Doug Mastriano embodies a Christian nationalist movement as he runs for Pa. governor
May 5, 2022, 2:29 PM ET
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'Shameless': Kari Lake blasted over latest conspiracy theory about 2020 election ballots
June 01, 2023
Kari Lake, fresh off her latest loss in court last month in her effort to overturn her Arizona election loss in 2022 to Gov. Katie Hobbs, is now pushing a new conspiracy theory about the 2020 presidential election — and Laurie Roberts of The Arizona Republic tore it to shreds in a new column.
"'Welcome to the Banana Republic of Arizona,' Lake tweeted Monday. 'Maricopa County report reveals thousands of ballots in 2020 didn’t have proof of citizenship.' Naturally, Lake’s 'war room' chimed in on this shocking development. 'The Secretary of State who oversaw this debacle is squatting as Governor,' her campaign account added. 'The guy who was Maricopa County Recorder is Secretary of State. These people were promoted for successfully sabotaging 2020.'"
"I suppose it wouldn't be all that surprising that Lake would be ignorant of such matters as as she revs up her supporters for what appears to be her inevitable run for the U.S. Senate next year," wrote Roberts. "Anything Lake doesn’t understand — state election law, federal election law, how bills become law — automatically becomes a 'bombshell.'"
The problem, wrote Roberts, is that, while 4,484 voters in Arizona didn't prove their citizenship, federal law says that they don't have to. State law requires proof of citizenship, but under the National Voter Registration Act of 1993, which supersedes the state law, voters are simply required to affirm they are a citizen under penalty of perjury. Roughly 5 to 7 percent of voters don't possess the type of identification needed for proof of citizenship, noted Roberts, and "some of them are Native Americans or others born outside of hospitals." The actual known grand total of non-citizens who improperly voted in 2020 was five.
IN OTHER NEWS: Judge denies bid to derail E. Jean Carroll case because Trump is a persecuted 'white Christian'
This, Roberts concluded, is Lake's big "bombshell." "And you wonder why people no longer trust our elections?" she wrote.
All of this comes as right-wingers are still targeting and harassing election officials in Arizona, baselessly accusing them of misconduct or fraud for Democrats' victories in the state in 2020 and 2022. Bill Gates, a Republican who serves as the Maricopa County Recorder, announced this week he would not be seeking re-election due to the campaign of intimidation against him by election conspiracy theorists.
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Trump keeping 'war plans' makes it 'inconceivable' that he will escape indictment: former DOJ official
June 01, 2023
A former top U.S. Dept. of Justice official says it is "inconceivable" that Donald Trump will not be charged, based on reports Special Counsel Jack Smith has an audio recording of the ex-president admitting he was in possession of a classified Pentagon document detailing a possible attack on Iran.
"I think if this audio tape exists, this is not a question of if there are going to be charges. It's just a question of when," announced NBC News/MSNBC legal analyst Andrew Weissmann, the well-known former FBI General Counsel who worked at DOJ for two decades.
Importantly, Weissmann, who made his remarks on MSNBC Thursday, notes that the document in question, if it is as described, contains "war plans."
"And the proof that we have learned just publicly is so strong. And Jack Smith is such a competent and aggressive prosecutor. It is inconceivable to me that this would not be charged, and having a tape recording of the prospective defendant admitting his possession of a classified document that he had no right to have," Weissmann says.
"And not just any classified document. I think it's really important to remember that what he talks about reportedly, is a classified document involving something that is unbelievably sensitive, which is war plans of the United States against another country."
Where news broke Wednesday NYU Law professor of law Ryan Goodman, a former U.S. Dept. of Defense Special Counsel, wrote: “War plans are among the most highly classified documents. Puts pressure on DOJ to indict, and a jury to convict.”
Some say, based on the audio, Trump might have been holding the document as he was being recorded at his Bedminster, New Jersey golf resort, allegedly discussing it.
“Make no mistake. This is squarely an Espionage Act case,” Goodman also said, calling the news a “bombshell.”
Explaining the gravity of the document, Weissmann notes, "this is not just taking love letters of Kim Jong Un or salacious material about the president in France. This is exactly what the Department of Justice and the intelligence community is worried about."
Continuing to explain just how serious this is, Weissmann served up the ground rules.
"Let's remember government documents, whether classified or not, belong to the government. They are not to be retained by a private citizen. And the former president is a private citizen. So for instance, when I was in the Department of Justice, the number of documents I could take when I left the Department of Justice would be zero. So you're not supposed to have that possession of government documents. If they are classified, there can be an additional type of charge, but it's not required that that material be classified or classified at a particular level."
"What you're looking at here is whether the person either knowingly took the documents or knowingly retained the documents. Important this tape recording, if it exists, as recorded, is that you've got Donald Trump admitting that he has in his possession a classified document – doesn't matter if it's Secret, Top Secret, it's classified, that itself is a crime."
And then finally, with respect to dissemination, the recording is that there does appear to be at least some dissemination of the information because Donald Trump, although he doesn't turn the document over or quote from it, he does talk about what is in there. In other words, the reason we're all talking about the fact that involves war plans involving Iran is because reportedly that is what Donald Trump said was in the document. If that proves out, that is a form of dissemination."
On social media later Thursday, Weissman tweeted, "Days, not months..." suggesting he believes an indictment of Trump would be coming sooner rather than later.
Watch Weissmann below or at this link.
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Judge denies bid to derail E. Jean Carroll case because Trump is a persecuted 'white Christian'
June 01, 2023
Judge Lewis Kaplan dismissed a motion from a Donald Trump ally to dismiss E. Jean Carroll's 2019 defamation case because he's being persecuted for being a white Christian.
Court documents uploaded on Thursday revealed Kaplan's decision to dismiss the demands of far-right Trump pal, James H. Brady. He has been described by the New York Post as "a gadfly who clogs courts with 'vexatious' claims." It goes on to claim that the man "has filed so many repetitive lawsuits he’s been ordered to stop and sanctioned in both state and federal courts..."
Writing to Judge Kaplan, Brady said: "I am making this motion to intervene in the case of Carroll v. Trump, 20-cv-7311, because I am unwilling to sit silent and watch another white Christian be treated as poorly and unfairly as I personally have been treated in the New York State and Federal Courts."
Judge Kaplan replied in less than 24 hours, telling Brady, "There are only two legal bases on which one may intervene in a civil action. The first is intervention as of right, which is available only to one who 'is given an unconditional right to intervene by a federal statute' or 'claims an interest relating to the property or transaction that is the subject of the action, and is so situated that disposing of the action may as a practical matter impair or impede the movant's ability to protect its interest, unless the existing parties adequately represent that interest.'"
He goes on to say the second is "by permission of the court, which is an appropriate case may be granted if the putative intervenor 'is given a conditional right by a federal statute' or 'has a claim or defense that shares with the main action a common question of law or fact.' Mr. Brady does not satisfy any of these criteria. Accordingly, this motion is denied."
The 2019 case is Carroll's first effort to sue Trump for defaming her, but it happened while Trump was still in office. Therefore, Trump claimed he couldn't be tried because he was the president. The case was taken to several appeals courts until, finally, it was decided that Trump was not defaming Carroll in his capacity as president of the United States, but as an individual.
The most recent decision by the jury that delivered a combination of nearly $5 million in damages to Carroll was from her second claim of defamation. That came after Trump was out of office. The first claim from Carroll is expected to deliver a higher judgment because it reportedly involved information about how it impacted Carroll's job and finances.
IN OTHER NEWS: Ron DeSantis heaped praise on Fauci in 2020: report
A third complaint has been filed following comments on his social media site and at the CNN town hall in which Trump allegedly defamed her again. Carroll's lawyer, Robbie Kaplan (no relation to Lewis Kaplan), said that it is rare that someone continues to defame someone after more than one judgment is issued, so there isn't a lot of case law to turn to. Still, they've filed a third case.
In response to that court filing, Trump attacked Carroll again.
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