 1.3 Trump’s Pre-Election Efforts to Delegitimize the Election Process
• 16:25 Ch 1.4 President Trump’s Launch of the Big Lie
• 18:42 Ch 1.5 Post-Election: President Trump Replaces His Campaign Team
• 20:12 Ch 1.6 President Trump’s Campaign Team Told Him He Lost the Election and There Was No Significant Fraud
• 28:25 Ch 1.7 President Trump Had His Day in Court
• 35:15 Ch 1.8 President Trump Repeatedly Promoted Conspiracy
• 1:03:48 Ch President Trump’s January 6th Speech

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

1. The Big Lie Late. On election night 2020, president Donald J Trump addressed the nation from the East Room of the White House. When Trump spoke at 2.21 am on November 4, the president's reelection was very much in doubt. Fox News, a conservative media outlet, had correctly called Arizona for former Vice President Joseph R Biden. Every Republican presidential candidate since 1996 had won Arizona. If the president lost the state and in the days ahead it became clear that he had then his campaign was in trouble. But as the votes continued to be counted, president Trump's apparent early lead in other key states states he needed to win steadily shrank Soon. He would not be in the lead at all. He'd be losing.

Speaker 1: 0:50

So the president of the United States did something he had planned to do long before election day. He lied Quote This is a fraud on the American public. This is an embarrassment to our country. Trump said We were getting ready to win this election. The president continued Frankly, we did win this election. We did win this election.

Speaker 1: 1:11

Trump claimed, without offering any evidence, that a major fraud was occurring in our nation. Neither of President Trump's claims are true. He had no basis for claiming victory or that fraud was taking place. Millions of votes still had not been counted. The states were simply tabulating the ballots cast by the American people. Trump's own campaign advisors told him to wait, that it was far too early to declare victory. As the evening progressed, president Trump called in his campaign team to discuss the results. Trump campaign manager William Stepien and other campaign experts advised him that the results of the election would not be known for some time and that he could not truthfully declare victory. Stepien was of the view that, because ballots were going to be counted for days, it was far too early to be making any proclamation about having won the election. Stepien told President Trump that his recommendation was to say votes are still being counted. It's too early to call the race. Jason Miller, another senior Trump campaign advisor, told the select committee that he argued in conversations with Stepien and others that night against declaring victory at the time as well, because it was too early to say one way or the other who would win. Miller recalled recommending that we should not go and declare victory until we had a better sense of the numbers. According to testimony received by the committee, the only advisor present who supported President Trump's inclination to declare victory was Rudy Giuliani, who, according to Miller, was definitely intoxicated that evening.

Speaker 1: 2:45

President Trump's decision to declare victory falsely on election night and unlawfully to call for the vote counting to stop was not a spontaneous decision. It was premeditated. The committee has assembled a range of evidence of President Trump's pre-planning for a false declaration of victory. This includes multiple written communications on October 31st and November 3rd 2020 to the White House by Judicial Watch President, tom Fitton. This evidence demonstrates that Fitton was in direct contact with President Trump and understood that he would falsely declare victory on election night and call for vote counting to stop. The evidence also includes an audio recording of President Trump's advisor, steve Vanden, who said this on October 31st 2020, to a group of his associates from China And what Trump's going to do is just declare victory.

Speaker 1: 3:36

Right, he's going to declare victory, but that doesn't mean he's the winner. He's just going to say he's the winner. The Democrats more of our people vote early, they count, they're voting now, and so they're going to have a natural disadvantage, and Trump's going to take advantage of it. That's our strategy. He's going to declare himself the winner. So when you wake up Wednesday morning, it's going to be a firestorm. Also, if Trump well, if Trump is losing by 10 or 11 o'clock at night, it's going to be even crazier. No, because he's going to sit right there and say they stole it. I'm directing the attorney general to shut down all ballot places in all 50 states. It's going to be. No, he's not going out easy If Trump if Biden's winning Trump is going to do some crazy shit. Also, in advance of the election, roger Stone, another outside advisor to President Trump, made this statement. I really do suspect it will still be up in the air. When that happens, the key thing to do is to claim victory. Possession is not into the law. No, we won. Fuck you, sorry Over. We won. You're wrong, fuck you.

Speaker 1: 4:43

In the days after the election, the president's own campaign told him he had lost and there was no evidence of significant fraud. When his campaign staff wouldn't tell him what he wanted to hear, president Trump replaced him with what Attorney General William Barr described as a clown car of individuals willing to promote various conspiracy theories. But Donald Trump was no passive consumer of these lies. He actively propagated them. Time and again. President Trump was informed that his election fraud claims were not true. He chose to spread them anyway. He did so even after they were legally tested and rejected in dozens of lawsuits. Not even the Electoral College's certification of former Vice President Biden's victory on December 14, 2020 stopped the president from lying Throughout. the big lie remained central to President Trump's efforts to block the peaceful transfer of power on January 6, 2021. Chapter 1, suction 1. The Big Lie reflected deliberate exploitation of the Red Mirage.

Speaker 1: 5:46

President Trump's big lie on election night was based on simple differences in how Americans vote. In 2020, it was well known that Democrats were much more likely to vote in mail-in ballots than in person in 2020. On the other hand, republicans preferred to vote in person on election day. In key swing states, with tight margins between the candidates, the election day votes would favor President Trump and disproportionately be counted first. Mail-in ballots which would favor former Vice President Joe Biden would disproportionately be counted later. In some states, it would take days to process the remaining mail-in ballots. The timing of how votes were counted created the potential for what is known as a Red Mirage, or an illusion of a red Republican victory. In the early stages of vote counting, president Trump would appear to be in the lead on election night. But this was not the whole picture. Many mail-in votes for former Vice President Biden would not be counted on election day. Therefore, the actual winner would likely not be known on election night.

Speaker 1: 6:49

The Red Mirage phenomenon was widely known prior to the 2020 presidential election. Chris Starwalt was the head of the Fox News election desk that correctly called Arizona for Biden. Starwalt and his team tried to warn viewers of the Red Mirage. He testified that over the past 40 or 50 years, americans have increasingly chosen to vote by mail or early or absentee, and the Democrats prefer that method of voting more than Republicans do. In nearly every election, starwalt elaborated Republicans win election day and Democrats win the early vote. And then you wait and start counting. It happens every time.

Speaker 1: 7:30

President Trump's campaign team made sure the president was briefed on the timing of the vote tallying. Stepien, his campaign manager, told the select committee the President Trump was reminded on election day that large numbers of mail-in ballots would still remain to be counted over the coming days. Stepien added that he personally reminded the President that, while early returns may be favorable, the counting would continue. I recounted back to 2016, when I had a very similar conversation with him on election day. I recounted back to that conversation with him and which I said just like I said in 2016, was going to be a long night. I told him in 2020 that you know it was going to be a process again. As you know, the early returns are going to be positive. Then we're going to be watching the returns of the ballots. As you know, they rolled in thereafter.

Speaker 1: 8:18

Ordinarily, the red mirage anomaly does not create problems in the election process because candidates wait for the votes to be tallyed before declaring victory or conceding. As Starwalt emphasized, prior to President Trump, no candidate had ever tried to avail themselves of this quirk in the election counting system. President Trump, however, made a different choice. In an extraordinary breach of the American democratic process, he decided to exploit the potential for confusion about the staggering time in vote counting to deceive the American public about the election results. He and his allies foreshadowed this decision in their statements in the months leading up to the November 2020 election.

Speaker 1: 9:02

Chapter 1, section 2. Trump's pre-election plans to declare victory. Bannon explained that the Democrats would have a natural disadvantage on election night because more Democrats would vote by mail than Republicans and it would take more time to count the mail-in ballots. This would give the President the illusion of a lead And Trump's going to take advantage of it. Bannon said That's our strategy. He's going to declare himself a winner. In an interview on Fox News the morning of the election, bannon insisted that President Trump needed to address the nation that night to provide the narrative engine for how we go forward. During an episode of his podcast later that same day, bannon clarified what he meant. President Trump is going to claim victory. Right, he's going to claim victory.

Speaker 1: 9:48

Tom Fitton drafted a victory statement for the President's read on election night On October 31st. He emailed the statement to President Trump's assistant, molly Michael, and social media guru, dan Scavino. Fitton wrote that Election Day, november 3rd, was the deadline by which voters in the states across the country must choose a President. Fitton argued that counting ballots that arrived after Election Day would be part of an effort by partisans to overturn the election results. Of course, that claim wasn't true. Mail-in ballots are regularly processed after Election Day. Regardless, fitton encouraged the President to preemptively declare victory. We had an election today and I won. Fitton wrote for President Trump. Early in the evening on Election Day, fitton emailed Michael again to say that he had just talked to him that is, president Trump about the draft statements. Later that evening, before President Trump made his election night remarks, michael replied that she was re-delivering to him, as in President Trump right now.

Speaker 1: 10:52

Roger Stone, president Trump's longtime political confidant, told several associates just prior to the election that Trump needed to declare victory, especially if the race wasn't called on Election Day. Let's just hope we are celebrating on Election Night, Stone said. I really do suspect it will still be up in the air. When that happens, the key thing to do is claim victory. Stone elaborated with colorful language Possession is not in the law. No, we won. Fuck you. Sorry over, we won, you're wrong. Fuck you Indeed.

Speaker 1: 11:26

Published reports echo these warnings about Trump's election strategy. Two days before the election, jonathan Swann of Axios reported that President Trump has told his confidants he'll declare victory on Tuesday night if it looks like he's ahead. Swann added that Trump's team is preparing to falsely claim that mail-in ballots counted after November 3, a legitimate count expected to favor Democrats, or evidence of election fraud If the vote tally swung against Trump. After Election Night, it states such as Pennsylvania from the Trump team would claim that Democrats had stolen the election. Fox News election analyst Chris Stierwald testified that he and his team had gone to pain to inform viewers that early votes would favor Republicans, but the lead would be a losery because the Trump campaign and the president had made it clear that they were going to try to exploit this anomaly. Others warned that President Trump could exploit the Red Mirage as well. Chapter 1, section 3 Trump's pre-election efforts to delegitimize the election process.

Speaker 1: 12:30

President Trump also paved the way for his false election night declaration of victory by blanketing voters with a blizzard of lies and statements delegitimizing mail-in voting. In the middle of a deadly pandemic and constantly questioning the security of ballots, trump used the president's bully puppet, including his heavily trafficked Twitter feed, to tell one lie after another. The select committee found dozens of instances in which Trump claimed that mail-in voting would produce a quote rigged election. Trump repeatedly denounced mail-in voting on Twitter, during interviews and even during a presidential debate. Here's a small sample of President Trump's attempts to delegitimize mail-in balloting On April 7, 2020, trump claimed Mail ballots are a very dangerous thing for this country because they're cheaters.

Speaker 1: 13:18

They go and collect them. They're fraudulent in many cases. These mail ballots come in. The mail ballots are corrupt, in my opinion, and they collect them and they get people to go in and sign them And then they they're forgeries in many cases. It's a horrible thing. The following day, on April 8, trump tweeted. Republicans should fight very hard when it comes to statewide mail-in voting. Democrats are clamoring for it. Tremendous potential for voter fraud and, for whatever reason, doesn't work out well for Republicans. On May 24, trump tweeted The United States cannot have all mail-in ballots. It will be the greatest rigged election in history. People grab them from mailboxes, print thousands of forgeries and force people to sign. Also forge names Some absentee OK, when necessary, trying to use COVID for this scam.

Speaker 1: 14:09

On September 17, trump falsely alleged the mail-in ballots were right for foreign interference. There is a group of people, largely radical left Democrats, that want election mayhem Statesmen in this crazy mess of sending ballots, also a gift of foreign interference in our election. Stop it now, before it's too late. And if I could interject here, i would just like to note that paper ballots are probably more a deterrent to foreign interference in our elections than anything. Before the election, president Trump campaigned against mail-in voting Bill Steppi and Southern Intercession, along with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy Steppi, and attempted to convince the president that mail-in voting was quote not a bad thing for his campaign. They argued that Trump's decision to discourage mail-in voting while urging his voters to vote only on election day leaves a lot to chance and would fail to take advantage of a superior grassroots operation that could encourage Trump voters to return their ballots. Trump failed to heed their warning. He continued to demonize mail-in voting. The Red Mirage was a key part of his big lie.

Speaker 1: 15:18

Ominously, trump consistently refused to commit to accepting the outcome of the election. During an interview on Fox News in July, chris Wallace asked quote Can you give a direct answer if you will accept the election? President Trump responded quote I have to see. Look you, i have to see. No, i'm not going to just say yes. I'm not going to say no, and I didn't last time either.

Speaker 1: 15:43

On September 23, 2020, a reporter asked Trump if he would commit to a peaceful transfer of power after the election. Trump a few was saying quote we're going to have to see what happens. Trump proclaimed that the ballots are a disaster, adding that if he could get rid of the ballots, we'll have a very peaceful. Well, there won't be a transfer. Frankly, there'll be a continuation. That is, according to President Trump, there would be a continuation of his presidency. The following day, september 24, another reporter followed up by asking if the election would be legitimate only if President Trump won. Trump again suggested there was something suspect about mail-in ballots, adding that he was not sure the election could be an honest one. Chapter 1, section 4 President Trump's launch of the Big Lie.

Speaker 1: 16:36

Consistent with the pre-election narrative planted by President Trump with the now-as-a-posed closing, president Trump began pushing the claim that late-reported vote tallies were illegitimate, even though he had been reminded by his campaign manager that very day that a large number of mail-in ballots would not be counted for several hours or days. President Trump claimed that Democrats were going to quote find ballots at four o'clock in the morning and add them to the list. He also suggested that Democrats were continuing to vote after the polls had closed. Indeed, this is exactly what Steve Vanden described when he said that President Trump would quote take advantage of the Democrats' natural disadvantage on election night. In the ensuing days and weeks, president Trump often referred to dumps of votes that were injected into the counting process. His supporters latched onto these false claims. There were no dumps of votes, just tallies of absentee ballots as they were reported by jurisdictions throughout the country in a fully transparent process. These batches of ballots included votes for both Trump and Biden. The late-reported votes favored the former Vice President. Just as President Trump's campaign advisor said they would, particularly in primarily Democratic cities.

Speaker 1: 17:51

Attorney General Bill Barr recognized immediately that the red mirage was the basis for President Trump's erroneous claim of fraud. Right out of the box, on election night, the President claimed that there was major fraud underway. Barr said I mean, this happened, as far as I could tell, before there was actually any potential of looking at evidence. President Trump's claim quote seemed to be based on the dynamic that at the end of the evening a lot of Democratic votes came in which changed the vote counts in certain states, and that seemed to be the basis for this broad claim that there was major fraud. President Trump knew about the red mirage. He tells the lie about it repeatedly, even after being directly informed that his claims were false. This was often the case in the post-election period. The President consciously disregarded facts that did not support his big lie.

Speaker 1: 18:45

Chapter 1, section 5, post-election President Trump Replaces His Campaign Team. President Trump's campaign leadership, including Bill Steppi and the campaign's manager Justin Clark, the campaign's deputy manager, supported President Trump and were willing to pursue recounts in other standard post-election litigation, but they were not willing to promote baseless conspiracy theories. Steppi and others characterized this group as team normal Less than two weeks after the election, president Trump pushed team normal aside because its members didn't tell him what he wanted to hear. In their place, trump promoted Ruly Giuliani and his associates, men and women, who spread baseless and extreme claims of election fraud. Giuliani, the former mayor of New York City, recruited several investigators and lawyers to assist him. Giuliani's team included Jenna Ellis, bernard Carrick, boris Epstein, catherine Fries and Christina. Bob Ellis functioned as Giuliani's deputy on the new Trump campaign legal team. Carrick, the former commissioner of the New York Police Department and a pardon felon, served as Giuliani's chief investigator. All the attorneys who collaborated with the Giuliani's legal team included Sidney Powell, cleida Mecho and John Eastman. As discussed elsewhere in this report, eastman became a key player in President Trump's efforts to overturn the election.

Speaker 1: 20:13

Chapter 1, section 6. President Trump's campaign team told him he lost the election and that there was no significant fraud. President Trump's campaign team quickly realized that none of the significant fraud claims were real. Bill Steppin testified that, as of November 5, the Trump campaign had not found any proof of fraudulent activity. There were allegations and reports, but nothing hard and fast that drew the results of the election in a question. The Trump campaign continued to investigate claims of fraud into the second week of the election, according to Steppin. As people shared wild allegations with the president, the campaign team was forced to review the facts and then serve as a truth-telling squad to the president regarding why the claims quote didn't prove to be true. For example, steppin recalled someone alleging that thousands of illegal votes had been cast in Arizona. That wasn't true. Votes had been submitted by overseas voters, such as military deployed and stationed abroad, who were obviously eligible to participate in the election.

Speaker 1: 21:20

Alex Cannon was a lawyer for the Trump campaign and previously worked for the Trump Organization. After the election, cannon was tasked with looking into allegations of voter fraud in the 2020 election, including the claim that thousands of ineligible votes had been cast in Arizona. Cannon recalled that Vice President Pence asked him what he was finding quote and I said that I didn't believe we were finding it or I was not personally finding anything sufficient to alter the results of the election. Cannon responded. Vice President Pence thanked him. Cannon reported his assessment to Mark Meadows, the White House chief of staff, as well. In mid to late November 2020, meadows asked Cannon what his investigation had turned up quote and I remember sharing with him that we weren't finding anything that would be sufficient to change the results in any of the key states. Cannon told Meadows. So there is no there there, meadows replied.

Speaker 1: 22:12

Jason Miller, a senior advisor to the Trump campaign, pushed claims of election fraud in public. In private, however, miller says that he told President Trump a different story, informing him numerous times that there was not enough election fraud to have changed the election. Miller, my understanding is that I think there are still very solid questions and concerns with the rules that were changed under the guise of COVID, but specific to election day fraud and irregularities that are not enough to overturn the election. Committee staff, and did you give your opinion on that to the president Miller? yes, committee staff. What was his reaction when you told him that? Miller, you haven't seen or heard I'm paraphrasing, but you haven't seen or heard all the different concerns and questions that have been raised. Committee staff how many times did you have this conversation with the president Miller? several, i couldn't put a specific number on it though. Committee staff, but more than one. Miller correct.

Speaker 1: 23:17

Matthew Morgan, the Trump campaign's top lawyer, came to a similar conclusion. Nearly two months after the election, on January 2, morgan met with the vice president's staff. According to Morgan, the consensus in the room was that, even if all the claims of fraud and irregularities were aggregated and read most favorably to the campaign, it was not sufficient to be outcome-determinative As far as the Trump campaign's professional leadership was concerned. There was no evidence that the election had been stolen from President Trump. To the contrary, there had been ample evidence that President Trump simply lost, and he was told so. On November 7, after the Associated Press called Pennsylvania and the overall election for Biden, a small team of campaign advisors met with Trump to inform him that his chances of success were virtually non-existent. They estimated his chance of winning at only 5-10%, which was a very bleak assessment. Despite the clear evidence that Trump had lost the election, he refused to concede. He disagreed with the data and insisted that he would prevail through legal challenges.

Speaker 1: 24:25

Giuliani, who later took over the campaign's legal operations, had a different strategy and pursued basis claims of election fraud. Trump supported Giuliani's approach and disregarded the factual evidence presented by the campaign team. Though the voting data clearly showed Trump's loss, he continued to challenge the results. Giuliani's leadership of the campaign's legal team led a conflict with the campaign, with team normal, expressing concerns and discomfort with the directions being taken. Giuliani made outlandish claims, including conspiracy theories about mail-in ballots and Democratic Party involvement in election theft. Giuliani's influence grew and it became a push for lawsuits, even when other members of the campaign advised waiting. Trump eventually pointed Giuliani as the head of the campaign's legal team, causing significant changes in leadership and disengagement by outside law firms that had been supporting the campaign's legal efforts.

Speaker 1: 25:21

On November 7, the day after Trump appointed Giuliani head of the campaign's legal team, giuliani held a press conference at Four Seasons Total Landscaping in Philadelphia, pennsylvania. He immediately began making outlandish claims, arguing that the Democrats had conspired to steal the election. As you know, from the very beginning, mail-in ballots were a source of some degree of skepticism, if not a lot of skepticism. As being innately prone of fraud, giuliani said Those mail-in ballots could have been written the day before by the Democratic Party hacks that were all over the convention center. Giuliani offered no evidence to support his shocking and baseless allegations.

Speaker 1: 26:01

Echoes of Trump's relentless campaign against mail-in balloting and his decision to exploit the red mirage were easy to hear. On November 10, giuliani and Carrick met with Trump in the Oval Office to discuss their investigation in voter fraud. White House counsel Pat Cipollone and White House senior advisor Eric Hirschman, were also in attendance. After Giuliani's presentation, trump asked Cipollone whether he had spoken to Bill Barr about the allegations of fraud. One day before Barr issued a memorandum outlining a shift in DOJ policy that allowed federal prosecutors to investigate claims of voting irregularities without waiting for the results to be certified, trump's question was an early indication that he was going to pressure the Department of Justice to endorse his phony fraud claims.

Speaker 1: 26:50

On November 14, trump announced on Twitter that Giuliani was now head of his campaign's legal team. Team Normals saw drastic changes to their roles on the newly structured campaign team, some self-imposed, and many outside law firms that had signed up to support the campaign's legal efforts disengaged completely. I don't think what was happening was necessarily honest or professional at that point in time. Stepping in and explaining This was in a fight that I was comfortable with, he added. On the day the leadership change was announced to the public, giuliani participated in a surrogate briefing to coordinate messaging by Trump loyalists during their media appearances. Giuliani announced that the messaging strategy would be, to quote go hard on Dominion and Smartmatic, bringing up Chavez and Maduro. Giuliani claimed that additional lawsuits would soon be filed to invalidate upwards of one million ballots Of note. Fox News recently reached a $787 million settlement with Dominion voting systems for presenting to the public the same fake claim as made by Rudy Giuliani.

Speaker 1: 28:00

Even with the messaging advanced by Rudy Giuliani and the new campaign team, trump in mid-November remained dug in. Still refusing to concede defeat, trump continued to insist that he was cheated out of victory, endorsing one wild conspiracy theory after another to deny the simple fact that he had lost the 2020 election. Chapter 1, section 7. President Trump had his day in court. We've proven the election was stolen, but no judge, including the Supreme Court of the United States, has had the courage to allow it to be heard. That was how President Trump described his efforts to overturn the election in court one day before the Electoral College met on December 14, 2020. That was false.

Speaker 1: 28:51

Judges across the nation did evaluate President Trump's claims that the election was stolen, as longtime Republican election attorney Benjamin Ginsburg testified before the select committee. The President's camp, as longtime Republican election attorney Benjamin Ginsburg testified before the select committee. The President's camp quote did have their day in court. It's just that in no instance did a court find that the charges of fraud were real. In total, the Trump campaign and allies of President Trump filed 62 separate lawsuits between November 4, 2020 and January 6, 2021, calling in a question or seeking to overturn the election results. Out of 62 cases, only one case resulted in a victory for President Trump or his allies, which affected relatively few votes, did not vindicate any underlying claims of fraud and would not have changed the outcome.

Speaker 1: 29:45

In Pennsylvania, 30 of the cases were dismissed by a judge after a hearing on the merits. In every state which claims were brought, only one or more judges specifically explained as part of their dismissal orders that they had evaluated the plaintiff's allegations or supported proof of widespread election fraud or other irregularities and found the claims to be entirely unconvincing. In Arizona, for example, the plaintiffs in Boyer v Ducey alleged that the election was tainted by the introduction of quote hundreds of thousands of illegal, ineligible, duplicate or purely fictitious ballots. A federal judge dismissed their suit, finding it void of plausible allegations and sorely wanting of relevant or reliable evidence. Likewise, in Ward v Jackson, an Arizona state court judge dismissed the lawsuit by the state GOP chair following a two-day trial, finding no evidence of misconduct, fraud or legal votes. This ruling was unanimously upheld by the state Supreme Court, where all seven justices were appointed by GOP governors.

Speaker 1: 30:51

In Georgia, a state court dismissed Boland v Raffensperger, which alleged that tens of thousands of illegal ballots were cast by out-of-state voters or with invalid signature matches. The judge found that quote the complaints factual allegations rest on speculation rather than duly plaid facts and do not support a conclusion that sufficient illegal votes were cast to change or place in doubt the result of the election. The judge who issued this decision had been appointed by a Republican governor, as had seven of the eight justices of the state Supreme Court who upheld her ruling. Likewise, a federal judge denied relief to the plaintiff in Ward v Raffensperger, which alleged that new procedures for checking absentee ballot signatures spoiled the result by making it harder to reject illegal ballots, finding no basis in fact or law to grant him the relief he seeks. The judge wrote that this argument is belod by the record because absentee ballots were actually rejected for signature issues at the same rate as in 2018.

Speaker 1: 31:55

In Michigan, a federal judge found in King v Whitmer that the plaintiff's claims of massive election fraud were based on nothing but speculation and conjecture that votes for President Trump were destroyed, discarded or switched to votes for Vice President Biden. Similarly, a state court judge rejected plaintiff's claims in two cases brought against Detroit and the surrounding county that accused them of systematic fraud and how absentee ballots were counted. The judge found that one group of plaintiffs offered no evidence to support their assertions and that the other group's interpretations of events is incorrect and decidedly contradicted by highly respected election experts. In Nevada a state court judge rejected a litany of claims of systematic election fraud in law v Whitmer ruling that the plaintiffs did not prove under any standard of proof that legal votes were cast and counted or legal votes were not counted at all due to voter fraud or for any other improper or illegal reason. The ruling was unanimously upheld by the Nevada Supreme Court.

Speaker 1: 32:59

In Pennsylvania a federal judge dismissed Donald Trump for President v Bookvar, finding that the Trump campaign had presented nothing but strained legal arguments without merit and speculative accusations unpled in the operative complaint and unsupported by any evidence. The dismissal was upheld by the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, which held that quote. Calling an election unfair does not make it so. Charges require specific allegations and then proof. We have neither here. That opinion was altered by another Trump appointee. Lastly, in Wisconsin another judge dismissed the lawsuit accusing the Wisconsin Election Commission of constitutional violations. That quote likely tainted more than 50,000 ballots. The judge ruled this quote. This court has allowed plaintiff the chance to make his case and he is lost on the merits. Fellini showed that the outcome was affected by commission rules about drop boxes, ballot addresses or individuals who claimed indefinitely confined status to vote from home. The ruling was upheld by a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, all of whom were Republican appointees, including one appointed by President Trump himself. In all, the judges who heard these post-election cases included 22 federal judges appointed by Republican presidents.

Speaker 1: 34:27

President Trump and his lawyers were well aware the courts were consistently rejecting his claims. During a December 18 meeting in the Oval Office with Trump, sidney Powell and others, White House Senior Advisor Eric Hirschman pointed out that President Trump's lawyers had their opportunity to prove their case in court and failed. Powell fired back that the judges are corrupt. Hirschman responded everyone. Every single case that you've done in the country you guys lost, every one of them is corrupt, even the ones we appointed.

Speaker 1: 35:01

President Trump was faced with another choice after having his day in court. He could accept that there was no real evidence of voter fraud or he could continue to amplify conspiracy theories and lies. He chose the latter, chapter 1, section 8. Trump Repeatedly Promoted Conspiracy Theories. Instead of accepting his defeat, president Trump attempted to justify his big lie with a series of increasingly preposterous claims. The president was not simply led astray by those around him. The opposite was true. He actively promoted conspiracy theories and false election for our claims, even after being informed they were baseless.

Speaker 1: 35:39

Millions of President Trump supporters believed that the election was stolen from him. Many of them still do. But President Trump knew the truth and chose to lie about it. The power of the president's bully pulpit should not be underestimated, especially in the digital age. President Trump's relentless lying sowed seas of distrust in America's election system. Researchers who studied this election denial phenomenon have noted quote President Trump didn't just promise audience to be receptive to false narratives of election fraud.

Speaker 1: 36:10

He inspired them to produce those narratives and then echo those false claims back to them. The media played a prominent role in amplifying erroneous claims of election fraud. Shortly after election day, the Stop the Steel campaign, discussed more fully in Chapter 6, went viral. Stop the Steel influencers echoed President Trump's premature declaration of victory, asserting that he won the election. The Democrats stole it from him and it was the responsibility of American patriots to combat this supposed injustice. This resulted in what Attorney General Barr has described as an avalanche of false claims, as President Trump supporters attempted to justify his big lie. The post-election allegations of fraud or other malfeasants were completely bogus, silly and usually based on complete misinformation, barr explained. Nonetheless, many of President Trump supporters wanted to believe them.

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The stolen election narrative has proven to be remarkably durable precisely because it is a matter of belief, evidence or reason. Each time a claim was debunked, more claims would emerge in its place. Barr later complained that this whole dynamic forced him and others to play whack-a-mole. The Department of Justice, under Barr's leadership and acting attorney Jeffrey Rosen, took unprecedented steps to investigate the avalanche of lies. Claims of election fraud were thoroughly examined, but none were found to have merit. Top officials in the Department of Justice personally informed Donald Trump that the claims he promoted were false, but he showed no interest in the actual facts. For instance, on December 27, rosen and Donahue spent two hours on the phone with Trump debunking multiple claims about the election. They explained that these allegations had been thoroughly investigated and were found to be baseless.

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However, president Trump persisted in promoting new claims, disregarding the evidence presented to him State authorities, judges, experts, journalists and even members of President Trump's legal team actively debunked his lies in real time. The courts consistently rejected the claims brought by the President's legal team, considering them to be speculative and unsupported. Despite these rejections, president Trump and his surrogates continued to assert these claims as truth in speeches, tweets and podcasts. The responsibility of refuting these false claims often fell on state and local officials, who provided prompt and thorough responses to the allegations of fraud. County clerks and outside experts also publicly denounced and dismantled these claims. However, president Trump disregarded these authoritative sources and persisted in promoting discredited claims. Overall, president Trump actively promoted conspiracy theories, propagated false claims and undermined public confidence in the election process, despite being repeatedly informed that his allegations lacked evidence and merit.

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The select committee presents two case studies demonstrating how President Trump and his surrogates lie in the face of overwhelming evidence. The first case study deals with Dominion voting systems. President Trump repeatedly claimed the Dominion's salt fare, switched votes and rigged the election. Well after the leaders of the campaign and the Justice Department officials told him that these claims were baseless. The President's mere dominion was central to his big lie. The second case study examines video footage recorded in Fulton County. On election night, president Trump and his representatives concocted a fictional narrative based on a deceptively edited version of the footage.

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Dominion voting systems. This case study focuses on the false claims and conspiracy theories spread by former President Donald Trump and his allies regarding Dominion voting systems after the 2020 US presidential election. Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, president Trump continued to maliciously spear Dominion and promote baseless allegations about the company's voting machines and software. The conspiracy theories about Dominion began to circulate shortly after the election. Sidney Powell, a lawyer affiliated with the Trump campaign, claimed on Fox News that Dominion machines were flipping votes and added non-existing votes to the system.

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On November 12, rudy Giuliani, another member of Trump's legal team, appeared on Fox News and falsely connected Dominion to Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez, alleging that its software was designed to manipulate elections. That same day, president Trump retweeted a quote report, claiming that Dominion had deleted 2.7 million Trump votes nationwide and switched hundreds of thousands of votes in key swing states. However, even Trump's own campaign staff, administration officials and state officials informed him that these claims were baseless. An internal campaign memo dated November 12 stated that Dominion software did not lead to improper vote counts, inciting reports confirming the accuracy of Dominion machines. White House Press Secretary Kayleigh Mechanating also tried to wave President Trump off the Dominion theory, encouraging him to use fact-driven arguments. Despite this, president Trump continued to assail Dominion on Twitter and other platforms, spreading false claims about the company's involvement in rigging the election. The Trump administration's own cybersecurity experts, including the United States Department of Homeland Security, cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, released statements reassuring the public that the election was secure and that there was no evidence of vote manipulation or compromised voting systems.

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President Trump had a decision point at this stage either to endorse the findings of his administration's experts or continue promoting baseless fictions about Dominion. He chose the latter, disregarding the facts. The case study also highlights a specific incident in Antrim County, michigan, where a human error in updating election counting software caused an initial reporting error in the vote count. Trump supporters quickly pointed to this as evidence of Dominion tampering with the votes, but it was proving to be a mistake and promptly corrected. Local and state officials in Michigan explained the error to the public and the Michigan Senate's Commission on Oversight conducted a comprehensive review confirming that it was an honest mistake by the county clerk.

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Despite these clarifications, president Trump and his supporters persisted in promoting the Dominion conspiracy theory. The president asked various individuals to investigate allegations of election irregularities and directed his acting secretary of Homeland Security to look into the Dominion claims. However, administration officials consistently debunked the conspiracy theory. Cc Director Christopher Krebs provided information that refuted the false claims, and Attorney General Bill Barr repeatedly raised concerns about the conspiracy theory and called it quote irresponsible. President Trump ignored the concerns raised by his officials and continued to repeat the false claims about Dominion. He even fired Krebs, who had released a statement dismissing the claims of election manipulation as unsubstantiated.

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Powell, giuliani and other Trump allies held a press conference at the Republican National Committee headquarters where they repeated the baseless allegations against Dominion. President Trump spoke with Powell on a phone call and laughed at her claims while muting the speakerphone, acknowledging that they sounded crazy. Democrats across the country assessed and rejected claims to Dominion shens being manipulated to affect the election outcome. However, trump and his legal team persisted in echoing the conspiracy theory by claiming evidence of vote switching. In Antrim County, they gained access to Dominion's voting machines for an unrelated case in an organization called Allied Security Operations Group ASOG for short conducted an analysis. The ASOG report, released on December 13, made sweeping and unsubstantiated claims about Dominion's machines and software, but the inspection revealed no evidence of vote manipulation, despite criticism from experts within and outside the Trump administration. President Trump continued to promote the ASOG report, disregarding the conclusions reached by his own officials and other independent experts.

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President Trump's fixation on Dominion's voting machines and the baseless theory that the machines had been manipulating votes led to a concerted effort to gain access to voting machines in states where Trump was claiming election fraud. On the evening of December 18, powell Lieutenant General Michael Flynn retired and Patrick Byrne met with the president at the White House Over several hours. They argued that President Trump had the authority under a 2018 executive order to seize voting machines. Several administration officials joined the meeting and forcefully rejected this extreme proposal. Multiple lawyers in the White House, including Eric Herschman, derek Lyons and White House counsel Pat Cipollone, pushed back strongly against the idea of seizing voting machines. Cipollone told the select committee that it was a horrible idea which had no legal basis, and he emphasized that he had seen no evidence of massive fraud in the election House. Adviser Eric Herschman similarly told the select committee that he never saw any evidence whatsoever to sustain the allegations against Dominion. National security adviser Robert O'Brien phoned into the December 18 meeting and was asked if he had seen any evidence of election fraud in the voting machines or foreign interference in our voting machines. O'brien responded that his team had looked into that and there's no evidence of it. On the same time, president Trump, mark Meadows and Rudy Giuliani were repeatedly asking leadership of DHS whether the agency had the authority to seize voting machines, and they were repeatedly told that DHS has no such unilateral authority. Giuliani and Powell were also unengaged in efforts to access voting machines in multiple states with the assistance of sympathetic local elections officials. Those efforts turned up no evidence of any vote manipulation by any Dominion machine, but President Trump continued to press this bogus claim.

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On January 2, 2021, trump had a lengthy phone call with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. The president repeatedly brought up Dominion's voting machines, alleging that they were at the heart of a conspiracy against him. Raffensperger was incredulous I don't believe that you're really questioning the Dominion machines, raffensperger said, because we did a hand retelling a 100% retelling of all the ballots and compared them to what the machine said and came up with virtually the same result. In other words, the story in Georgia was the same. In Antrim County, michigan, officials performed a hand recount to put to rest any allegation that Dominion machines had manipulated the vote, but once again, President Trump consciously disregarded these basic facts and persisted with his lies. During a January 4, 2021 speech in Dalton, georgia. President Trump chose to ignore Secretary Raffensperger's straightforward observations. The president rhetorically attacked Dominion once again, claiming that a crime had been committed in this state, and it was immeasurable. The president called for an immediate forensic audit of an appropriate sampling of Dominion's voting machines and related equipment. His allegations were both false and nonsensical. Georgia had already performed a statewide hand recount of all ballots.

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President Trump and his allies have never provided any evidence whatsoever showing the Dominion software altered votes in the 2020 presidential election. In fact, some of the most vocal proponents of the Dominion claims harbored their own misgivings about the claims they were making in public. For example, rudy Giuliani repeatedly claimed in public that Dominion voting machines stole the election and that foreign countries had interfered in the election, but the evidence uncovered by the select committee reveals that he did not believe either of those things. To be true, giuliani testified that he did not believe that voting machines stole the election. He also acknowledged that he has seen no evidence that foreign countries had interfered in the election or manipulated votes. This testimony is consistent with his lead investigator, bernie Carrick's acknowledgement that he had not come across proof that voting machines were used to switch, delete or inject votes improperly. Christina Bobb, an attorney who worked with Giuliani, similarly could not point to any evidence of wrongdoing by Dominion. Even Sidney Powell, perhaps the most committed proponent of the Dominion falsehood, was unable to provide the select committee with any evidence or expert report that demonstrated that the 2020 election outcome in any state had been altered through manipulation of voting machines, and Powell defended herself in a defamation suit brought by Dominion by claiming that quote. No reasonable person would conclude that her statements were truly statements of fact. By January 6, 2021, president Trump's claims regarding Dominion had been debunked time and again. The president knew, or should have known, that he had no basis for alleging the Dominion voting machines that cost him the election As it stands. Fox News settled with Dominion over charges that Fox News baselessly accused the company of rigging its voting machines against former President Donald Trump in 2020 for a total amount of $787.5 million.

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Case Study 2. The State Farm Arena Video. President Trump also recklessly promoted allegations that video footage from a ballot counting center in Fulton County, georgia, was proof of major election fraud. He was repeatedly informed that these allegations were false, but he pressed him anyway On December 3rd, rudy Giuliani, president, state legislators was selectively edited footage of ballots being counted on election night at Fulton County State Farm Arena. Giuliani misrepresented the videos of smoking gun for proving election fraud. The president repeatedly claimed that he would have won Georgia if not for a supposed conspiracy that unfolded on election night. Trump and some of his supporters alleged that political operatives faked a water main rupture to expel Republican poll watchers. These same operatives then supposedly took illegal ballots from suitcases hidden under tables and added those ballots to the official count multiple times over by scanning the video. None of these allegations was true. President Trump repeatedly referred to the State Farm Arena Video in his speeches, falsely claiming it was evidence for grand conspiracy.

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Despite being notified by multiple sources that the allegations were false, including Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen, richard Donahue, georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger and investigative agencies like the FBI, doj and Georgia Bureau of Investigation, president Trump persisted in spreading these false claims. The actual evidence, including full video footage and machine data, contradicted Trump's narrative. It revealed that there were no mystery ballots brought in from an unknown location and hidden under tables. Instead, the videos show on ballots that had already been opened but not counted, being placed in boxes and stored under the table. The ballots in question were not double counted, but were scanned multiple times by a worker due to a jamming scanner. Despite the conclusive evidence and testimony debunking the allegations, trump continued to cite the Fulton County video as evidence of a conspiracy. His executive assistant even emailed a document citing suitcase gate among the worst fraud incidents in Georgia to several politicians. These false claims endangered innocent public servants such as Ruby Freeman and Shay Moss, who were falsely accused by Rudy Giuliani of passing around USB ports as if they're vials of heroin or cocaine, when in fact Moss had been given a ginger mitt by her mother. Freeman, as described in Chapter 2, basis. Accusations like these forever changed the lives of election workers like Freeman and Moss, all in service of President Trump's big lie, the Fake Ballot Myth. The Trump campaign's distortion of the state farm arena video is just one example of the fake ballots lie.

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President Trump frequently claimed that fake ballots for Biden were injected to the vote counting process To hear the president tell it there were truckloads of ballots delivered in the middle of the night and millions more votes were cast than there were registered voters. However, every claim related to fake ballots brought forward by the Trump campaign and its surrogates was debunked and dismissed by judges, trump officials, state authorities and independent election experts. The nine cases that raised fake ballot claims were promptly dismissed. For example, in Constantino vs The City of Detroit, a Michigan court ruled that the claims of forged, backdated and double counted votes were incorrect, not credible and based on speculation.

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President Trump and his surrogates repeatedly made false claims about excess votes, alleging that more votes were cast than there were registered voters in certain states, cities or pre-sakes. However, these claims were easily fact-checked and proven false. For example, in Pennsylvania, president Trump claimed that 1.1 million ballots were improperly created and counted with. This was based on a misinterpretation of mail-in voting data. Similarly, claims about 205,000 more votes than voters in Pennsylvania were based on flawed comparisons and discrepancies resulting from counties not uploading their official results to the registry. In late December of 2020, acting Deputy Attorney General Donahue told President Trump that this allegation was faceless. President Trump kept repeating it anyway.

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The president and his surrogates made similar false claims concerning excessive votes in Michigan. Many of those claims originated with the grossly inaccurate affidavit submitted by Russell Ramslin, the person behind the very amateurish and false and misleading ASOG report regarding Dominion voting machines in Antrim County. Ramslin claimed in a similar affidavit filed in federal court in Georgia that 3,276 precincts in Michigan had turned out of between 84% and 350%, with 19 precincts reporting turnout in excess of 100%. Ramslin's affidavit was wildly ridiculed, in part because he relied on data for dozens of precincts that are located in Minnesota, not Michigan. Even after he corrected his affidavit to remove the Minnesota townships, his Michigan data remained wildly off base.

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The Multiple Counting of Balance Fiction. The president and his surrogates repeatedly claimed that ballots for former Vice President Biden were counted multiple times. These claims originated when someone noticed election officials rerunning stacks of ballots through counting machines, but the allegation is based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the vote counting process. It is routine and appropriate for election officials to rescan ballots if they are not properly scanned and tabulated. In the initial effort In Constantino v City of Detroit, the court rejected the incorrect and not credible affidavit speculating that ballots were run through scanners and counted multiple times, in favor of the more accurate and persuasive explanation of activity put forward by the highly respected election official with 40 years of experience. As with other misguided claims of election fraud, the claim that ballots were counted multiple times disregards the safeguards in the voting process. In particular, as noted above, it would certainly have been apparent in the canvassing process if hundreds of ballots were counted multiple times in Detroit, because the total number of ballots would greatly exceed the number of voters who voted. But that was not the case.

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The Imaginary Dead and Ineligible Voters. In addition to their false claims regarding fake ballots, president Trump and his surrogates also relentlessly asserted that tens of thousands of ballots were cast by dead or otherwise ineligible voters. For example, trump and Giuliani frequently alleged that more than 66,000 unregistered juveniles voted in Georgia. In fact, no underage people voted in Georgia. Giuliani offered several different made-up figures of the numbers of non-citizens who supposedly voted in Arizona, but provided no evidence to substantiate his claims. In fact, arizona requires every new voter to provide proof of citizenship in order to register to vote or to complete a federal voter registration form that requires the individual to sign an attestation to citizenship status under penalty of perjury, and no person can vote without being registered. By mid-November, the Trump campaign staff determined this allegation that thousands of non-citizens voted in Arizona was based on highly unreliable information and it is one of the fake claims that led to Rudy Giuliani losing his New York law license. These ineligible voters did not exist, nor were the thousands of vote cast in the names of dead Americans.

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In his January 2nd call with Georgia Secretary of State Raffensperger, the president claimed that close to about 5,000 dead voters cast ballots in the election. Raffensperger quickly informed the president this wasn't true. But the dead voter lie wasn't limited to Georgia. President Trump wanted Americans to believe that dead voters contributed to his defeat in several battleground states. But even the Trump campaign and its lawyers recognized early on that the claims regarding dead voters were grossly exaggerated, to say the least. By early November, trump lawyers discovered that many people listed by the campaign as having died were actually alive and well.

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In early December, eric Hirschman advised chief of staff Mark Meadows by a text message that the Trump legal team had determined that the claim of more than 10,000 dead people voting in Georgia was not accurate. The ensuing exchange makes it clear that both men knew that Rudy Giuliani's claims were absurd. Hirschman, justin FYI, alex Cannon and his team verified that the 10,000 supposed dead people voting in Georgia is not accurate. Meadows, i didn't hear that claim. It is not accurate. I think I found 22. If I remember correctly, two of them died just days before the general Hirschman. It was a legend in Rudy's hearing today, your number is much closer to what we can prove. I think it's 12. Meadows my son found 12 obituaries and 6 other possibles depending on the voter roll accuracy. Hirschman, that sounds more like it. Maybe we can help Rudy find the other 10,000? Meadows, lol.

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Shortly thereafter, a Georgia court dismissed the claim if there were tens of thousands of votes cast by ineligible voters. Noting, the claims rest on speculation rather than duly pled facts. The Trump campaign's own expert on the supposed dead voters admitted that the campaign lacked the necessary data to make any conclusions about whether any or how many votes were cast in the name of a deceased person. State officials did have such data, however, and were able to conduct the type of matching analysis required. The state authorities determined that there were only a handful of cases in which people voted on behalf of deceased individuals, even in those cases where the person who voted actually did die. President Trump's lawyers knew that the vast majority of the voters included on their list of dead voters actually cast their votes before they passed.

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In early January 2021, just days before January 6th, republican Senator Lindsey Graham asked several Trump lawyers to provide evidence to support the campaign's claims regarding dead voters. As Giuliani's team investigated, they concluded that they could not find evidence of dead voters anywhere near the number that Giuliani and President Trump were claiming publicly. After noting the shortcomings in their evidence, catherine Fries, a lawyer working with the Giuliani legal team, warned that Senator Graham would push back on their evidence, as predicted by Fries. Senator Graham was not impressed by the information provided by Giuliani's team. In his speech on the Senate floor on January 6th, graham explained why he would not object to the certification of electoral votes.

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Senator Graham referred to the failure of the Trump attorneys to provide the evidence he requested. They said there's 66,000 people in Georgia under 18 voted. How many people believe that? I asked give me 10. Hadn't had one. They said 8,000 felons in prison in Arizona voted Give me 10. Hadn't got one. Does that say there's problems in every election? I don't buy this. Enough is enough. We've got to end it.

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Documents obtained by the select committee reveal that President Trump and his lawyers knew that the claims being made in court about dead or ineligible voters in Georgia were inaccurate, and the lawyers were concerned that if the president vouched for those claims in another court pleading, he might be criminally prosecuted. On December 31st, as the lawyers rushed to file a federal lawsuit in Georgia. Some of the lawyers raised concerns about the president signing a verification under oath that the allegations regarding voter fraud in Georgia, including claims regarding dead people voting, were true. As Eastman noted in an email to his colleagues on December 31st, although the president signed a verification regarding the Georgia claims back on December 1st, he has since been made aware that some of the allegations and evidence proffered by experts has been inaccurate. For him to sign a new verification with that knowledge would not be accurate and I have no doubt that an aggressive district attorney or US attorney someplace will go after both the president and his lawyers once all the dust settles on this. Despite those concerns, president Trump and his attorneys filed a complaint that incorporated the same inaccurate numbers and President Trump signed a verification swearing under oath that the inaccurate numbers were quote true and correct or quote believe to be true and correct to the best of his knowledge and belief. A federal judge reviewing the relevant emails and pleadings recently concluded the email show that President Trump knew that the specific numbers of voter fraud were wrong, but continued to tout those numbers both in court and to the public. The court finds that these emails are sufficiently related to an infurterance of a conspiracy to defraud the United States.

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Chapter 1, section 9, president Trump's January 6 speech. In noon on January 6, 2021, President Trump addressed thousands of his supporters at a rally just south of the White House. The election had been decided two months earlier. The courts found that there was no evidence of significant fraud. The states certified their votes by mid-December. It was over. President Trump lost. But that's not what the president told those in attendance. He delivered an incendiary speech from beginning to end, arguing that nothing less than the fate of America was at stake. Our country has had enough. President Trump said We will not take it anymore. And that's what this is all about. He claimed that his followers had descended on Washington to save our democracy and stop the steal. He refused once again to concede and he proclaimed that today. I will lay out just some of the evidence proving that we won the election, and we won it by a landslide.

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For months, president Trump had relentlessly promoted this big lie. He and his associates manufactured one tale after another to justify it For more than an hour. On January 6, president Trump wove these conspiracy theories and lies together. By the select committee's assessment, there were more than 100 times during his speech, in which President Trump falsely claimed that either the election had been stolen from him or falsely claimed that votes had been compromised by some specific act of fraud or major procedural violations. That day, president Trump repeated many of the same lies he had told for months, even after being informed that many of these claims were false. He lied about dominion voting machines in Michigan, suitcases of ballots in Georgia, more votes than voters in Pennsylvania, votes cast by non-citizens in Arizona and dozens of other false claims of election fraud. None of those claims were true, as explained in the chapters that follow.

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The big lie was central to President Trump's plan to stay in power. He used the big lie to pressure state and local officials to undo the will of the people. This campaign convened fake electors on the baseless pretents that former Vice President Biden won several states due to fraud or other malfeasance. The president tried to subvert the Department of Justice by brow-beating its leadership to endorse his election lies and when the DOJ's senior personnel did not acquiesce, president Trump sought to install a loyalist who would. When all those efforts failed, president Trump betrayed his own vice president. He pressured Vice President Pence to obstruct the joint session of Congress on January 6, falsely claiming that he had the power to refuse to count certain electoral votes. President Trump knew this was illegal, but attempted to justify it with lies about the election.

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On December 19, 2020,. President Trump summoned the mob to Washington DC on the same day that Congress was sent to certify a former Vice President Biden's victory, by claiming the election was stolen and promising a wild protest. And the bogus stolen election claim was the focus of President Trump's speech on January 6. The litany of lies, he told, riled up a mob that would march to the US Capitol to intimidate Vice President Pence and members of Congress. Quote And we fight. We fight like hell, and if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore. President Trump told the crowd. He incited them with these words just after praising his own election night lie. The big lie. President Trump told his followers to fight to save their country from a bogus specter of supposed election fraud, and many of them did.