There was nothing quiet about one library in Washington D.C. Tuesday afternoon, as a deer shockingly smashed into its windows and ran wildly inside.
"We just knew it was coming up in the office so we just piled up boxes and stuff," one employee said.
The deer suffered a broken jaw from the break in and was later euthanized by animal control. It is unclear as to when the library would reopen.
WATCH: Video from Associated Press, which was published on February 1, 2012.
For weeks it’s been said by political analysts that Donald Trump might evade charges related to his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection attempt, but a prominent legal expert on Wednesday cast doubt on that assumption.
Former U.S. Attorney Harry Litman said that recent developments now appear to show that it is "more likely" that the former president’s role in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol will lead special counsel Jack Smith to pursue an indictment. Litman cited new reporting on former Trump officials Mark Meadows and Steve Bannon that suggests Smith is now zeroing in on Jan. 6.
Bannon, who served as a special assistant to Trump, was subpoenaed by a federal grand jury in Washington D.C. hearing evidence in the Jan. 6 probe, NBC News reported Wednesday.
That follows multiple reports Tuesday that Meadows, who served as Trump’s chief of staff in the last year of his presidency, testified in connection one or both of Smith’s investigations.
The New York Times reports that Meadows is viewed as a potentially important witness in both investigations.
Jonathan Swan, Michael S. Schmidt and Maggie Haberman write for The Times that “Mr. Meadows was around for pivotal moments leading up to and after the 2020 election, as Mr. Trump plotted to try to stay in office and thwart Joseph R. Biden Jr. from being sworn in to succeed him. Some of them were described in hundreds of text messages that Mr. Meadows turned over to the House select committee that investigated the Jan. 6 attack at the Capitol before he decided to stop cooperating. Those texts served as a road map for House investigators.”
Litman views these reports as evidence that Smith is prioritizing the Jan. 6 probe.
“Between Bannon and Meadows, Smith is really going to the dead center of the January 6 offenses,” Litman tweeted Wednesday.
“Makes charges there seem both more likely and less remote in time.(not to say "imminent" by any means; in fact, we probably should stop using that word altogether!)," he added.
\u201cBetween Bannon and Meadows, Smith is really going to the dead center of the January 6 offenses. Makes charges there seem both more likely and less remote in time. (not to say "imminent" by any means; in fact, we probably should stop using that word altogether!).\u201d— Harry Litman (@Harry Litman) 1686176757
Former President Donald Trump could be on the brink of an indictment for obstruction of justice and removal of classified information in the Mar-a-Lago documents probe, according to new reporting.
But until a few weeks ago, noted CNN's Kaitlan Collins on "The Situation Room," the Trump team actually thought they were home free on this case — because they expected the concurrent investigations of classified documents inadvertently removed and returned by President Joe Biden and former Vice President Mike Pence would muddy the waters, even though those cases had significantly different facts.
"How do you think trump and his team are reacting to the second grand jury down in Florida?" asked anchor Wolf Blitzer.
"It is amazing how much of a shift there has been from Trump's legal team," said Collins. "They initially believed it was more serious. Then after Pence and Biden became embroiled in their own document issues, they seemed to think that they had an out. There is no way that they believed that Trump could be charged, considering his predecessor and former running mate had similar issues, even though they were very different on the obstruction issue."
However, said Collins, "that has changed in recent weeks."
"They are concerned about this," said Collins. "And seem to have this belief that Trump could be charged potentially in this. Trump is denying publicly online that he has been told he is going to be indicted, but there is definitely a sense of alarm in Trump's legal team over this."
Watch below or at the following link.
Kaitlan Collins says Trump's team thought they were in the clear on Mar-a-Lagowww.youtube.com
A legal affairs expert who previously served as an aide to Attorney General Merrick Garland on Wednesday suggested that Donald Trump could be behind reports surfacing this week that an indictment against the former president is imminent.
Anthony Coley, who headed Justice Department’s Office of Public Affairs under Garland, in a “public service announcement,” suggested that the former president in the past has found that spreading misinformation has served his interests. Coley cited previous reports that turned out to be erroneous in his call for calm.
“Here’s my public service announcement, a reminder, for the day: Trump creates and thrives off of chaos. It’s his playbook. And sometime uninformed people are cited, wrongly, as credible sources,” Coley tweeted.
Coley’s comments followed Wednesday’s blockbuster report from The Independent that the DOJ is readying to ask a grand jury hearing evidence against the former president on obstruction and Espionage Act charges, which could happen as soon as Thursday.
The “Espionage Act” was trending on Twitter Wednesday afternoon after the Independent report was published.
“Remember when a 'senior Justice Department source' told a nat'l outlet that Garland didn’t know the date or time of the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago on Aug 8th or was asked to approve it? False. Garland rebutted that on-the-record on Aug. 11th,” Coley said.
“A similar effort to create chaos (and panic, among his faithful) is at play now….the fact of the matter is that only a small group of DOJ officials really know the state-of-play with Smith’s investigations. Everything else – charges, timing, venue – is pure speculation."
At the minimum, Coley suggests taking the latest reports with a grain of salt.
“Let’s all take a breath, and let Smith and team complete their work,” he said.
“We’ll all know when we know. Thank you for coming to my TedTalk <smile> (End)”
\u201cHere\u2019s my public service announcement, a reminder, for the day: Trump creates and thrives off of chaos. It\u2019s his playbook. And sometime uninformed people are cited, wrongly, as credible sources. (THREAD)\u201d— Anthony Coley (@Anthony Coley) 1686174247
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