Donald Trump wants prosecutor to investigate 2020 loss to Joe Biden
Trump's efforts to challenge his 2020 election loss to former President Joe Biden failed in court. Independent reviews and leading members of his own administration dismissed his fraud claims.
In 2022, eight conservative legal experts published a report called "Lost, Not Stolen," reviewing the evidence in 64 different cases in six swing states -- Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. They found that Trump and his allies didn't provide evidence of widespread election fraud. Trump lost every case but one.
Trump's own attorney general, William Barr, said in early December 2020 that the Justice Department had "not seen fraud on a scale that could have affected a different outcome in the election."
Yet Trump persisted, pressuring Congress to try and overturn the election results in a campaign that culminated on Jan. 6, 2021 when a mob of his supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol.
Trump later was impeached and indicted by a grand jury for his actions in the election aftermath, but the Senate acquitted him on the impeachment charge and Special Counsel Jack Smith requested to dismiss the Jan. 6 charges against Trump after he won, which a judge approved.
Trump pardoned nearly 1,600 people charged with crimes related to Jan. 6 on his first day back in office.
Contributing: Erin Mansfield, Isabel Morales
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Sky News
26 minutes ago
- Sky News
Israel-Iran live: ran and Israel exchange attacks - a day after Tehran rules out nuclear negotiations
Iran and Israel have been exchanging attacks after Tehran ruled out nuclear negotiations with US while it is facing "Israeli aggression". Reports have suggested a nuclear facility site in Iran has been "targeted". Listen to our Trump 100 podcast as you scroll.
The Herald Scotland
an hour ago
- The Herald Scotland
Scotland's future is uncertain. But then so is the here and now
At the same time, many in the mischievous media exaggerate the transient. Who is up, who is down? What is new, what is demanding attention? Always eager to hasten to the next caravanserai. This week, by contrast, there was a glance towards the longer term. Where are we going with our NHS, our services, our fiscal structure? What, an Edinburgh conference asked, will Scotland look like in 2050? Now, even adopting such a perspective may be viewed as courageous, given the perils currently confronting our planet. As Israel and Iran trade missiles, as President Trump ponders, it may seem rash to contemplate anything other than our collective survival. However, we cannot live that way. We cannot flee for the sanctuary of a dark corner whenever Donald J. Trump turns into King Lear: confused and uncertain yet insisting that he is the terror of the earth. And so it is entirely right to cast an eye ahead. However it may appear at first glance that there is a faintly futile tinge to the entire endeavour. Consider. In 1920, did the ravaged continent of Europe discern that, by 1945, they would have endured a second, bloody conflict? They did not. More prosaically, in 1980, did we know that the passing of a further quarter century would lead to a transformation in Information Technology and the creation of a Scottish Parliament? We did not. Yet contemplate a little more deeply. Were not the roots of the Second World War seeded in the aftermath of the First World War? The constraints and financial reparations understandably imposed upon Germany – but resented by their emerging, deadly leader? Read more Brian Taylor Do the Scottish Conservatives have any reason to exist? This is a set-back and an opportunity for the SNP - which one will they embrace? Brian Taylor: The fundamental battle which unites Donald Trump and Nigel Farage And the more modern period? Were there not early prequels for the 21st century information revolution? Further, here in Scotland, was not the cause of Scottish self-government measurably advanced in the wake of the election of Margaret Thatcher in 1979? In short, when we purport to look into the future, we are in reality studying present-day conditions. We are examining how reform might generate a steady transformation which would emerge over that longer period. It is a way of urging impatient voters and the mischievous media to cut a little slack for our elected tribunes. It is about the future, yes, but viewed through the prism of the present. In the context of reform, there was much talk this week about reviving thoughts advanced by the commission on public services, ably chaired by the late and decidedly great Campbell Christie. I recall Campbell for his intellect, his humour, his baffling devotion to Falkirk FC, his fierce competitiveness at golf – and his determination to work with all and sundry to make Scotland a better place. In 2011, his commission urged Scotland to embrace 'empowerment, integration, efficiency and prevention' in transforming the public sector. This week, Ivan McKee, Scotland's Public Finance Minister, set out a programme of reforms and savings – with an explicit nod to those earlier endeavours by the Christie team. Mr McKee is a key figure in the Scottish Government, returning to office alongside his close ally, Kate Forbes. Both advocate a focus upon efficiency – and, perhaps above all, economic growth. In doing so, they are most certainly aligned with the instincts and aims of the First Minister. Now John Swinney displayed another intuitive tendency in his forward-looking remarks this week. His solution to the entrenched problems confronting Scotland? It lay, you will be astonished to learn, with independence. So shifting attention back to independence, rather than the day-to-day concerns of the voters? Was this a U-turn? Not really, no. Indeed, I suspect too much can be made of this apparent change. Firstly, Mr Swinney is a believer, a fervent Nationalist. He yearns for independence. Secondly, he leads a party which contains many whose fervour is undimmed by minor matters such as convincing others. Thirdly, there is an SNP National Council this weekend. Enough, Brian. Away with cynicism. I believe John Swinney is simply sustaining his dual strategy. He feels a little more liberated to advance the option of independence – while simultaneously concentrating for the most part on the anxieties of the people, such as the cost of living and the health service. John Swinney (Image: PA) In short, his attention is drawn by the here and now, even as he offers a potential vision of the future. His opponents are similarly grounded. Labour's Anas Sarwar, for example, glanced forward and concluded that the SNP were only offering 'managed decline.' Still, futurology can be a source of innocent merriment. What might we favour? Ivan McKee is surely right to suggest public services which prioritise customers rather than producers, which share information and thus resources. But how about the health service? The current system is simply unsustainable, unaffordable. Do you see that nurse gesturing to you? That health worker is not waving but drowning. We have to cut waste – but also overall demand. Perhaps, as the Health Secretary Neil Gray suggested, that can be done in part by an emphasis on prevention. However, that will undoubtedly take time – which ministers facing elections do not have. Politically, Mr Swinney's focus will be upon ensuring that the stats are going in the right direction. Education? Our economy, our society, both need the acquisition of useful skills. I recall my school textbook entitled 'Physics is Fun!' This proved to be a brazen lie. However, physics is vital, along with tricky stuff like maths, literature and French irregular verbs. Our universities are struggling financially. But, as they reform, they must maintain the objective of excellence. If they are truly to be world-class, as Scotland advertises, then they must aspire to the very highest standards. And the economy itself? We need growth and prosperity. We need an environmental drive, including renewables, which does not shut down our industry and agriculture. The future? Simple really. Brian Taylor is a former political editor for BBC Scotland and a columnist for The Herald. He cherishes his family, the theatre – and Dundee United FC
Telegraph
2 hours ago
- Telegraph
Trump attack on Left-wing bias on TV sparks ‘constitutional crisis'
Elon Musk may have stepped aside, but Donald Trump still has a Doge problem. The US president's plan to run a scythe through up to $425bn (£316bn) of government spending could be gutted or even vetoed in the Senate, where just a few rebel Republicans could scupper the cuts. But Trump and Russell Vought, his budget tsar, have hatched a scheme, called a 'pocket rescission', that might keep the Doge (department of government efficiency) dream on track. And it could even shift the constitutional balance of power between president and Congress towards a testy Trump. It's a high-risk, high-stakes strategy. The outcome will determine whether the Doge spending reductions can go ahead, helping to pay for Trump's 'big, beautiful' tax cuts without blowing out the budget and rattling the bond markets. But the unprecedented procedure takes the White House and Capitol Hill into uncharted legal waters. So it is likely to end up in the courts – joining a raft of litigation that will either reinforce the institutional checks on the president's power or unleash him. 'It's a challenge to Congress,' says Sarah Binder, a political scientist at the Brookings Institution and George Washington University. 'I don't like to throw around the term 'constitutional crisis', but it's not a great position for lawmakers and institutions.' Under the constitution, Congress has the so-called power of the purse, meaning that lawmakers, not the president, are the final arbiter of what the government spends or does not spend. If the president wants to cut funding or programmes that Congress has already authorised, his only option is to launch a rescission procedure – a formal request for the cuts, which both houses of Congress must approve. The rescission process was introduced in a law called the Impoundment Control Act, which had the overall aim of making it hard for Richard Nixon, the then-president, and his successors from delaying or withholding funds once Congress had green-lighted them. Rescission has seldom been used. Ronald Reagan used it to secure $15.2bn of spending cuts as president in the early 1980s, but later in the decade, Congress tended to ignore or refuse his rescission messages. Trump tried it on with a $15bn-plus request in his first term, but was stymied in the Senate. The Democrats then got control of Congress in the midterms and pushed back another $27bn salvo. Now Trump is trying again. The initial proposal – Vought says it will be 'the first of many' – is to scuttle $9.4bn of spending on public broadcasters and international aid programmes. This rescission was flagged back in March but formally put to Congress only this month. In an executive order early last month, Trump said he wanted to terminate all public funding of National Public Radio (NPR) and the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), which accounts for about $1bn of this first rescission package. 'Which viewpoints NPR and PBS promote does not matter. What does matter is that neither entity presents a fair, accurate or unbiased portrayal of current events to tax-paying citizens,' Trump said. 'Today the media landscape is filled with abundant, diverse, and innovative news options. Government funding of news media in this environment is not only outdated and unnecessary but corrosive to the appearance of journalistic independence.' The White House has until July 18 to persuade Congress. The rescission scraped through the House of Representatives by 214 votes to 212, but the Senate is the real test. If just four Republicans in the 100-seat upper house swap sides, the spending stays in place. It's not looking promising for Trump. Several Republicans have already voiced concern about at least some of the cuts. The dissenters include Senator Susan Collins, who chairs an influential Senate finance committee that will consider the cuts at a session on June 25. There could be fireworks. Vought will appear before the committee and, in recent weeks, he has started airing the possibility of bypassing Congress altogether through an untested and almost unknown variant of rescission: the so-called pocket rescission. 'It's a provision that has been rarely used, but it is there,' Vought told CNN. 'And we intend to use all of these tools.' The trick with the pocket rescission is to make the request to Congress right before the end of the fiscal year, which runs to Sept 30. The White House reckons that the Impoundment Control Act's wording creates a loophole: if Congress does not act on the request before Sept 30, then even if the window is well short of 45 days the spending approval will lapse automatically on that date. The case for pocket rescissions was made recently by Wade Miller, of the Center for Renewing America (CRA), a Right-wing think tank. 'A rescission is a viable tool for carrying out the broader political mandate to curb unnecessary spending,' he wrote in a briefing paper. 'If the executive branch decides to use this process, the deployment of a rescission with fewer than 45 days remaining in the fiscal year is a statutorily and constitutionally valid strategy.' The CRA was set up by Vought himself, after he served as director of the Office of Management and Budget in the final six months of Trump's first term. He returned to the White House with the president this January, in the same role. But other Washington think tanks trenchantly oppose the CRA's position. 'Calling it a pocket rescission implies that it's like an actual functional tool under the law, in a way that it's actually not. It is a strategy that the person who is running the Office of Management and Budget has articulated to evade the law,' says Cerin Lindgrensavage, a lawyer at Protect Democracy. She says the whole purpose of the Impoundment Control Act was to stop any presidential ploy to skirt its strictures. 'One of the reasons why they might want to do this is because they're afraid they don't have the votes to actually make the cuts the legal way.' Binder, from Brookings, says that the Act doesn't explicitly deal with what happens if a president makes the request right before the end of the fiscal year. 'There's certainly room here for an aggressive Office of Management and Budget and an aggressive administration to try to stretch – others might say manipulate – the silence in the budget law,' she says. 'But the logic of the matter suggests that pocket rescissions are not legal under the Act and I would imagine there's a strong argument that they are unconstitutional under Congress's power of the purse.' Binder suspects Vought is looking to get a test case into the courts. Given there could be a constitutional principle at stake, it could go all the way to the Supreme Court, where a majority of judges are Republican appointees. In the meantime, litigants could get restraining orders or injunctions to prevent the Doge cuts. But they can't necessarily get the White House to respect these. The stage is set for a constitutional showdown. The question is whether Trump and Vought will really pull the trigger. And then, whether the weapon will actually work.
