Jan. 6 committee ‘laid the foundation for charging Trump’s legal advisers’: legal expert

Three attorneys linked to Donald Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election -- Jeffrey Clark, Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman -- are under increasing pressure, according to a new report from The Guardian.

“The strong evidence presented about the fake electors scheme at recent House committee hearings, including testimony by senior justice department officials, laid the foundation for charging Trump’s legal advisers, Eastman and Giuliani, and possibly Clark, with multiple state and federal crimes,” said Michael Zeldin, an ex-DOJ prosecutor.

He told The Guardian that members of Trump’s legal team could possibly face charges for “obstruction of an official proceeding, conspiracy to defraud the United States, false statements in connection with the fake electors scheme, and election fraud.”

During a Jan. 6 committee hearing, Republican lawmaker Liz Cheney said Trump chose to listen to the advice of "apparently inebriated" Giuliani "to just claim he won, and insist that the vote counting stop -- to falsely claim everything was fraudulent."

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Trump started pushing what came to be known as his "Big Lie" around 2:30 am on November 4, 2020, prematurely declaring victory on the night of an election he ultimately lost to Democrat Joe Biden by seven million votes.

Giuliani and associates including the lawyer Sidney Powell would go on to push debunked theories of massive voter fraud that put them at odds with the White House lawyers Stepien referred to as "Team Normal."

“The cumulative evidence presented over the course of the hearings paint a picture of a president who was told explicitly by multiple people that he lost the election and that once he exhausted his judicial remedies (losing nearly 60 cases) his continuing pressure campaign to prevent the orderly transfer of power was illegal," Zeldin told The Guardian.

The Jan. 6 committee has also presented evidence that many of Trump's allies, including Giuliani, sought pardons from the president.

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But Giuliani has denied the claims. “No, I NEVER asked for a pardon nor thought of one. I NEVER lied nor did anything wrong. Friends were suggesting Trump do a pardon for everyone around him because the corrupt Democrats try to frame people,” Giuliani, told The Washington Times. “Case in fact, Russian hoax and Quid pro quo.”

With additional reporting by AFP