The public prosecutor’s office is investigating Donald Trump more intensively than previously known. It’s about the ex-US President’s role in the “stop the steal” strategy after his election defeat by Joe Biden. A far-reaching charge is not out of the question.
So now it is: prosecutors in the US are taking a close look at Donald Trump’s behavior during the last few weeks of his tenure. It’s about whether the ex-president helped obstruct the counting of the electorate’s votes. This finally sealed his defeat against Joe Biden. It’s a potential crime — and in the worst case, it could result in Trump being convicted, possibly even losing the right to be re-sworn in as president.
The Justice Department, whose department head is also the chief attorney general, has never indicted a former president in its history. It is completely unclear whether it will come to that. However, it is now clear that the investigators are not stopping at Trump. They want to know exactly what he did before and during the January 6, 2021 uprising. Find out who the then-President was talking to, what, and when, to find out what his responsibility is for the storming of the Capitol that saw his supporters rush into Congress, politicians flee, and the count had to be suspended.
Among other things, the investigators want to know in detail how Trump put his Vice President Mike Pence under pressure. Pence was responsible for certifying the Senate election results that January 6th. To this end, Rudy Giuliani, as Trump’s private attorney, coordinated alternative electoral bodies in several states. You should vote for Trump against the election result. This was to convince Pence to reject Biden’s rightful electorate. Had Trump ordered this himself, it would be a possible crime for which he could be charged. The Justice Department has subpoenaed several of these bogus voters.
Such false electoral bodies had formed in seven states and wanted to vote for Trump’s election victory, even though Biden had won there. The investigators have therefore procured telephone logs from high-ranking employees of the ex-president and ex-vice president. They also searched the home of Jeffrey Clark, a former ministry official who was convinced of the alleged voter fraud. After the lost election, Trump and his team tried to prove election fraud with the slogan “Stop the Steal” and a myriad of legal means, but this was unsuccessful.
Parallel to the activities of the judiciary, Congress itself is investigating the events of January 6 in a committee of inquiry. According to US media, the panel plans to turn over the evidence gathered to the Justice Department for possible indictment once its activities are complete. The department has already asked several witnesses to share their knowledge with the investigators. Apparently, after Trump’s presidency ended, moving boxes marked “confidential” were also brought to his residence in Mar-a-Lago.
Prosecutors are also interested in the lawyers who surrounded Trump during his final weeks in the White House – attorneys Jenna Ellis, Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman. Investigators are also examining Eastman’s phone. According to the committee of inquiry, Trump played an important role in his activities. Eastman wanted to get Pence to accept the alternative votes, so Trump arranged contact between his lawyer and Republican party leader Ronna McDaniel, from whom they hoped to help their plan.
The investigation against Trump does not end there. Several members of Congress and police officers have sued the ex-president over January 6th. According to witnesses on the investigative committee, Trump knew his supporters were armed. In his speech before the storming of the Capitol, he nevertheless called on them to go to the building and “fight like crazy” for the election victory, even wanting to run there with them.
The Fulton County District Attorney’s Office in Georgia is also investigating before January 6 and has subpoenaed a number of Trump associates. 16 people who had declared themselves as voters could also be charged. Biden had won the election against Trump in the state with a wafer-thin majority of just under 12,000 votes. The President then called the local election commissioner, a Republican, and told him to “find 11,780 votes.” Giuliani also published a video of two poll workers there who allegedly committed voter fraud. The women then received death threats. The accusation against the helpers turned out to be unfounded.
At the federal level, Attorney General Merrick Garland has never said explicitly whether prosecutors are considering indicting Trump. Garland expressed his intentions differently: “We want to hold accountable everyone who was legally responsible for the events surrounding January 6th.”
And apart from the investigations into his political activities, Trump has legal problems in his native New York. He is said to have systematically overvalued his real estate in order to obtain loans and undervalued it to the authorities in order to have to pay less taxes.
