Donald Trump and his allies engaged in criminal activity in an effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election, the House Committee investigating the assault on the US Capitol by a mob of supporters of the United States said on Wednesday evening. ex-president.
The commission has enough evidence to “conclude in good faith that the president and his campaign members engaged in a criminal conspiracy to defraud the United States,” she wrote in a brief obtained by multiple sources. American media.
The commission’s statements do not form its final conclusion, as the investigation is still ongoing.
It is no less damning against Mr. Trump, who fought to cling to power after losing to Joe Biden.
The commission drafted its brief following a court motion seeking access to documents from right-wing lawyer John Eastman, US media reported.
This Trump ally is the one who penned a now-famous memo outlining how he says Vice President Mike Pence could block lawmakers from certifying Joe Biden’s election victory over Donald Trump in what would normally have been a routine session of Congress on January 6, 2021. In the end, Mr. Pence had refused to do so.
The commission believes that this act constitutes a violation of a United States law that criminalizes “conspiring to commit an offense against the United States or to defraud the United States or any of its agencies in any way or whatever the end”.
Donald Trump, then one of Twitter’s most powerful users, had months and long before the election instilled the idea in his tens of millions of followers that the election might be rigged.
On January 6, just before the murderous assault on the Capitol, he castigated alleged electoral fraud during a rally in front of the White House and called on the crowd to “fight”.
The Republican suffered a second impeachment trial following the Capitol assault, but was acquitted by the Senate which tried him for “incitement to insurrection”.
He still dominates the Republican Party and regularly hints at his desire to run for a second term in 2024.