WASHINGTON — A quick tick-tock:
Last night at 10:54 p.m. EST, former President Donald Trump was indicted for a fourth time, in a fourth jurisdiction.
Seventeen minutes after the 13 new felony charges were released, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) took to social media and declared it a “WITCH HUNT.”
And before the clock struck 11:30 p.m., House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) declared the two-plus-year investigation a “sham,” even as a sworn grand jury in Fulton County, Ga., unanimously disagreed with the speaker’s assessment.
A senior member of the House Oversight Committee, Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-VA), says we ain’t seen nothing yet.
“We're going to be subjected to a massive disinformation and distraction campaign by the Republicans. Distort, distract, deflect and dissemble. Those are the tools of the trade,” Connolly told Raw Story. “But I think it's going to be very hard to overcome the facts as they're being laid out in these various indictments.”
While the conservative media machine is following the lead of Trump and his Republican allies in Congress, Connolly says their distortions-to-lies get harder to defend with each new case — not to mention the 91 felony charges now hanging over the former president.
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“They’re all engaged in defending the indefensible. You know, they can rail all they want about a laptop that was owned by the son of the president of the United States, but we've got four criminal indictments in four different locations of the former president and his acolytes,” Connolly says. “And that's pretty compelling.”
Still, even before the indictment dropped Monday evening, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) urged Republicans to defund special counsel Jack Smith, which is something Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Matt Gaetz (R-FL), for two, have been pushing in Congress.
Connolly wonders if some Republicans are getting nervous.
“Now, members of Congress, you know, I think many of them crossed the line. Some of them came perilously close to that line, and we'll see what happens with them,” Connolly says.
Of the four Republicans the House Jan. 6 select committee formally referred to the House Ethics Committee — McCarthy, Jordan, Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ) and Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA) — the new indictment only mentions Perry.
After all 16 alleged fake electors in Michigan were charged last month, Raw Story exclusively reported Perry — along with Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) — denied being worried.
“I don’t have any concerns,” Perry told Raw Story.
This latest indictment has the other three lawmakers named by the Jan. 6 select committee — McCarthy, Biggs and Jordan — publicly parroting Trump, even as Connolly says they’re likely singing a different tune in private.
“In some ways, this is the most sweeping of all of the indictments, because it's all-encompassing. It finally points the finger at what, in fact, all of us saw, and wraps a very coherent narrative around it as a massive conspiracy involving lots of people,” Connolly said. “I mean, that's massive. I think it's a big deal. You can't overstate the criticality of this indictment.”
Connolly says they’re mimicking Trump in more ways than one.
“That’s all part and parcel of the attempt to try to dismantle and degrade and demean and dismiss the legal system in America,” Connolly says. “When you can't win your case in front of a jury, then maybe you try to debunk the entire legal system?”
But that’s why Connolly and other Democrats are glad the Fulton County, Ga., trial is slated to be televised — in likely contrast to federal court proceedings, where there are no plans for television coverage.
“It’s necessary for the country to see this, to hear it, to go through this process,” Connolly says. “The public needs to hear the evidence. It's compelling. You know, it's one thing to read a headline and decide you can dismiss it. It's another to be riveted in front of the television and watch the evidence unfold in the courtroom where political rhetoric isn't going to cut it. It's now in a court of law, and you're being held to legal standards. And you're accused of violating them criminally, along with 18 co-conspirators.”
