Increasingly a candidate, Donald Trump has suggested that he could pardon attackers on Capitol Hill if he is re-elected president, a political one-upmanship that responds to a parliamentary inquiry whose threat is becoming more and more pressing.
The former president’s remarks at a rally in Texas this weekend caused unease even in his party.
“If I run, and if I win, we will treat those on January 6 fairly,” he said at his second rally in two weeks about his supporters who invaded the seat of the American Congress. Have
Before promising “the biggest demonstration ever seen, from Washington to New York via Atlanta” if ever prosecutors did “anything illegal” in the investigations of his affairs and his person.
One of these investigations, led by a parliamentary committee with a Democratic majority, seeks to shed light on his responsibility in the attack on Congress by his supporters on January 6, 2021. And gradually draws the picture of a president who has used all the means at its disposal to try to cling to power.
Glued papers
Like this (never signed) draft White House executive order ordering the nation’s top military official to seize election machines across the United States, which the commission got its hands on.
Or, as the New York Times Monday evening, this order from Donald Trump to his lawyer to contact the Department of Homeland Security, and – again – take control of the famous machines, at the heart of the wacky conspiracy theories of the Trump camp.
After hearing more than 400 witnesses, the parliamentary committee is now going through more than 700 pages of documents, some of which were deliberately torn up by Donald Trump… And glued together by his staff.
Among these hundreds of archives, there is certain information “that the former president had hoped to keep hidden”, assure the elected officials at the head of this commission.
In any case, Donald Trump’s intentions no longer have much of a secret.
“Overturning the presidential election” was indeed the intention of the Republican billionaire, he confirmed this weekend in a press release.
“So many frauds and irregularities”, he castigated about the ballot that his tide of red caps and him still believe stolen.
To find out how far exactly Donald Trump has dared to go in his crusade, the so-called “January 6” commission has issued a series of subpoenas to members of the former real estate mogul’s entourage. One of them has already been charged for refusing to testify.
This group of elected officials is advancing at full speed, anxious to publish its work before the midterm elections during which the Republicans promise a “red wave”, and to bury the work of the parliamentary inquiry.
war chest
Donald Trump also sees his winning party, and already seems to be positioning himself for the next deadline: the presidential election of 2024. Monday evening, he seemed more than ever a candidate, boasting of having a war chest of more than 122 million dollars , an unprecedented amount for a former president.
“They hate that I break all the records,” he said, accusing the media of not wanting to cover his successes. Or to dwell too much on his disappointments.
But there are still serious hurdles in his potential run for the White House.
Even if his party were to win the November legislative elections, Donald Trump will also have to face the gaze of his conservative peers, who for some have seriously started to distance themselves.
One of his closest allies, Senator Lindsey Graham, was quick to call the promises of supposed presidential pardons from the former tenant of the White House “inappropriate”.
Conservative tenor Mitch McConnell and leader of the Republicans in the Senate also opposed it on Tuesday.
At the same time, several elected officials from his camp have been working for weeks on a bill specifically set up to prevent any election from being overturned. Or that history stutters.