New emails reveal Trump and his friends putting pressure on the Justice Department to contest the election results in 2020.
According to a batch of emails released by Democrats on Tuesday, former President Donald Trump's White House assistant, chief of staff, and other allies pressured the Justice Department to investigate claims of voter fraud in the 2020 election, and Trump directed allies to push then-acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen to join the legal effort to challenge the election result.
The emails indicate how Trump aides pressed Rosen to consider bogus and outrageous accusations that the election was rigged, and pushed to have the Justice Department legally back up the fraudulent accusations. The emails also provide insight into how Rosen dealt with White House political pressure shortly after being appointed to run the department in the last weeks of Trump's presidency.
In the face of the pressure, Rosen claimed he would not speak to Trump's personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, about his baseless allegations that the 2020 election would be rigged.
When then-White House top of staff Mark Meadows asked Rosen to set up an FBI meeting with a Giuliani associate who was peddling a conspiracy theory that Italy was using military technology and satellites to sway votes to Joe Biden, Rosen refused.
Rosen wrote to then-acting Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue, "I flatly refused, indicated I would not be giving any special treatment to Giuliani or any of his 'witnesses,' and re-affirmed yet again that I will not talk to Giuliani about any of this."
The latest emails add to earlier findings by, The New York Times, and others about Meadows' communications to Rosen after the election, which exposed how the top White House aide pressed the Justice Department to take action in Trump's favour. A series of concerns regarding voting procedures in New Mexico, purported "anomalies" in a Georgia county, and claims regarding Italian satellites were included in the emails.
The emails also show how Trump directed allies toward Rosen, who was named acting attorney general following William Barr's resignation in December 2020 after Barr publicly stated that there was no widespread election fraud.
On 29 December, a private prosecutor, Kurt Olsen, appealed to John Moran at the Justice Department for a meeting with Rosen and promised that he could meet an hour's notice at the Justice Department. In a follow-up e-mail Trump directed Trump to meet Rosen to debate the US taking similar action, he attached a draught complaint following the Texas Supreme Court proceeding unsuccessfully to challenge election results in 4 states.
Olsen responded, "The President of the United States has received this complaint, and he asked me last night to inform AG Rosen in person today to discuss pursuing this action." "I've been told to report back to the President after the meeting this afternoon."
The draught complaint was also shared with Meadows and White House attorney Pat Cipollone, according to Trump's White House assistant, who submitted it to Rosen and Donoghue for consideration the same day.
On December 14, Trump's assistant forwarded a document purporting to show voter fraud in Antrim County, Michigan, to Rosen and Donoghue. Donoghue's aide forwarded the document to the US attorneys for Michigan's eastern and western districts.
By the end of the year, it was clear that Rosen and Donoghue were sick of the White House's pressure campaign.
The e-mails show how Meads urged the Department of Justice to investigate Trump's allegations of fraud, as did Cleta Mitchell, Trump's lawyer who assisted Trump on his call on January 2 when the Georgian officials pressured him "to find" votes.
In a January 1 e-mail, Meadows stated that in Fulton County, Georgia, "allégations were made of anomaly in the signature match," asking Rosen to have an officer in the Justice Department "engage immediately to determine if the allegation is true."
Later that day, Rosen emailed the email to Donoghue, saying: "Isn't this incredible? The message below will not receive a response from me."
"At least it's better than the last one," Donoghue replied, "but that doesn't say much."
Meadows provided Rosen a link to a YouTube movie on Italian satellites, which Rosen emailed to Donoghue, who replied, "Pure craziness."
In another exchange, Donoghue told Steve Engel of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel that he wanted to meet with him "about some antics that could potentially end up on your radar," implying that the Office of Legal Counsel was concerned about potential issues.
The committee's new emails include correspondence with Jeffrey Clark, a Justice Department lawyer who tried to persuade Trump to fire Rosen and use the Justice Department to overturn Georgia's election results, according to The New York Times in January.
The official of the Justice Department Patrick Hovakimian wrote after a meeting on the third of January of the Trump, Clark, Rosen and others: 'It sounds like Rosen and won the case of justice.'
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