2.3 Outreach and Implementation of the Plan

¶Just one day after the State-focused plan came up in the Oval Office with the President and his top lieutenants, President Trump started taking concrete steps aimed at State legislators. And in the weeks that followed, the President spearheaded outreach aimed at numerous officials in States he lost but that had GOP-led legislatures, including in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, and Arizona.

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¶The Select Committee estimates that in the two months between the November election and the January 6th insurrection, President Trump or his inner circle engaged in at least 200 apparent acts of public or private outreach, pressure, or condemnation, targeting either State legislators or State or local election administrators, to overturn State election results. This included at least:

68 meetings, attempted or connected phone calls, or text messages, each aimed at one or more State or local officials;
18 instances of prominent public remarks, with language targeting one or more such officials;⁵⁶⁵⁶ This figure is almost certainly a significant undercount, since it only includes public remarks by President Trump, public testimony, or the most noteworthy interviews conducted by one of his subordinates, but it does not include a review of every single remark targeting State or local officials during this period by those presidential subordinates. and
125 social media posts by President Trump or senior aides targeting one or more such officials, either explicitly or implicitly, and mostly from his own account.⁵⁷⁵⁷ This figure is also almost certainly an undercount, since it only includes those posts by President Trump’s campaign or advisors when they covered new ground that was substantially different from social media posts that were already made by President Trump. Also, many of these posts were replicated across multiple platforms.

¶Furthermore, these efforts by President Trump’s team also involved two other initiatives that tried to enlist support from large numbers of State legislators all at once:

The Trump Campaign contacted, or attempted to contact, nearly 200 State legislators from battleground States between November 30, 2020 and December 3, 2020, to solicit backing for possible Statehouse resolutions to overturn the election. At least some messages said they were “on behalf of the president.”⁵⁸⁵⁸ Jonathan Oosting, “Trump Campaign Lobbies Michigan Lawmakers to Ignore Vote, Give Him Electors,” Bridge Michigan, (Dec. 2, 2020), available at https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-government/trump-campaign-lobbies-michigan-lawmakers-ignore-vote-give-him-electors; MIRS Monday Podcast, “Call to Legislator From Someone Claiming to be with Trump Campaign (12/1/2020),” PodBean, Dec. 1, 2020, available at https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-iqskx-f3cfc6; Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Angela McCallum Production), McCallum_01_001570, (Undated Basic Script for calls to Representatives/Senators).Show full note
Nearly 300 State legislators from battleground States reportedly participated in a private briefing with President Trump, Rudolph Giuliani, John Eastman, and others on January 2nd. The President reportedly urged them to exercise what he called “the real power” to choose electoral votes before January 6th, because, as President Trump said on the call, “I don’t think the country is going to take it.”⁵⁹⁵⁹ Paul Bedard, “Exclusive: Trump Urges State Legislators to Reject Electoral Votes, ‘You Are the Real Power,’” Washington Examiner, (Jan. 3, 2021), available at https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/washington-secrets/exclusive-trump-urges-state-legislators-to-reject-electoral-votes-you-are-the-real-power.

¶It may be impossible to document each and every meeting, phone call, text message, or other contact that President Trump and his allies had with State and local officials in various battleground States. What follows is a summary that focuses on four States and that demonstrates the lengths to which President Trump would go in order to stay in power based on lies—the Big Lie—about the election.

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President Trump’s Early Pressure On Public Servants

¶To carry out his plan, President Trump, Rudolph Giuliani, and other surrogates of President Trump publicly and privately sought assistance from State and local officials whom they assumed would help as Republicans on the same team with the “same goal.”⁶⁰⁶⁰ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Maricopa County Board of Supervisors Production), CTRL0000020072 (December 24, 2020, copy of voice message and a transcription) pp. 1–2); see also Yvonne Wingett Sanchez and Ronald J. Hansen, “‘Asked to Do Something Huge’: An Audacious Pitch to Reverse Arizona’s Election Results,” AZ Central, (Dec. 2, 2021), available at https://www.azcentral.com/in-depth/news/politics/elections/2021/11/18/arizona-audit-rudy-giuliani-failed-effort-replace-electors/6349795001/.Show full note Some helped. Others didn’t.

¶On November 12th, U.S. Representative Tim Walberg (R-MI) sent an email to President Trump’s Executive Assistant Molly Michael, describing a request he had received earlier that day:

During my conversation with the President this morning he asked me to check with key leadership in Michigan’s Legislature as to how supportive they could be in regards to pushing back on election irregularities and potential fraud. He wanted me to gauge their willingness to talk with him about efforts to bring about transparency and integrity in Michigan’s election and report back to him.⁶¹⁶¹ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (National Archives Production), 076P-R000010292_0001 (November 12, 2020, email from Rep. Tim Walberg to Molly Michael).

¶Representative Walberg added that he had already acted on this request: “I’ve had conversations with [Michigan] Speaker Lee Chatfield, Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey, and Senate President Pro Tempore Aric Nesbitt. They all assured me they would look forward to speaking with the President to report on their continuing efforts” related to overseeing the election “and receiving any suggestions from President Trump.”⁶²⁶² Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (National Archives Production), 076P-R000010292_0001 (November 12, 2020, email from Rep. Tim Walberg to Molly Michael). The day after Representative Walberg’s call with the President, President Trump’s assistant forwarded to the Acting Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security a letter signed by two other Michigan legislators outlining claims of supposed election fraud. Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, (Department of Homeland Security production), CTRL0000033284, (Nov. 13, 2020 email from Molly Michael to Chad Wolf titled “Re: Michigan Letter”); Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, (no production listed, Ex. 44 from Chad Wolf interview), CTRL0000926977 (Nov. 13, 2020 letter to Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson from Michigan State Senators Lana Theis and Tom Barrett).Show full note The President would soon host Chatfield, Shirkey, Nesbitt, and four other Michigan State lawmakers at the White House.⁶³⁶³ “Administration of Donald J. Trump, 2020, Digest of Other White House Announcements,” Government Publishing Office, (Dec. 31, 2020), p. 115, available at https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/DCPD-2020DIGEST/pdf/DCPD-2020DIGEST.pdf; Annie Grayer, Jeremy Herb & Kevin Liptak, “Trump Courts Michigan GOP Leaders in Bid to Overturn Election He Lost,” CNN, (Nov. 19, 2020), available at https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/19/politics/gop-michigan-results-trump/.Show full note

¶In Arizona, on November 13, 2020, the day after officials finished counting ballots cast in Maricopa County, Chairwoman Kelli Ward, of the Arizona Republican Party, texted Mark Meadows that she had “[j]ust talked to POTUS” and that “[h]e may call the Chairman of the Maricopa Board of Supervisors,” Clint Hickman.⁶⁴⁶⁴ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Mark Meadows Production), MM012007 (text from Kelli Ward to Meadows). Ward also left a message for Hickman that said, “I just talked to President Trump, and he would like me to talk to you and also see if he needs to give you a call to discuss what’s happening on the ground in Maricopa. Give me a call back when you can.”⁶⁵⁶⁵ Brahm Resnik, “‘Stop the Counting’: Records Show Trump and Allies Pressured Top Maricopa County Officials Over Election Results,” 12News, (July 7, 2021), available at https://www.12news.com/article/news/politics/stop-the-counting-records-show-trump-and-allies-pressured-top-maricopa-county-officials-over-election-results/75-61a93e63-36c4-4137-b65e-d3f8bde846a7. According to Hickman, Ward was unusually active after the election, even for a party chair, and was the first person to pressure him. One of her first messages to Hickman before trying to connect him with President Trump was: “We need you to stop the counting.”⁶⁶⁶⁶ Select Committee to Investigation the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview with Clint Hickman, (Nov. 17, 2021); Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Maricopa County Board of Supervisors Production), CTRL0000020004.

¶In Georgia, the President initially took a more public approach. After the Associated Press called the race there on November 12th, President Trump tweeted harsh criticisms of Governor Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.⁶⁷⁶⁷ Brian Slodysko, “EXPLAINER: Why AP called Georgia for Biden,” Associated Press, (Nov. 13, 2020), available at https://apnews.com/article/why-ap-called-georgia-for-joe-biden-29c1fb0502efde50fdccb5e2c3611017. Often these tweets called for them to take specific actions that would have shifted the election results in his favor, such as rejecting a court settlement (which he referred to as a consent decree) that dictated the procedures for verifying signatures on absentee ballots. And he was relentless.

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¶In November alone, President Trump tweeted that Raffensperger was “a so-called Republican (RINO)” and asked “Where is @BrianKempGA,”⁶⁸⁶⁸ Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Nov. 13, 2020 7:50 p.m. ET, available at https://media-cdn.factba.se/realdonaldtrump-twitter/1327413534901350400.jpg (archived). before suggesting that “They knew they were going to cheat.”⁶⁹⁶⁹ Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Nov. 14, 2020 9:29 a.m. ET, available at https://media-cdn.factba.se/realdonaldtrump-twitter/1327619653020110850.jpg (archived). He called to “Break the unconstitutional Consent Decree!”⁷⁰⁷⁰ Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Nov. 16, 2020 9:04 a.m. ET, available at https://media-cdn.factba.se/realdonaldtrump-twitter/1328338211284616193.jpg (archived). and urged stricter signature matches with a demand to “Get it done! @BrianKempGA.”⁷¹⁷¹ Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Nov. 19, 2020 1:46 p.m. ET, available at https://media-cdn.factba.se/realdonaldtrump-twitter/1329420741553643522.jpg (archived). He called Kemp “hapless” and asked why he wouldn’t use emergency powers to overrule Raffensperger on the signature-verification procedures, declaring that “Georgia Republicans are angry.”⁷²⁷² Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Nov. 30, 2020 1:59 p.m. ET, available at https://media-cdn.factba.se/realdonaldtrump-twitter/1333410419554344964.jpg (archived). President Trump also retweeted posts asking, “Who needs Democrats when you have Republicans like Brian Kemp,” and “why bother voting for Republicans if what you get is Ducey and Kemp?”⁷³⁷³ President Donald J. Trump, “Tweets of November 30, 2020,” The American Presidency Project, available at https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/tweets-november-30-2020; see also Fox 10 Staff, “Tweet mocking Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey and Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp Now on Billboard,” Fox 10 News, (Dec. 9, 2020), available at https://www.fox10phoenix.com/news/tweet-mocking-arizona-gov-doug-ducey-and-georgia-gov-brian-kemp-now-on-billboard.Show full note

¶Pennsylvania was an early, but not unique, example of how President Trump’s State-pressure campaign affected the lives of the public servants running this country’s elections.

¶On November 7th, Rudy Giuliani headlined a Philadelphia press conference in front of a landscaping business called Four Seasons Total Landscaping, near a crematorium and down the street from a sex shop.⁷⁴⁷⁴ Miles Bryan, “From Obscure To Sold Out: The Story Of Four Seasons Total Landscaping In Just 4 Days,” NPR, (Nov. 11, 2020), available at https://www.npr.org/2020/11/11/933635970/from-obscure-to-sold-out-the-story-of-four-seasons-total-landscaping-in-just-4-d.

¶Standing in front of former New York Police Commissioner and recently-pardoned convicted felon, Bernard Kerik, Giuliani gave opening remarks and handed the podium over to his first supposed eyewitness to election fraud, who turned out to be a convicted sex offender.⁷⁵⁷⁵ Matt Friedman, “Man Featured at Giuliani Press Conference is a Convicted Sex Offender,” Politico, (Nov. 9, 2020), available at https://www.politico.com/states/new-jersey/story/2020/11/09/man-featured-at-giuliani-press-conference-is-a-sex-offender-1335241. Giuliani claimed “at least 600,000 ballots are in question” in Pennsylvania and falsely suggested that large numbers of ballots in the State had been cast for dead people, including boxer Joe Frazier and actor Will Smith’s father.⁷⁶⁷⁶ McKenzie Sadeghi, “Fact Check: No Evidence Vote Was Cast in Joe Frazier’s Name,” USA Today, (Nov. 14, 2020), available at https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/11/14/fact-check-no-evidence-late-joe-frazier-voted-2020-election/6283956002/; Ledyard King and John Fritze, “Trump Attorney Rudy Giuliani Says Trump Won’t Concede, Revives Baseless Claims of Voter Fraud,” USA Today, (Nov. 7, 2020) available at https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/11/07/joe-biden-victory-president-trump-claims-election-far-over/6202892002/.Show full note

¶Within days, Republican Philadelphia City Commissioner Al Schmidt and others publicly debunked Giuliani’s specific allegations of election fraud, including the claims about dead people voting in Pennsylvania elections.⁷⁷⁷⁷ Veronica Stracqualursi, “Republican Election Official in Philadelphia Says He’s Seen No Evidence of Widespread Fraud,” CNN, (Nov. 11, 2020), available at https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/11/politics/philadelphia-city-commissioner-2020-election-cnntv/index.html. In reaction, President Trump tweeted on the morning of November 11th that “[a] guy named Al Schmidt, a Philadelphia Commissioner and so-called Republican (RINO), is being used big time by the Fake News Media to explain how honest things were with respect to the Election in Philadelphia. He refuses to look at a mountain of corruption & dishonesty. We win!”⁷⁸⁷⁸ Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Nov. 11, 2020 9:03 a.m. ET, available at https://media-cdn.factba.se/realdonaldtrump-twitter/1326525851752656898.jpg (archived).

¶That statement targeting Schmidt led to a deluge of threatening and harassing phone calls and emails by people who heard President Trump and falsely held out hope that Schmidt or someone else could overturn the results of Pennsylvania’s election.⁷⁹⁷⁹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 13, 2022), at 1:47:00 to 1:48:00, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pr5QUInmGI8.

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¶As a public official, Schmidt was no stranger to threats. But being targeted by the President of the United States was different. In Schmidt’s public testimony to the Select Committee, he described why. “[P]rior to that the threats were pretty general in nature. ‘Corrupt election officials in Philadelphia are going to get what’s coming to them’” and other similar threats.⁸⁰⁸⁰ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 13, 2022), at 1:47:00 to 1:48:00, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pr5QUInmGI8. “After the President tweeted at me by name, calling me out the way that he did,” Schmidt explained, “the threats became much more specific, much more graphic, and included not just me by name but included members of my family by name, their ages, our address, pictures of our home. Just every bit of detail that you could imagine.”⁸¹⁸¹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 13, 2022), at 1:47:00 to 1:48:00, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pr5QUInmGI8.

¶As the President continued to push the Big Lie and vilify public officials, such threats multiplied.

Efforts to Prevent State and Local Officials From Certifying the Election

¶Some of President Trump’s early outreach was part of an effort to prevent State and local officials from certifying his loss. One example comes from Michigan, and the other from Arizona.

¶Wayne County, Michigan, includes Detroit and its surrounding areas. On November 17th, the county’s Board of Canvassers met to certify election results, a process the Michigan Supreme Court described over a century ago as ministerial and clerical.⁸²⁸² See McQuade v. Furgason, 91 Mich. 438 (1892). The various Boards of Canvassers in Michigan know that the certification process is clerical because they are so instructed in the official “Michigan Boards of County Canvassers Manual.” See “Procedures and Duties of the Boards of County Canvassers,” State of Michigan, (July 2022), pp. 18-19, available at https://www.michigan.gov/-/media/Project/Websites/sos/02lehman/BCC_Manual.pdf?rev=7270a5ddcefa465b8ab8b95930ef5890.Show full note

¶The meeting started at 6:00 p.m. and lasted over three hours.⁸³⁸³ “Minutes of Meeting Wayne County Board of Canvassers,” Wayne County Board of Canvassers, (Nov. 17, 2020), p. 1, available at https://www.waynecounty.com/elected/clerk/board-of-canvassers.aspx. Its two Republican members, Board Chair Monica Palmer and Board Member William Hartmann, first voted to block the certification of the election.⁸⁴⁸⁴ “Minutes of Meeting Wayne County Board of Canvassers,” Wayne County Board of Canvassers, (Nov. 17, 2020), pp. 1-5, available at https://www.waynecounty.com/elected/clerk/board-of-canvassers.aspx. After a brief break, Palmer and Hartmann returned, changed their votes, and certified the election results.⁸⁵⁸⁵ “Minutes of Meeting Wayne County Board of Canvassers,” Wayne County Board of Canvassers, (Nov. 17, 2020), p. 5, available at https://www.waynecounty.com/elected/clerk/board-of-canvassers.aspx. Just over twenty minutes later, Palmer and Hartmann received a call from President Trump and RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel.⁸⁶⁸⁶ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Monica Palmer, (Sept. 28, 2021); Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Ronna Romney McDaniel, (Mar. 9, 2022); Phone records for Monica Palmer show calls from Ronna McDaniel at 9:53 PM and 10:04 PM. See Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Verizon Production, Feb. 9, 2022).Show full note

¶Palmer claimed that the call “was not pressure.” Rather, she said, “[i]t was genuine concern for my safety” and “there were general comments about different States, but we really didn’t discuss the details of the certification.”⁸⁷⁸⁷ Annie Grayer, Jeremy Herb, and Kevin Liptak, “Trump Courts Michigan GOP Leaders in Bid to Overturn Election He Lost,” CNN, (Nov. 19, 2020), https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/19/politics/gop-michigan-results-trump/.

¶The Select Committee doesn’t know exactly what President Trump privately said on that phone call.⁸⁸⁸⁸ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Monica Palmer, (Sept. 28, 2021). Palmer told the Select Committee that she could not recall the exact words that President Trump used on the call, and she claimed that she could not even recall whether the President raised issues related to the election. By the next evening, however, Palmer and Hartmann had each issued signed affidavits reassuming their earlier position that Wayne County’s results should not be certified.⁸⁹⁸⁹ Kendall Karson, Katherine Faulders, and Will Steakin, “Republican Canvassers Ask to ‘Rescind’ Their Votes Certifying Michigan Election Results,” ABC News, (Nov. 19, 2020), available at https://abcnews.go.com/US/wayne-county-republican-canvassers-rescind-votes-certifying-election/story?id=74290114; Krystle Holleman and Spencer Soicher, “Pair of Wayne Co. Board of Canvassers Members File Affidavits to Rescind Certification of Election Results,” WILX10, (Nov. 19, 2020), available at https://www.wilx.com/2020/11/19/pair-of-wayne-county-board-of-canvassers-members-file-affidavits-to-rescind-certification-of-election-results/; Paul Egan, “GOP Members of Wayne County Board of Canvassers Say They Want to Rescind Votes to Certify,” Detroit Free Press, (Nov. 19, 2020), available at https://www.freep.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/11/19/wayne-county-board-of-canvassers-monica-palmer-william-hartmann/3775242001/.Show full note Palmer’s affidavit even declared that “I rescind my prior vote,” though rescinding wasn’t possible and her statement had no legal effect.⁹⁰⁹⁰ Kendall Karson, Katherine Faulders, and Will Steakin, “Republican Canvassers Ask to ‘Rescind’ Their Votes Certifying Michigan Election Results,” ABC News, (Nov. 19, 2020), available at https://abcnews.go.com/US/wayne-county-republican-canvassers-rescind-votes-certifying-election/story?id=74290114; Krystle Holleman and Spencer Soicher, “Pair of Wayne Co. Board of Canvassers Members File Affidavits to Rescind Certification of Election Results,” WILX10, (Nov. 19, 2020), available at https://www.wilx.com/2020/11/19/pair-of-wayne-county-board-of-canvassers-members-file-affidavits-to-rescind-certification-of-election-results/; Paul Egan, “GOP Members of Wayne County Board of Canvassers Say They Want to Rescind Votes to Certify,” Detroit Free Press, (Nov. 19, 2020), available at https://www.freep.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/11/19/wayne-county-board-of-canvassers-monica-palmer-william-hartmann/3775242001/.Show full note And, President Trump apparently knew before it was public that Hartmann and Palmer would try to change their votes; almost eight hours before either of these affidavits were publicly released, President Trump tweeted that these “two harassed patriot Canvassers refuse to sign the papers!”⁹¹⁹¹ Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Nov. 18, 2020 10:38 a.m. ET, available at https://media-cdn.factba.se/realdonaldtrump-twitter/1329086548093014022.jpg (archived).

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¶Republicans in Arizona experienced similar treatment. In the most populous and electorally significant county in Arizona, Maricopa County’s Board of Supervisors met on November 20th to certify the county’s election results. Their Board, made up of four Republicans and one Democrat, carefully reviewed the official canvass, asked questions for approximately two hours, then unanimously voted to certify the results.⁹²⁹² Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jack Sellers and Bill Gates, (Oct. 6, 2021).

¶Earlier that day, Kelli Ward contacted two of the board’s members, Jack Sellers and Bill Gates, and asked them to delay the certification on the basis of supposed improprieties.⁹³⁹³ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jack Sellers and Bill Gates, (Oct. 6, 2021). According to Sellers and Gates, however, Arizona law required certification that day and they had no information (neither then, nor ever) to doubt the county’s election results.⁹⁴⁹⁴ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jack Sellers and Bill Gates, (Oct. 6, 2021).

¶When Arizona certified its 2020 statewide election results on November 30th, it fell to Governor Doug Ducey, a Republican, to sign the certification. While on camera during the signing ceremony, Governor Ducey’s phone played a ringtone for the song “Hail to the Chief,” which he immediately silenced.⁹⁵⁹⁵ Jonathan J. Cooper, “Arizona Governor Silences Trump’s Call, Certifies Election,” Associated Press, (Dec. 2, 2020), available at https://apnews.com/article/election-2020-donald-trump-arizona-elections-doug-ducey-e2b8b0de5b809efcc9b1ad5d279023f4.

¶The Governor later confirmed it had been President Trump calling and that he returned the President’s call shortly afterwards, but declined to say what the two discussed other than saying that President Trump did not ask him to withhold certification.⁹⁶⁹⁶ Jonathan J. Cooper, “Arizona Governor Silences Trump’s Call, Certifies Election,” Associated Press, (Dec. 2, 2020), available at https://apnews.com/article/election-2020-donald-trump-arizona-elections-doug-ducey-e2b8b0de5b809efcc9b1ad5d279023f4. The Select Committee does not know whether that is true, but that evening President Trump blasted Ducey on Twitter, accusing him of “rushing to put a Democrat in office,” and warning that “Republicans will long remember!”⁹⁷⁹⁷ Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Nov. 30, 2020 3:39 p.m. ET, available at http://web.archive.org/web/20201201024920mp_/https:/twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1333556242984431616 (archived). The President also retweeted posts bashing Ducey and his Georgia counterpart Brian Kemp, which asked “Who needs Democrats when you have Republicans like Brian Kemp and Doug Ducey?”, “why bother voting for Republicans if what you get is Ducey and Kemp?”, and “Brian Kemp: ‘My state ran the most corrupt election in American history.’ Doug Ducey: ‘Hold my beer.’”⁹⁸⁹⁸ President Donald J. Trump, “Tweets of November 30, 2020,” The American Presidency Project, available at https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/tweets-november-30-2020; “Tweet Mocking Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey and Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp Now on Billboard,” Fox 10 News, (Dec. 9, 2020), available at https://www.fox10phoenix.com/news/tweet-mocking-arizona-gov-doug-ducey-and-georgia-gov-brian-kemp-now-on-billboard.Show full note President Trump even commented “TRUE!” when retweeting a post that “Gov Ducey has betrayed the people of Arizona.”⁹⁹⁹⁹ Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Nov. 30, 2020 3:40 p.m. ET, available at http://web.archive.org/web/20201201022358/https:/twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1333556458575818754 (archived).

¶Governor Ducey pushed back, writing on Twitter that, “I’ve been pretty outspoken about Arizona’s election system, and bragged about it quite a bit, including in the Oval Office . . . In Arizona, we have some of the strongest election laws in the country . . . The problems that exist in other states simply don’t apply here.”¹⁰⁰¹⁰⁰ Doug Ducey (@DougDucey), Twitter, Nov. 30, 2020 9:48 p.m. ET, available at https://twitter.com/dougducey/status/1333603735855976450. Governor Ducey explained the law for certifying elections in Arizona and pointed out that the certification now triggered a “5-day window for any elector to bring a credible challenge to the election results in court. If you want to contest the results, now is the time. Bring your challenges.”¹⁰¹¹⁰¹ Doug Ducey (@DougDucey), Twitter, Nov. 30, 2020 9:48 p.m. ET, available at https://twitter.com/dougducey/status/1333603735855976450. And, Governor Ducey referenced his oath of office: “That’s the law. I’ve sworn an oath to uphold it, and I take my responsibility seriously.”¹⁰²¹⁰² Doug Ducey (@DougDucey), Twitter, Nov. 30, 2020 9:48 p.m. ET, available at https://twitter.com/dougducey/status/1333603735855976450. President Trump and his allies never brought a credible challenge and, instead, lost every case they brought challenging the results in Arizona.

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Efforts to Replace Electoral College Electors and Overturn The Election

¶Once counties and States certified the election, or when it was nearly certain that they would, President Trump and his team’s focus largely shifted. President Trump and his team encouraged State legislators to meet in special sessions, if necessary, and choose electoral college electors who would vote for the Trump/Pence ticket. Ultimately, no State legislature took that step, but it was the basis for pressuring State officials from November through January 6, 2021.

Meetings With State Legislators—The “Hearings”

¶The concept of State legislators appointing their own electors featured prominently in a series of hastily arranged official and unofficial “hearings” with State legislators that the Trump team announced on November 24, 2020.¹⁰³¹⁰³ “Pennsylvania, Arizona, Michigan Legislatures to Hold Public Hearings on 2020 Election,” Donald J. Trump for President, (Nov. 24, 2020), available at http://web.archive.org/web/20201130045430/https:/www.donaldjtrump.com/media/pennsylvania-arizona-michigan-legislatures-to-hold-public-hearings-on-2020-election/.

¶On November 25th, President Trump called in to an unofficial meeting with legislators in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.¹⁰⁴¹⁰⁴ “Donald Trump Remarks Transcript: Pennsylvania Republican Hearing on 2020 Election,” Rev, (Nov. 25, 2020), available at https://www.rev.com/blog/transcripts/donald-trump-remarks-transcript-pennsylvania-republican-hearing-on-2020-election. The meeting was set up to appear like an official hearing, but it was not. It took place in a hotel ballroom, and those presenting arguments or purported evidence, like Giuliani, Jenna Ellis, and others, were not placed under oath.¹⁰⁵¹⁰⁵ Teresa Boeckel and J.D. Prose, “Pa. GOP Lawmakers Host Giuliani to Hear Election Concerns. Trump Visits Via Cell Phone,” York Daily Record, (Nov. 25, 2020), available at https://www.ydr.com/story/news/politics/2020/11/25/pa-gop-lawmakers-host-rudy-giuliani-hear-election-concerns/6420319002/. According to President Pro Tempore of the Pennsylvania Senate Jake Corman, he had initially been asked by State Senator Doug Mastriano to hold a hearing about the election. Corman responded that any formal hearing should be official, with sworn testimony, and open to both parties.¹⁰⁶¹⁰⁶ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022). That was not what Senator Mastriano ultimately convened.

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¶President Trump had originally made plans to attend the Pennsylvania gathering in person, but he cancelled after several advisors tested positive for COVID–19.¹⁰⁷¹⁰⁷ See Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (National Archives Production), 076P-R000008474_0001 (November 25, 2020, email from Jared Small confirming that Trump will not be present in Gettysburg); Philip Rucker, Ashley Parker, Josh Dawsey, and Amy Gardner, “20 Days of Fantasy and Failure: Inside Trump’s Quest to Overturn the Election,” Washington Post, (Nov. 28, 2020), available at https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-election-overturn/2020/11/28/34f45226-2f47-11eb-96c2-aac3f162215d_story.html; Alayna Treene and Rebecca Falconer, “Trump Cancels Pennsylvania Trip for GOP Hearing on Voter Fraud Claims,” Axios, (Nov. 25, 2020) available at https://www.axios.com/2020/11/25/trump-pennsylvania-gop-hearing-voter-fraud-claims. Apparently, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows also contemplated going to Pennsylvania for the hearing when the President couldn’t attend. Text messages between Cassidy Hutchinson and Meadows’s Secret Service detail say, “U heard how mark is motorcading to gburg right[,] and potus isn’t anymore.” Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Cassidy Hutchinson production), CH-CTRL0000000080 (Nov. 25, 2020).Show full note When President Trump called in and spoke to those gathered in the hotel ballroom, his false claims were met with cheers, and he made his purpose clear: “this election has to be turned around . . . Why wouldn’t they overturn an election? Certainly overturn it in your State . . . We have to turn the election over.”¹⁰⁸¹⁰⁸ “Donald Trump Remarks Transcript: Pennsylvania Republican Hearing on 2020 Election,” Rev, (Nov. 25, 2020), available at https://www.rev.com/blog/transcripts/donald-trump-remarks-transcript-pennsylvania-republican-hearing-on-2020-election.

¶President Trump made the ask and Giuliani told the legislators how to carry it out. Giuliani told the assembled legislators that it was their “power” and “responsibility” to pick Pennsylvania’s presidential electors and that “[they] have to convince the rest of [their] members, Republican and Democrat, they owe that to the people of” Pennsylvania.¹⁰⁹¹⁰⁹ “Pennsylvania Senate Republican Lawmaker Hearing Transcript on 2020 Election,” Rev, (Nov. 26, 2020), available at https://www.rev.com/blog/transcripts/pennsylvania-senate-republican-lawmaker-hearing-transcript-on-2020-election. Jenna Ellis told them that although Pennsylvania law dictates that electors are chosen by popular vote, “[y]ou can take that power back at any time. You don’t need a court to tell you that.”¹¹⁰¹¹⁰ “Pennsylvania Senate Republican Lawmaker Hearing Transcript on 2020 Election,” Rev, (Nov. 26, 2020), available at https://www.rev.com/blog/transcripts/pennsylvania-senate-republican-lawmaker-hearing-transcript-on-2020-election.

¶President Trump invited some of the lawmakers to come meet him at the White House that evening and, according to Giuliani, it was “a large group” that went.¹¹¹¹¹¹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Deposition of Rudolph Giuliani, (May 20, 2022), pp. 65–66; Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Deposition of Molly Michael, (Mar. 24, 2022), pp. 59–60, 62; “Administration of Donald J. Trump, 2020, Digest of Other White House Announcements,” Government Publishing Office, (Dec. 31, 2020), p. 116, https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/DCPD-2020DIGEST/pdf/DCPD-2020DIGEST.pdf.Show full note Special Assistant to the President Cassidy Hutchinson’s text messages with Kerik included the guest list and descriptions of the vehicles that would need access to the White House grounds.¹¹²¹¹² Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Cassidy Hutchinson production), CH-CTRL0000000062 (Nov. 25, 2020, Cassidy Hutchinson’s text messages with Bernie Kerik). Pennsylvania State Senator Doug Mastriano drove one car, a hired driver drove a van with most of the State legislators, and Kerik drove an SUV with attorney Katherine Friess and election-conspiracy proponent Phil Waldron.¹¹³¹¹³ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Cassidy Hutchinson production), CH-CTRL0000000062 (Nov. 25, 2020, Cassidy Hutchinson’s text messages with Bernie Kerik). Hutchinson estimated that at least 29 visitors traveled from Pennsylvania to the White House that day, and she explained that their conversation with the President touched on holding a special session of the State legislature to appoint Trump electors.¹¹⁴¹¹⁴ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Continued Interview of Cassidy Hutchinson (Mar. 7, 2022), pp. 87, 91-92.

¶Just a few days later, on November 30, 2020, President Trump also called into another one of Giuliani and Jenna Ellis’s hotel “hearings,” this time in Arizona. Several Arizona State lawmakers hosted the meeting at a Hyatt Regency in Phoenix after they did not receive permission to organize an official hearing at the State Capitol.¹¹⁵¹¹⁵ Howard Fischer, “GOP Officials Still Fighting Arizona’s Vote Tally on Very Day Biden’s Win Will Be Certified,” Tuscon.com, (Nov. 30, 2020), available at https://tucson.com/news/local/gop-officials-still-fighting-arizonas-vote-tally-on-very-day-bidens-win-will-be-certified/article_021fbb5c-673f-549a-9cbb-900178c17079.html. Before the hearing started, State GOP Representative Mark Finchem “promised information to show that the state’s 11 electoral votes should not go to Democrat Joe Biden,” and argued that “the U.S. Constitution empowers lawmakers to decide, on their own, whether the election was valid and, if not, to select the electors of their choice.”¹¹⁶¹¹⁶ Howard Fischer, “GOP Officials Still Fighting Arizona’s Vote Tally on Very Day Biden’s Win Will Be Certified,” Tuscon.com, (Nov. 30, 2020), available at https://tucson.com/news/local/gop-officials-still-fighting-arizonas-vote-tally-on-very-day-bidens-win-will-be-certified/article_021fbb5c-673f-549a-9cbb-900178c17079.html.

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¶Giuliani told the assembled legislators that the officials certifying Arizona’s election results “have made no effort to find out” if the results of the election were accurate, “which seems to me gives the state legislature a perfect reason to take over the conduct of this election because it’s being conducted irresponsibly and unfairly.”¹¹⁷¹¹⁷ Right Side Broadcasting Network, “LIVE: Arizona State Legislature Holds Public Hearing on 2020 Election,” YouTube, at 2:08:56, Nov. 30, 2020, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rri6flxaXww&t=7738s. Likewise, Jenna Ellis said that it was “not just the choice, but the actual duty and obligation of the legislature to step in and to make sure that you don’t certify false results.”¹¹⁸¹¹⁸ Right Side Broadcasting Network, “LIVE: Arizona State Legislature Holds Public Hearing on 2020 Election,” YouTube, at 1:21:02, Nov. 30, 2020, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rri6flxaXww&t=4862s. During a recess, she also took to Twitter, writing, “[t]he certification of Arizona’s FALSE results is unethical and knowingly participating in the corruption that has disenfranchised AZ voters. BUT, this in no way impacts the state legislature’s ability to take back the proper selection of delegates.”¹¹⁹¹¹⁹ Jenna Ellis (@JennaEllisEsq), Twitter, Nov. 30, 2020 3:04 p.m. ET, available at https://twitter.com/jennaellisesq/status/1333502306176835588.

¶When it was President Trump’s turn to address this handful of lawmakers over the phone, he called them “legends for taking this on,” and used the opportunity to criticize Governor Ducey: “you’ll have to figure out what’s that all about with Ducey. He couldn’t [certify] fast enough” and “Arizona will not forget what Ducey just did. We’re not gonna forget.”¹²⁰¹²⁰ “Remarks: Donald Trump Calls in to Meeting of Arizona GOP Lawmakers on Election,” Factbase, (Nov. 30, 2020), available at https://factba.se/transcript/donald-trump-remarks-arizona-gop-meeting-election-november-30-2020. That night Giuliani joined President Trump in criticizing Governor Ducey, while at the same time making baseless allegations about voting machines in Arizona and calling for a special legislative session to change the outcome of the election: “Governor Ducey of Arizona refuses to meet with me. He doesn’t want to explain that he selected a foreign corrupt Voting Machine company to count the vote. I understand his reluctance, but [sic] just call a special session. Let’s find out how crooked your election really was?”¹²¹¹²¹ Rudy Giuliani (@RudyGiuliani), Twitter, Nov. 30, 2020 11;17 p.m. ET, available at https://twitter.com/RudyGiuliani/status/1333626364805533696.

¶Michigan was next. Giuliani’s team announced that the Michigan legislature would hold a hearing on December 1st, but the relevant committee chair excluded Giuliani because it was only open to witnesses “with first hand knowledge.”¹²²¹²² “Pennsylvania, Arizona, Michigan Legislatures to Hold Public Hearings on 2020 Election,” Donald J. Trump, (Nov. 24, 2020), available at http://web.archive.org/web/20201130045430/https:/www.donaldjtrump.com/media/pennsylvania-arizona-michigan-legislatures-to-hold-public-hearings-on-2020-election/; Jonathan Oosting (@jonathanoosting), Twitter, Nov. 24, 2020 5:35 p.m. ET, available at https://twitter.com/jonathanoosting/status/1331365885123178499; Jonathan Oosting (@jonathanoosting), Twitter, Nov. 30, 2020 3:42 p.m. ET, available at https://twitter.com/jonathanoosting/status/1333511772448370689.Show full note That chairman, Michigan State Senator Edward McBroom (R-Vulcan), had already held Senate Oversight hearings by then in an actual effort to evaluate claims of fraud in the 2020 election, which ultimately resulted in a comprehensive report that concluded that the Republican-led committee “found no evidence of widespread or systematic fraud” in Michigan’s election.¹²³¹²³ See “Report on the November 2020 Election in Michigan,” Michigan Senate Oversight Committee, (June 21, 2020), available at https://misenategopcdn.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/99/doccuments/20210623/SMPO_2020ElectionReport_2.pdf.

¶Michigan’s House Oversight Committee, however, did allow Giuliani to testify in a hearing on December 2nd. Before the hearing, Giuliani joined the State’s GOP chairwoman to give what was billed as a legal briefing. In the online presentation, Giuliani told the audience there’s “nothing wrong with putting pressure on your state legislators”¹²⁴¹²⁴ Wood TV8, “Giuliani and Laura Cox Hold ‘Legal Briefing’ Before Giving Testimony Wednesday Evening,” Facebook Watch, at 10:30-10:45, Dec. 2, 2020, available at https://www.facebook.com/woodtv/videos/rudy-giuliani-and-laura-cox-hold-legal-briefing-before-giving-testimony-wednesda/1996033023872394/. to pick new electors and that “you have got to get them to remember that their oath to the Constitution sometimes requires being criticized. Sometimes it even requires being threatened.”¹²⁵¹²⁵ Wood TV8, “Giuliani and Laura Cox Hold ‘Legal Briefing’ Before Giving Testimony Wednesday Evening,” Facebook Watch, at 13:05-13:20, Dec. 2, 2020, available at https://www.facebook.com/woodtv/videos/rudy-giuliani-and-laura-cox-hold-legal-briefing-before-giving-testimony-wednesda/1996033023872394/.

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¶When Giuliani appeared for the hearing in Michigan, he was not placed under oath, used his time to refer to Michigan’s election as a “con job,” and urged legislators to “have the courage to say that certification that was done by your state is a complete phony.”¹²⁶¹²⁶ Michigan House Oversight Committee, Public Hearing, (Dec. 12, 2020), at 4:03:13-4:04:22, 4:05:59-4:07:09, available at https://www.rev.com/tc-editor/shared/QQodU0TgHNW4ACZmBtqq6EbotJVTGos3UifEuLQA8ygjV7GrDDAeGJ6hdps86h_ywJAatI_KepUqEeZnloKHBiByyMI. The information presented was baseless—and sometimes racist—conspiracy theories. One witness brought to criticize Michigan’s voter verification even said: “I think Chinese all look alike. So how would you tell? If some Chow shows up, you can be anybody and you can vote.”¹²⁷¹²⁷ Edward-Isaac Dovere (@IsaacDovere), Twitter, Dec. 3, 2020 7:56 a.m. ET, available at https://twitter.com/IsaacDovere/status/1334481562193317888. And, as he had promised in the legal briefing the day before, Giuliani then called on the legislators to do what the Trump Campaign had reportedly been discussing since before election day. He said that the State legislature could still singlehandedly decide the election result “anytime you want to. Anytime. You can take it back tonight. You can take it back the day before the electors go down to Washington.”¹²⁸¹²⁸ Michigan House Oversight Committee, Public Hearing, (Dec. 12, 2020), at 4:09:04, available at https://www.rev.com/tc-editor/shared/QQodU0TgHNW4ACZmBtqq6EbotJVTGos3UifEuLQA8ygjV7GrDDAeGJ6hdps86h_ywJAatI_KepUqEeZnloKHBiByyMI. Jenna Ellis also participated, insisting “no honest person can hear these citizens of your own state today . . . and can let this proceed. What the Constitution obligates you to do is to take back your plenary power.”¹²⁹¹²⁹ Michigan House Oversight Committee, Public Hearing, (Dec. 12, 2020), at 4:35:15, available at https://www.rev.com/tc-editor/shared/QQodU0TgHNW4ACZmBtqq6EbotJVTGos3UifEuLQA8ygjV7GrDDAeGJ6hdps86h_ywJAatI_KepUqEeZnloKHBiByyMI.

¶Finally, Georgia. There, Giuliani and others appeared in multiple hearings, the first of which was held on December 3, 2020. In that hearing, Giuliani was direct and called on Georgia legislators to overturn the election results—“you are the final arbiter of who the electors should be”—based on the false premise that “there is more than ample evidence to conclude that this election was a sham.”¹³⁰¹³⁰ 11Alive, “Second Georgia Senate Election Hearing,” YouTube, at 1:56:30 to 1:57:15, 5:29:205:32:45, Dec. 3, 2020, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRCXUNOwOjw. Then, at a separate hearing on December 10th, he told State legislators that Georgia’s Governor, Lieutenant Governor, and secretary of State were engaged in a “cover up” of “a crime in plain sight,” and that it fell to “the state legislature [ ] to vindicate the honor of the state.”¹³¹¹³¹ GA House Mobile Streaming, “Governmental Affairs 12.10.20,” Vimeo – Livestream, at 1:51:55-1:52:55, available at https://livestream.com/accounts/25225474/events/9117221/videos/214677184. And, Giuliani used yet another appearance, on December 30th, to call the 2020 election “the most crooked election, the most manipulated election in American history,” and implore the Republican legislators to hold a special session to vote on appointing new electors, something he said that they could do “right up until the last moment” before January 6th.¹³²¹³² Global TV Online, “#LIVE: Georgia State Senate Holds Meeting on 2020 Election…,” YouTube, at 3:08:00 to 3:09:30, 3:20:15 to 3:21:2, Dec. 30, 2020, available at https://youtu.be/D5c034r0RlU?t=12016.

¶More perniciously, Giuliani also used these hearings to advance conspiracy theories that falsely accused Fulton County election workers of rigging Georgia’s election results. His delegation to the December 3rd hearing played clips of election-night surveillance footage from the State Farm Arena that showed election workers scanning ballots, sometimes after partisan poll watchers had gone home.¹³³¹³³ 11Alive, “Second Georgia Senate Election Hearing,” YouTube, at 0:33:30-0:58:00, December 3, 2020, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRCXUNOwOjw. Although the poll watchers should have been there the entire time while election workers counted the votes, there was nothing nefarious about the circumstances and no question about the end result. In fact, the FBI, Department of Justice, and Georgia Bureau of Investigation would determine that these ballots were legitimate ballots, that observers were not illegally ejected, and that the ballots were scanned and counted properly, contrary to claims by President Trump and his attorneys.¹³⁴¹³⁴ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Byung J. Pak, (May 19, 2022), pp. 10-23; United States Senate Judiciary Committee, Interview of Jeffrey Rosen, (August 7, 2021), pp. 30-31, available at https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/rosen-transcript-final; Declaration of Frances Watson at 1-3, Pearson v. Kemp, No. 1:20-cv-04809 (N.D. Ga., Dec. 6, 2020), ECF No. 72-1, available at https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/20420664-frances-watson-affidavit; Response of the Georgia Secretary of State to the Court’s Order of September 20, 2021 at 5-7, 41-47, 53, 55, Favorito v. Wan, No. 2020CV343938 (Fulton County Sup. Ct., Ga., October 12, 2021), available at https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/21084096/favorito-sos-brief-in-response-to-order-of-92021-with-exs-a-and-b.pdf; William P. Barr, One Damn Thing After Another: Memoirs of an Attorney General (Harper Collins, 2022), at pp. 541-42; “Georgia Election Officials Briefing Transcript December 7: Will Recertify Election Results Today,” Rev, (December 7, 2020), available at https://www.rev.com/blog/transcripts/georgia-election-officials-briefing-transcript-december-7-will-recertify-election-results-today.Show full note And yet Giuliani baselessly declared at the December 3rd hearing that, to him, the video was a “powerful smoking gun” proving that “those votes are not legitimate votes.”¹³⁵¹³⁵ 11Alive, “Second Georgia Senate Election Hearing,” YouTube, at 5:31:50-5:32:10, Dec. 3, 2020, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRCXUNOwOjw.

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¶But Giuliani’s claims took a more ominous turn during the December 10th hearing. There, he publicly named two of the election workers shown in the video, Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea ArShaye “Shaye” Moss, and accused them of vote-tampering and engaging in criminal conduct.¹³⁶¹³⁶ GA House Mobile Streaming, “Governmental Affairs 12.10.20,” Vimeo – Livestream, at 2:09:00-2:13:00, available at https://livestream.com/accounts/25225474/events/9117221/videos/214677184. He seized on a clip of Freeman passing Moss a ginger mint, claiming that the two women, both Black, were smuggling USB drives “as if they’re vials of heroin or cocaine.” He also suggested that Freeman and Moss should be jailed and that they deserved to have their homes searched.¹³⁷¹³⁷ GA House Mobile Streaming, “Governmental Affairs 12.10.20,” Vimeo – Livestream, at 2:09:00-2:13:00, available at https://livestream.com/accounts/25225474/events/9117221/videos/214677184. Not only were Giuliani’s claims about Freeman and Moss reckless, racist, and false, they had real-world consequences that turned both women’s lives upside down. And further heightening the personal impact of these baseless attacks, President Trump supported, and even repeated, them, as described later.

¶In the end, the hearings were widely panned. In Michigan alone, current and former Republican lawmakers publicly questioned the hearings and implored President Trump and his team to stop. U.S. Representative Paul Mitchell (R-Mich.) implored on Twitter “Please JUST STOP!” and “wondered why Republican leaders allowed testimony he said was ‘driving the party into this ditch.’”¹³⁸¹³⁸ Mike Wilkinson, “The Rudy Giuliani ‘Circus’ Has Left Lansing. The Reviews Are Bad,” Bridge Michigan, (Dec. 3, 2020), available at https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-government/rudy-giuliani-circus-has-left-lansing-reviews-are-bad. Similarly, former Michigan lawmaker Martin Howrylak (R-Oakland) said that he was “embarrassed” by the hearing, and former Michigan Senator Ken Sikkema (R-Grand Rapids) said that “the way the committee was run was atrocious.”¹³⁹¹³⁹ Mike Wilkinson, “The Rudy Giuliani ‘Circus’ Has Left Lansing. The Reviews Are Bad,” Bridge Michigan, (Dec. 3, 2020), available at https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-government/rudy-giuliani-circus-has-left-lansing-reviews-are-bad. Later, the President promoted a tweet calling a Democratic lawmaker a “#pos” for speaking out at the Michigan hearing.¹⁴⁰¹⁴⁰ Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Dec. 6, 2020 6:01 a.m. ET, https://media-cdn.factba.se/realdonaldtrump-twitter/1335464302766149632.jpg (archived). Months later, Giuliani’s license to practice law in New York was suspended for, among other reasons, the “false claims” he made on various dates, including during the hearings in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Arizona, and Georgia.¹⁴¹¹⁴¹ In the Matter of Rudolph W. Giuliani, No. 2021-00506, slip op at *2, 32 (N.Y. App. Div. May 3, 2021), available at https://int.nyt.com/data/documenttools/giuliani-law-license-suspension/1ae5ad6007c0ebfa/full.pdf.

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The Trump Campaign’s Barrage of Phone Calls to State Legislators

¶Not only was replacing electors a theme during the official and unofficial State hearings, it was also a critical component of President Trump’s plan both before and after the hearings took place.

¶In fact, while the hearings were happening, the Trump Campaign set up an operation to contact hundreds of State legislators and ask them to support an effort to appoint electoral college electors for the Trump/Pence ticket in States that President Trump had lost.

¶On the same day as Giuliani’s hearing in Michigan, Trump Campaign staff contacted dozens of Republicans in Michigan’s State legislature. A Trump Campaign supervisor sent text messages to his team, directing them to reach out to lawmakers “to explain the process for legislative redress and tell them how to send representative[s] to th[e] electoral college.”¹⁴²¹⁴² Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Angela McCallum Production), McCallum_01_001501 (November 30, 2021, Michael Brown text message to group at 2:47 a.m.). He added: “We’re gonna be lobbyists. Woot.”¹⁴³¹⁴³ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Angela McCallum Production), McCallum_01_001501 (November 30, 2021, Michael Brown text message to group at 2:47 a.m.).

¶According to a Campaign staffer’s spreadsheet produced to the Select Committee, the Trump Campaign apparently tried contacting over 190 Republican State legislators in Arizona, Georgia, and Michigan, alone.¹⁴⁴¹⁴⁴ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Angela McCallum Production), McCallum_01_001528 - 1564 (Trump Campaign spreadsheet).

¶One voicemail left as part of this initiative was leaked to the press on December 1, 2020. In it, a Trump Campaign staffer said, “I did want to personally reach out to you on behalf of the President.”¹⁴⁵¹⁴⁵ Mirs Monday Podcast, “Call to Legislator from Someone Claiming to Be With Trump Campaign (12/1/20),” Podbean.com, at 0:08, (Dec. 1, 2020), available at https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-iqskx-f3cfc6. Her main point came later in the message: “we want to know when there is a resolution in the House to appoint electors for Trump if the President can count on you to join in support.”¹⁴⁶¹⁴⁶ Mirs Monday Podcast, “Call to Legislator from Someone Claiming to Be With Trump Campaign (12/1/20),” Podbean.com, at 1:32, (Dec. 1, 2020), available at https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-iqskx-f3cfc6. Another message from this effort that reached reporters made the same ask and claimed that, “[a]fter a roundtable with the President, he asked us to reach out to you individually” to whip support for a “joint resolution from the State House and Senate” that would “allow Michigan to send electors for Donald J. Trump to the Electoral College and save our country.”¹⁴⁷¹⁴⁷ Jonathan Oosting, “Trump Campaign Lobbies Michigan Lawmakers to Ignore Vote, Give Him Electors,” Bridge Michigan, (Dec. 2, 2020), available at https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-government/trump-campaign-lobbies-michigan-lawmakers-ignore-vote-give-him-electors.

¶Soon after the voicemail leaked, the Campaign staffer who left this voicemail got a text message from one of her supervisors, who wrote: “Honest to god I’m so proud of this” because “[t]hey unwittingly just got your message out there.”¹⁴⁸¹⁴⁸ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Angela McCallum production), McCallum_01_001523 (text messages with Michael Brown). He elaborated: “you used the awesome power of the presidency to scare a state rep into getting a statewide newspaper to deliver your talking points.”¹⁴⁹¹⁴⁹ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Angela McCallum production), McCallum_01_001523 (text messages with Michael Brown).

Outreach by President Trump and Senior Aides

¶While Campaign aides blanketed State officials with these calls, some State officials received more personalized outreach directly from President Trump, Giuliani, and their allies throughout the post-election period about this issue.

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Michigan

¶As discussed earlier, Rep. Walberg reached out to State legislators in Michigan at the President’s request in mid-November, including Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey and House Speaker Lee Chatfield. By November 18th, President Trump called Chatfield and Shirkey to invite them to what would become a meeting for a group of Michigan lawmakers in the Oval Office.¹⁵⁰¹⁵⁰ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Michael Shirkey, (June 8, 2022), pp. 8-10; Senator Mike Shirkey (@SenMikeShirkey), Twitter, Nov. 20, 2020 6:13 p.m. ET, available at https://twitter.com/SenMikeShirkey/status/1329925843053899780. Although President Trump didn’t tell Shirkey what the meeting would be about, the President was focused on the election and asked Shirkey what he and others were doing to investigate election fraud.¹⁵¹¹⁵¹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Michael Shirkey, (June 8, 2022), p. 10. The meeting happened on November 20th.¹⁵²¹⁵² “Administration of Donald J. Trump, 2020, Digest of Other White House Announcements,” Government Publishing Office, (December 31, 2020), p. 115, available at https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/DCPD-2020DIGEST/pdf/DCPD-2020DIGEST.pdf.

¶In Shirkey’s words, there “wasn’t a mystery” about why the group was at the White House once the meeting started.¹⁵³¹⁵³ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Michael Shirkey, (June 8, 2022), p. 16. When the President mentioned several baseless claims of election fraud in Wayne County, Shirkey told the President that he had lost the election and that it had nothing to do with Wayne County, where he had actually performed better than he had in 2016.¹⁵⁴¹⁵⁴ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Michael Shirkey, (June 8, 2022), pp. 16-18.

¶From the President’s body language, Shirkey concluded that wasn’t what he wanted to hear. But the meeting continued, and the President dialed in Giuliani, who delivered a “long monologue,” reciting a “litany” of allegations about supposed fraud that was short on substance.¹⁵⁵¹⁵⁵ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Michael Shirkey, (June 8, 2022), pp. 21-22. Shirkey challenged Giuliani, asking “when are you going to . . . file a lawsuit in Michigan,” which he said Giuliani did not answer.¹⁵⁶¹⁵⁶ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Michael Shirkey, (June 8, 2022), p. 22. Although Shirkey says he did not recall the President making any precise “ask,” Chatfield recalled President Trump’s more generic directive for the group to “have some backbone and do the right thing.”¹⁵⁷¹⁵⁷ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Lee Chatfield (Oct. 15, 2021). Leader Shirkey did not remember any specific “ask” from the President during the Oval Office meeting. Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Michael Shirkey, (June 8, 2022), p. 16 (“One thing I do remember is that he never, ever, to the best of my recollection, ever made a specific ask. It was always just general topics[.]”).Show full note Chatfield understood that to mean they should investigate claims of fraud and overturn the election by naming electors for President Trump.¹⁵⁸¹⁵⁸ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Lee Chatfield (Oct. 15, 2021). Shirkey told the President that he was not going to do anything that would violate Michigan law.¹⁵⁹¹⁵⁹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Michael Shirkey, (June 8, 2022), p. 57.

¶After the meeting ended, Shirkey and Chatfield issued a joint statement: “We have not yet been made aware of any information that would change the outcome of the election in Michigan and as legislative leaders, we will follow the law and follow the normal process regarding Michigan’s electors, just as we have said throughout this election.”¹⁶⁰¹⁶⁰ “Legislative Leaders Meet with President Trump,” State Senator Mike Shirkey, (Nov. 20, 2020), available at https://www.senatormikeshirkey.com/legislative-leaders-meet-with-president-trump/.

¶That was not the end, however. Chatfield and Shirkey received numerous calls from the President in the weeks following the election. Chatfield told the Select Committee that he received approximately five to ten phone calls from President Trump after the election, during which the President would usually ask him about various allegations of voter fraud.¹⁶¹¹⁶¹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Lee Chatfield, (Oct. 15, 2021). Chatfield said that he repeatedly looked into the President’s claims, but never found anything persuasive that could have changed the outcome of the election.¹⁶²¹⁶² Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Lee Chatfield, (Oct. 15, 2021).

¶President Trump’s calls were not enough, so he turned to the public. On January 3, 2021, the Trump Campaign posted a tweet that urged supporters to “Contact Speaker Lee Chatfield & Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey” to “Demand [a] vote on decertification.”¹⁶³¹⁶³ Team Trump (Text TRUMP to 88022) (@TeamTrump), Twitter, Jan. 3, 2021 9:00 a.m. ET, available at http://web.archive.org/web/20210103170109/https://twitter.com/TeamTrump/status/1345776940196659201 (archived). Why President Trump thought the Michigan legislature would convene to decertify the election in a matter of hours when it had refused to do so since early November is not clear. But that didn’t stop the President from making things personal. The President’s January 3rd tweet included Shirkey’s personal cellphone number as well as a number for Chatfield that turned out to be wrong. As a result, Shirkey said he received nearly 4,000 text messages, and another private citizen reported being inundated with calls and texts intended for Chatfield.¹⁶⁴¹⁶⁴ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Michael Shirkey, (June 8, 2022), p. 52; Aaron Parseghian, “Former Michigan Resident Slammed with Calls after Trump Campaign Mistakenly Posts Number on Social Media,” Fox 17 West Michigan, (Jan. 4, 2021), available at https://www.fox17online.com/news/politics/former-michigan-resident-slammed-with-calls-after-trump-campaign-mistakenly-posts-number-on-social-media.Show full note

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Pennsylvania

¶On November 21st, Mark Meadows texted a number apparently belonging to Representative Scott Perry (R–PA) and asked: “Can you send me the number for the speaker and the leader of the PA Legislature. POTUS wants to chat with them.”¹⁶⁵¹⁶⁵ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Mark Meadows Production), MM012414 (text to Rep. Scott Perry from Meadows). Hours later, Meadows received a response of “Yes sir.”¹⁶⁶¹⁶⁶ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Mark Meadows Production), MM012445 (text to Meadows from Rep. Scott Perry). At the time, the leader of the Pennsylvania Senate was Jake Corman and the Speaker of the Pennsylvania House was Bryan Cutler.

¶Corman told the Select Committee that he received a call on Thanksgiving Day 2020 from Giuliani, urging him to call the legislature into a special session to replace Biden electors with Trump electors.¹⁶⁷¹⁶⁷ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022); Jake Corman and Kerry Benninghoff, “Pa. Lawmakers Have No Role to Play in Deciding Presidential Election,” Centre Daily Times, (Oct. 19, 2020), available at https://www.centredaily.com/opinion/article246527648.html. This idea wasn’t new to Corman. President Trump and his allies had gone public about their intentions before then, including during the Pennsylvania hotel hearing, but Corman had braced himself for this even before the election. Before election day in 2020, a reporter from The Atlantic interviewed Corman and other prominent Republicans in Pennsylvania about the possibility that President Trump would try to circumvent the popular vote in swing States by asking the legislatures to appoint Trump/Pence electors. After the article, Corman drafted an op-ed, making it clear that the Pennsylvania legislature did not have the legal authority to appoint Trump/Pence electors in contravention of the popular vote, a position that he would generally maintain through the 2020 Presidential election cycle.¹⁶⁸¹⁶⁸ Barton Gellman, “The Election That Could Break America,” The Atlantic, (Sept. 23, 2020), available at https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/11/what-if-trump-refuses-concede/616424/; Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022); see Jake Corman, “Pa. Lawmakers Have No Role to Play in Deciding Presidential Election,” Centre Daily Times, (Oct. 19, 2020) available at https://www.centredaily.com/opinion/article246527648.html. Senator Corman and other Pennsylvania lawmakers sent a letter to Congress in January that mentioned “numerous unlawful violations” of State law and asked that Congress “delay certification of the electoral college.” Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (National Archives Production), 076P-R000002160_00001. In his informal interview with the Select Committee, however, Senator Corman acknowledged that he signed the letter due to pressure he was receiving after the election, but explained that he believed fraud and these types of issues should be adjudicated in the courtroom, not the legislature, and, in any event, he said that he was never presented with credible evidence of voter fraud. See Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022).Show full note

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¶During that call, Giuliani first tried “pumping [Corman] up as a patriot” before asking the Senator to call the Pennsylvania legislature into a special session. Corman told Giuliani that he did not have the authority to do that, a position with which his own lawyers agreed.¹⁶⁹¹⁶⁹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022). Giuliani’s reply was that Corman must have bad lawyers. Corman said he offered to connect Giuliani with his legal team. His legal team spoke with Giuliani and a lawyer working with him, Jenna Ellis, the following day, reiterating their view that such a move by the legislature would be illegal.¹⁷⁰¹⁷⁰ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022). That same day, or possibly the next, Giuliani and Ellis called him back to renew their request for a special legislative session and to demean Corman’s attorneys, calling them “terrible,” “bad,” and “wrong.”¹⁷¹¹⁷¹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022). Corman, however, held his ground and ended the call.¹⁷²¹⁷² Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022).

¶While packing to return to Pennsylvania from his Thanksgiving visit to Florida, Corman says he received a call from an unknown number with a Washington, DC area code, which he let go to voicemail.¹⁷³¹⁷³ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022). It turned out to be a White House operator calling on behalf of President Trump.¹⁷⁴¹⁷⁴ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022).

¶Corman called back and spoke to President Trump, who insisted that he had won the election in Pennsylvania and said something to the effect of, “Jake, this is a big issue. We need your help.”¹⁷⁵¹⁷⁵ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022). Corman told the President that he couldn’t do what the Trump team was asking; President Trump replied, “I’m not sure your attorneys are very good.”¹⁷⁶¹⁷⁶ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022). Corman wanted to end the call and offered to have his lawyers speak again with President Trump’s, but they never had another call with the President’s lawyers.¹⁷⁷¹⁷⁷ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022).

¶Pennsylvania House Speaker Bryan Cutler was another main target for the President’s team. He received voicemails in late November for four days in a row from Giuliani and/or Jenna Ellis, which he provided to the Select Committee.¹⁷⁸¹⁷⁸ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Bryan Cutler Production), B_CUTLER_0000131-0000134 (Giuliani and Ellis voicemails). Cutler explained that he did not feel comfortable talking with the President’s team in case he ended up having to preside over a legislative session about the election, and he had his attorneys relay that to the President’s team.¹⁷⁹¹⁷⁹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Bryan Cutler, (May 31, 2022), p. 21. Giuliani received the message but continued to call Speaker Cutler nonetheless.¹⁸⁰¹⁸⁰ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Bryan Cutler, (May 31, 2022), p. 21.

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¶In the first of these voicemails, on November 26th, Giuliani asked to “get together, quietly” to discuss “the amount of fraud that went on in your State,” and said that Giuliani and Ellis had also just spoken to Pennsylvania House Majority Leader Kerry Benninghoff.¹⁸¹¹⁸¹ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Bryan Cutler Production), B_CUTLER_0000131 (Giuliani and Ellis voicemail). On November 27th, Ellis called and said in a second voicemail that they had just talked to Pennsylvania House Member Russ Diamond and were “very grateful” to the State’s legislature “for doing your Article II duty.”¹⁸²¹⁸² Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Bryan Cutler Production), B_CUTLER_0000132 (Jenna Ellis voicemail). On November 28th, Giuliani left a third voicemail and claimed to have “something important” that “really changes things,” and said that “the president wanted me to make sure I got it to you.”¹⁸³¹⁸³ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Bryan Cutler Production), B_CUTLER_0000133 (Giuliani voicemail). And then on November 29th, Giuliani left a fourth message and said, “I understand that you don’t want to talk to me now” but still sought “the courtesy of being able to talk to you as the president’s lawyer” and a “fellow Republican” because “you’re certifying what is a blatantly false statement . . . I can’t imagine how that’s in your interests or in the interests of our party.”¹⁸⁴¹⁸⁴ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Bryan Cutler Production), B_CUTLER_0000134 (Giuliani voicemail).

¶Giuliani and Ellis didn’t get through, but the President did. “[I]f we wanted to do something, what were the options[?]” the President asked Cutler.¹⁸⁵¹⁸⁵ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Bryan Cutler, (May 31, 2022), pp. 42-44, 46-47. The New York Times reported that Speaker Cutler spoke with President Trump twice by phone, Cutler told the Select Committee that this claim was incorrect and that he only spoke with the President by phone once, followed by their second conversation on December 3rd, which was in person. See Trip Gabriel, “Trump Asked Pennsylvania House Speaker about Overturning His Loss,” New York Times, (Dec. 8, 2020), available at https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/08/us/politics/trump-pennsylvania-house-speaker.html; see also Amy Gardner, Josh Dawsey and Rachael Bade, “Trump Asks Pennsylvania House Speaker for Help Overturning Election Results, Personally Intervening in a Third State,” Washington Post, (Dec. 8, 2020), available at https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-pennsylvania-speaker-call/2020/12/07/d65fe8c4-38bf-11eb-98c4-25dc9f4987e8_story.html.Show full note Cutler explained to President Trump that he could file a legal challenge contesting the election, and asked the President why his team had never requested a statewide recount.¹⁸⁶¹⁸⁶ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Bryan Cutler, (May 31, 2022), pp. 43-44. Cutler was also clear about the “constitutional peculiarities” of Pennsylvania, where the State constitution specifically prohibits retroactive changes to how electors are chosen.¹⁸⁷¹⁸⁷ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Bryan Cutler, (May 31, 2022), pp. 26-27, 44.

¶Practically, President Trump’s call achieved nothing. The President wasn’t getting what he wanted in his calls to leaders in Pennsylvania: a special session of the legislature to appoint Trump/Pence electors.

¶Seemingly undeterred, President Trump invited several leaders of the Pennsylvania legislature to the White House for Christmas gatherings.¹⁸⁸¹⁸⁸ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Bryan Cutler, (May 31, 2022), pp. 49-57; Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jake Corman, (Jan. 25, 2022). Senator Corman decided not to go, although Speaker Cutler did. President Trump spoke with Cutler on December 3rd, while Cutler, his chief of staff, and their wives were at that White House Christmas tour.¹⁸⁹¹⁸⁹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Bryan Cutler, (May 31, 2022), p. 50. The issue of overturning the results of Pennsylvania’s election came up again, as did the possibility of a special session of the State legislature to appoint Trump electors.¹⁹⁰¹⁹⁰ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Bryan Cutler, (May 31, 2022), pp. 50-55. Cutler told the President that the State legislature could not reconvene without an order from the Governor and a petition from a supermajority of legislators, neither of which was likely to happen.¹⁹¹¹⁹¹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Bryan Cutler, (May 31, 2022), pp. 54-55. Cutler also told the President that they could not appoint new electors without a court order. In Cutler’s opinion, President Trump “seemed to understand. And that was—that was clear.”¹⁹²¹⁹² Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Bryan Cutler, (May 31, 2022), pp. 56-57. The President’s apparent understanding, however, did not result in any meaningful changes to his public rhetoric.

¶On December 3rd, the same day that Cutler met with President Trump, Cutler, Corman, House Majority Leader Benninghoff, and Senate Majority Leader Kim Ward issued a three-page single-spaced joint statement asserting, in no uncertain terms, that Pennsylvania’s General Assembly “lacks the authority . . . to overturn the popular vote and appoint our own slate of electors,” since “[d]oing so would violate our Election Code and Constitution, particularly a provision that prohibits us from changing the rules for election contests of the President after the election.”¹⁹³¹⁹³ “Statement on Election Reform,” Pennsylvania Senate GOP (Dec 3, 2020, accessed July 14, 2022), available at https://www.pasenategop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/election-reform-120320.pdf. In response, President Trump retweeted a December 4th post by Bernard Kerik, which tagged all four of these State legislators with the hashtag “Traitors,” and declared that “These are the four cowardice[sic] Pennsylvania legislators that intend to allow the Democrat machine to #StealtheVote! #Cowards #Liars #Traitors.”¹⁹⁴¹⁹⁴ Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Dec. 6, 2020 12:56 a.m. ET, available at https://media-cdn.factba.se/realdonaldtrump-twitter/1335463148137164802.jpg (archived).

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¶But five days later, President Trump publicly thanked Cutler for signing onto a December 4th letter that encouraged Members of Congress from Pennsylvania to object to their State’s electoral votes on January 6th. The President tweeted: “Thank you to Speaker Cutler and all others in Pennsylvania and elsewhere who fully understand what went on in the 2020 election. It’s called total corruption!”¹⁹⁵¹⁹⁵ Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Dec. 8, 2020 2:51 p.m. ET, available at https://media-cdn.factba.se/realdonaldtrump-twitter/1336322408970559495.jpg (archived); “Letter to Pennsylvania’s Congressional Delegation,” Pennsylvania State GOP, (Dec. 4, 2020, last accessed July 14, 2022), available at http://www.pahousegop.com/Display/SiteFiles/1/2020/120420CongressElection2020B.pdf. When the Select Committee asked Cutler about this apparent change in his position, he said that he signed on to this letter not because of concerns that fraud or corruption meant the results of the election Pennsylvania were wrong, but rather because of concerns about “programmatic changes or areas for improvement” related to the election.¹⁹⁶¹⁹⁶ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Bryan Cutler, (May 31, 2022), pp. 60-61. In fact, Cutler reiterated to the Committee that he “was not personally aware of” any widespread election fraud that would have changed the result of the election.¹⁹⁷¹⁹⁷ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Bryan Cutler, (May 31, 2022), p. 61.

¶The pressure facing State legislators during this period was significant. On December 9th, the New York Times quoted Pennsylvania’s Senate Majority Leader Kim Ward, revealing that she too had received a call from President Trump in which he pushed his election fraud narrative.¹⁹⁸¹⁹⁸ Trip Gabriel, “Even in Defeat, Trump Tightens Grip on State G.O.P. Lawmakers,” New York Times, (Dec. 9, 2020), available at https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/us/politics/trump-pennsylvania-electoral-college.html. Ward told the Times that she hadn’t been given enough time to sign the same December 4th letter that Cutler did, but commented that if she had taken a stand against it, “I’d get my house bombed tonight.”¹⁹⁹¹⁹⁹ Trip Gabriel, “Even in Defeat, Trump Tightens Grip on State G.O.P. Lawmakers,” New York Times, (Dec. 9, 2020), available at https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/us/politics/trump-pennsylvania-electoral-college.html.

Arizona

¶In late November, Arizona House Speaker Russell “Rusty” Bowers, a longtime Republican who served 17 years in the State legislature, received a call from President Trump and Giuliani.²⁰⁰²⁰⁰ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 41:30-46:35, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og; Yvonne Wingett Sanchez and Ronald J. Hansen, “White House Phone Calls, Baseless Fraud Charges: The Origins of the Arizona Election Review,” AZ Central, (Nov. 17, 2021), available at https://www.azcentral.com/in-depth/news/politics/elections/2021/11/17/arizona-audit-trump-allies-pushed-to-undermine-2020-election/6045151001/.Show full note Giuliani alleged that Arizona’s election results were skewed by illicit ballots, cast by non-citizens or on behalf of dead people.²⁰¹²⁰¹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 41:30-46:35, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og; Yvonne Wingett Sanchez and Ronald J. Hansen, “White House Phone Calls, Baseless Fraud Charges: The Origins of the Arizona Election Review,” AZ Central, (Nov. 17, 2021), available at https://www.azcentral.com/in-depth/news/politics/elections/2021/11/17/arizona-audit-trump-allies-pushed-to-undermine-2020-election/6045151001/.Show full note Bowers demanded proof for these audacious claims on the call and President Trump told Giuliani to comply, but the evidence never came.²⁰²²⁰² Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 41:30-46:35, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og; Yvonne Wingett Sanchez and Ronald J. Hansen, “White House Phone Calls, Baseless Fraud Charges: The Origins of the Arizona Election Review,” AZ Central, (Nov. 17, 2021), available at https://www.azcentral.com/in-depth/news/politics/elections/2021/11/17/arizona-audit-trump-allies-pushed-to-undermine-2020-election/6045151001/.Show full note The point of the call, however, was different. Like in Michigan and Pennsylvania, President Trump and his allies were working the phones to get something. They wanted Bowers to hold a public hearing with the ultimate aim of replacing Presidential electors for former Vice President Joe Biden with electors for President Trump.²⁰³²⁰³ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 41:30-46:35, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og; Yvonne Wingett Sanchez and Ronald J. Hansen, “White House Phone Calls, Baseless Fraud Charges: The Origins of the Arizona Election Review,” AZ Central, (Nov. 17, 2021), available at https://www.azcentral.com/in-depth/news/politics/elections/2021/11/17/arizona-audit-trump-allies-pushed-to-undermine-2020-election/6045151001/.Show full note

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¶Bowers had never heard of anything like that before, and Giuliani acknowledged that it had never been done. Where President Trump and Giuliani saw a potential opportunity, however, Bowers saw a fundamental problem.

¶As Bowers explained it, what they wanted him to do was “counter to my oath when I swore to the Constitution to uphold it.”²⁰⁴²⁰⁴ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 41:30-46:35, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og. And he said that to the President and Giuliani: “you are asking me to do something against my oath, and I will not break my oath.”²⁰⁵²⁰⁵ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 41:30-46:35, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og. Giuliani replied: “aren’t we all Republicans here? I mean, I would think you would listen a little more open to my suggestions, that we’re all Republicans.”²⁰⁶²⁰⁶ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 41:30-46:35, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og. In his testimony to the Select Committee, Speaker Bowers said this appeal to party loyalty occurred in that call or in a later meeting, and that the President brought it up “more than once.”Show full note

¶The pressure didn’t stop with that call. On December 1st, Giuliani and Ellis got an audience with some of the most powerful Republican lawmakers in Arizona, including Bowers, Senate President Karen Fann, Senate President Pro Tempore Vince Leach, House Majority Leader and Senator-Elect Warren Petersen, Senate Majority Whip Sonny Borrelli, Senator Michelle Ugenti-Rita, and others.²⁰⁷²⁰⁷ Dillon Rosenblatt and Julia Shumway, “Giuliani COVID-19 Diagnosis Closes Arizona Legislature,” Arizona Capitol Times, (Dec. 6, 2020), available at https://azcapitoltimes.com/news/2020/12/06/giuliani-covid-19-diagnosis-closes-arizona-legislature/; Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers, (Nov. 17, 2021); Vince Leach (@VinceLeach), Twitter, Dec. 1, 2020 11:28 p.m. ET, available at https://twitter.com/VinceLeach/status/1333991317500727298. Speaker Bowers told the Committee that Giuliani and Ellis were accompanied by Katherine Friess, J. Philip Waldron, Bernard Kerik, and others. See Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers, (Nov. 17, 2021).Show full note The Select Committee was unable to get Giuliani and Ellis’ perspective on this outreach because Giuliani claimed that his communications with Bowers—who was not his client nor part of his legal team—were “privileged,” while Ellis invoked her Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination.²⁰⁸²⁰⁸ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Deposition of Rudolph Giuliani, (May 20, 2022), pp. 58-59; Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Deposition of Jenna Ellis, (Mar. 8, 2022), pp. 50-51.

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¶Bowers, on the other hand, told the Select Committee that Giuliani and Ellis asked the lawmakers to deliver Arizona’s electors for President Trump, despite the certified popular vote count.²⁰⁹²⁰⁹ “Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Russel “Rusty” Bowers, (June 19, 2022), pp. 35-36; Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers, (Nov. 17, 2021); “Speaker Bowers Addresses Calls for the Legislature to Overturn 2020 Certified Election Results,” Arizona State Legislature, (Dec. 4, 2020), available at https://www.azleg.gov/press/house/54LEG/2R/201204STATEMENT.pdf.Show full note To bolster their request, Giuliani and Ellis raised numerous allegations of election fraud at the meeting, though they never produced evidence in support of their claims. In live testimony before the Committee, Bowers recalled Giuliani saying in this meeting that “we’ve got lots of theories, we just don’t have the evidence.”²¹⁰²¹⁰ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 53:00-53:40, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og. At the time, Bowers didn’t know whether it was a gaffe or an example of Giuliani not thinking through what he had just said.²¹¹²¹¹ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 53:00-53:40, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og. In any event, Bowers said he and others in his group made particular note of that comment.²¹²²¹² Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 53:00-53:40, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og. And it was borne out; Bowers testified that “No one provided me, ever, such evidence.”²¹³²¹³ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 53:00-53:40, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og.

¶In late December, in another phone call with President Trump, Bowers reiterated that he would not do anything illegal for him.²¹⁴²¹⁴ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 56:00-59:50, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og; Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Transcribed Interview of Russell Bowers, (June 19, 2022), pp. 39-41. Afterward, John Eastman joined the chorus of Trump allies attempting to change his mind. In a call on January 4th that included the Speaker’s chief counsel as well as Arizona House Majority Leader-Elect Ben Toma, Eastman urged Bowers to hold a vote to decertify Arizona’s Presidential electors.²¹⁵²¹⁵ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 56:00-59:50, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og. When Bowers told Eastman he couldn’t unilaterally reconvene the legislature, Eastman urged him to “just do it and let the court sort it out.”²¹⁶²¹⁶ Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Hearing on the January 6th Investigation, 117th Cong., 2d sess., (June 21, 2022), at 56:00-59:50, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa43_z_82Og. Bowers refused and the Arizona legislature took no such action.

¶Many of President Trump’s efforts in Arizona focused on State officials, but his team also continued to reach out to the Board of Supervisors for Maricopa County even after it certified the election. One focus was voting machines. According to the Arizona Republic, Giuliani left a voicemail in mid- to late-December for Board Member Steve Chucri that “I see we’re gonna get a chance to take a good look at those machines . . . give me a call as soon as you get a chance. The president also wanted me to pass on a few things to you, too.”²¹⁷²¹⁷ “Trump Allies Leave Voicemail Messages for Maricopa County Supervisors,” AZ Central, (July 2, 2021), available at https://www.azcentral.com/videos/news/politics/elections/2021/07/02/trump-allies-left-voicemail-messages-maricopa-county-supervisors-election-and-contested-results/7837919002/. On December 4th, Giuliani also left a message for the Board’s Chairman Clint Hickman: “I was very happy to see that there’s gonna be a forensic audit of the machines. And I really wanted to talk to you about it a bit. The President wanted me to give you a call. All right? Thank you. Give me a call back.”²¹⁸²¹⁸ “Trump Allies Leave Voicemail Messages for Maricopa County Supervisors,” AZ Central, (July 2, 2021), available at https://www.azcentral.com/videos/news/politics/elections/2021/07/02/trump-allies-left-voicemail-messages-maricopa-county-supervisors-election-and-contested-results/7837919002/. Hickman chose not to call back.²¹⁹²¹⁹ See Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Clint Hickman, (Nov. 17, 2021); see also Yvonne Wingett Sanchez, “‘We Need You to Stop the Counting’: Records Detail Intense Efforts by Trump Allies to Pressure Maricopa County Supervisors,” AZ Central (July 2, 2021), available at https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/elections/2021/07/02/records-show-trump-allies-kelli-ward-rudy-giuliani-pressed-county-officials-over-election-results/7813304002/.Show full note

¶Then, on Christmas Eve, Giuliani left voicemails for Board Members Bill Gates and Jack Sellers, asking them to call him back. In his message for Gates, Giuliani said:

It’s Giuliani, President Trump’s lawyer. If you get a chance, would you please give me a call? I have a few things I’d like to talk over with you. Maybe we can get this thing fixed up. You know, I really think it’s a shame that Republicans sort of are both in this, kind of, situation. And I think there may be a nice way to resolve this for everybody.²²⁰²²⁰ Yvonne Wingett Sanchez, “‘Fighting for Democracy Here’: Election Audit Pits Maricopa County Republicans vs. Arizona GOP,” AZ Central, (May 23, 2021) available at https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/elections/2021/05/23/election-audit-pits-maricopa-county-republicans-against-arizona-gop-senators/5186141001/; see also “Trump allies leave voicemail messages for Maricopa County supervisors,” AZ Central, (July 2, 2021), available at https://www.azcentral.com/videos/news/politics/elections/2021/07/02/trump-allies-left-voicemail-messages-maricopa-county-supervisors-election-and-contested-results/7837919002/.Show full note

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¶In his message for Sellers, Giuliani said “I’d like to see if there is a way that we can resolve this so that it comes out well for everyone. We’re all Republicans, I think we all have the same goal. Let’s see if . . . we can get this done outside of the court.”²²¹²²¹ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Maricopa County Board of Supervisors Production), CTRL0000020072, pp. 1-2 (December 24, 2020, copy of voice message and a transcription); see also Yvonne Wingett Sanchez and Ronald J. Hansen, “‘Asked to Do Something Huge’: An Audacious Pitch to Reverse Arizona’s Election Results,” AZ Central, (Dec. 2, 2021), available at https://www.azcentral.com/in-depth/news/politics/elections/2021/11/18/arizona-audit-rudy-giuliani-failed-effort-replace-electors/6349795001/.Show full note Like Hickman, neither Gates nor Sellers returned Giuliani’s calls.²²²²²² Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, Informal Interview of Jack Sellers and Bill Gates, (Oct. 6, 2021).

¶So President Trump made the call himself. On December 31st, Board Chair Clint Hickman received a voicemail from the White House switchboard, asking him to call back for President Trump. Hickman said that he did not return the call, in part because the county was still facing litigation over the election.²²³²²³ Yvonne Wingett Sanchez, “‘We Need You to Stop the Counting’: Records Detail Intense Efforts by Trump Allies to Pressure Maricopa County Supervisors,” AZ Central, (July 2, 2021), available at https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/elections/2021/07/02/records-show-trump-allies-kelli-ward-rudy-giuliani-pressed-county-officials-over-election-results/7813304002/. Another call from the White House came through on January 3rd with a request that Hickman call back for the President. But, by then, the President’s call with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, described below, had leaked, and Hickman “didn’t want to walk into that space.”²²⁴²²⁴ Yvonne Wingett Sanchez, “‘We Need You to Stop the Counting’: Records Detail Intense Efforts by Trump Allies to Pressure Maricopa County Supervisors,” AZ Central, (July 2, 2021), available at https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/elections/2021/07/02/records-show-trump-allies-kelli-ward-rudy-giuliani-pressed-county-officials-over-election-results/7813304002/.

Georgia

¶On December 5th, President Trump traveled to Georgia to headline a rally and mobilize voters in advance of a January Senate runoff. But the President’s day started with a morning call to Governor Brian Kemp during which they discussed reconvening the legislature in a special session.²²⁵²²⁵ Document on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (Bill Stepien Production), WS00104-105 (December 5, 2021, email from Joshua Findlay to Matthew Morgan, Justin Clark, and Bill Stepien at 11:44 p.m.). After the call, Kemp took to Twitter. He acknowledged that he had spoken to the President and that he told the President that he supported the idea of, and had already called for, a signature audit in Georgia.²²⁶²²⁶ Brian Kemp (@BrianKempGA), Twitter, Dec. 5, 2020 12:44 p.m., available at https://twitter.com/briankempga/status/1335278871630008324. President Trump responded later that night by complaining that Georgia had not yet done a signature-verification audit and instead insisted that the Governor should “[a]t least immediately ask for a Special Session of the Legislature.”²²⁷²²⁷ Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Dec. 5, 2020 9:35 p.m. ET, available at https://media-cdn.factba.se/realdonaldtrump-twitter/1335336916582084614.jpg (archived). As detailed later in this report, the call for special sessions of legislatures in various States, including Georgia, never gained traction and, when all else failed, became a focus for two Department of Justice lawyers. The following day, Governor Kemp and Lieutenant Governor Geoff Duncan issued a definitive statement rejecting President Trump and his allies’ calls to overturn the results in Georgia:

While we understand four members of the Georgia Senate are requesting the convening of a special session of the General Assembly, doing this in order to select a separate slate of presidential electors is not an option that is allowed under state or federal law.

State law is clear: the legislature could only direct an alternative method for choosing presidential electors if the election was not able to be held on the date set by federal law. In the 1960s, the General Assembly decided that Georgia’s presidential electors will be determined by the winner of the State’s popular vote. Any attempt by the legislature to retroactively change that process for the November 3rd election would be unconstitutional and immediately enjoined by the courts, resulting in a long legal dispute and no short-term resolution.²²⁸²²⁸ Office of Governor Brian P. Kemp, “Gov. Kemp, Lt. Gov. Duncan Issue Statement on Request for Special Session of General Assembly,” MadMimi.com, (Dec. 6, 2020), available at https://madmimi.com/p/50e7a11?pact=1301484-161142215-11561983238-b09ac0db7ff3f3c8bd594d6a33e7f63d0cf4c135.

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¶President Trump responded by directing his ire at Georgia officials and, throughout the month of December, President Trump grew even more relentless in his social media attacks against Kemp than he had been the previous month. He retweeted attorney Lin Wood calling on Georgians to call and urge the FBI to focus more on election fraud and “[t]ell them to also investigate @BrianKempGA @GeoffDuncanGA & @GaSecofState.”²²⁹²²⁹ Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Dec. 8, 2020 3:07 p.m., available at http://web.archive.org/web/20201208200907/https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/1336401919422640128 (archived) (retweeting Lin Wood (@LLinWood), Twitter, Dec. 8, 2020, 11:22 a.m., available at http://web.archive.org/web/20201208200908/https://twitter.com/LLinWood/status/1336390712380813313 (archived)). And he retweeted another post by Lin Wood that depicted Governor Kemp and Secretary Raffensperger wearing masks digitally altered to show the Chinese flag, and warned that they “will soon be going to jail.”²³⁰²³⁰ Brett Samuels, “Trump Retweets Lawyer Who Said Republican Officials in Georgia Are ‘Going to Jail’,” The Hill, (Dec. 15, 2020), available at https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/530250-trump-retweets-lawyer-who-says-republican-officials-in-georgia-are-going-to/. Even without his many retweets, President Trump posted an average of about one tweet per day in December 2020 either criticizing Governor Kemp or pressuring him explicitly or implicitly to take actions to help overturn the election.²³¹²³¹ Search results for “‘The Republican Governor of Georgia refuses’ | ‘As badly as we were treated in Georgia’ | kemp | @briankempga,” from November 30 to December 31, 2020, Trump Twitter Archive V2, (last accessed December 12, 2022), available at https://www.thetrumparchive.com/?searchbox=%22%5C%22The+Republican+Governor+of+Georgia+refuses%5C%22+%7C+%5C%22As+badly+as+we+were+treated+in+Georgia%5C%22+%7C+kemp+%7C+%40briankempga%22&dates=%5B%222020-11-30%22%2C%222020-12-30%22%5D&results=1.Show full note

¶President Trump seemed consumed with his plans to overturn the election and, based on documents obtained by the Select Committee, it appears that the President received input from many outside donors or advisors who had access to his staff’s email addresses. On December 7th, a Trump donor named Bill White emailed senior Trump advisors, including Dan Scavino and Rudolph Giuliani, to say that he “[j]ust spoke to [Georgia State] Senator [William Burton] Jones [who] asked if Potus can R[e]T[weet] this now pls,” along with a tweet by Senator Jones that read: “Georgia Patriot Call to Action…call your state Senate & House Reps & ask them to sign the petition for a special session.”²³²²³² Document on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (National Archives Production), 076P-R000007750_0001, (December 7, 2020 email from Bill White to Dan Scavino and others) including screenshot of Burt Jones (@burtjonesforga), Twitter, Dec. 7, 2020 11:26 a.m., available at https://twitter.com/burtjonesforga/status/1335984150789173248), available at https://twitter.com/burtjonesforga/status/1335984150789173248).Show full note President Trump and Giuliani each retweeted Senator Jones’s tweet an hour later.²³³²³³ Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter, Dec. 7, 2020 1:29 p.m. ET, available at https://factba.se/biden/topic/twitter?q=burtjonesforga&f= (archived); Rudy W. Giuliani (@RudyGiuliani), Twitter, Dec. 7, 2020 12:25 p.m., available at https://twitter.com/RudyGiuliani/status/1335998988101804035.

¶Bill White also emailed Molly Michael, Dan Scavino, and Giuliani, on December 8th with information that he said “POTUS asked me last night” to send right away.²³⁴²³⁴ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (National Archives Production), 076P-R000007693_00001. He recommended a Presidential tweet criticizing Georgia’s Lt. Gov. Duncan as well as tweets to put pressure on Senate Majority Leader Mike Dugan and Senate President Pro Tempore Butch Miller.²³⁵²³⁵ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (National Archives Production), 076P-R000007693_00001. He wrote that President Trump would be calling Dugan and Miller “to ask them to call special session and strategize with them why they are keeping this from happening.”²³⁶²³⁶ Documents on file with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (National Archives Production), 076P-R000007693_00001. Dugan later confirmed that he had received a call from President Trump’s office but that the two of them were not able to connect.²³⁷²³⁷ David Wickert and Greg Bluestein, “Inside the Campaign to Undermine Georgia’s Election (Part I),” Atlanta Journal-Constitution, (Dec. 30, 2021), available at https://www.ajc.com/politics/election/georgia-2020-election-what-happened/. And the following day, Steve Bannon revealed on his podcast that President Trump spoke to Georgia House Speaker Ralston and Speaker Pro Tempore Jan Jones.²³⁸²³⁸ Shepherd’s Sling, “Steven K. Bannon - War Room Pandemic - Ep. #568/569 (Full 2hrs Podcast),” BitChute, at 16:50 - 18:00, Dec. 8, 2020, available at https://www.bitchute.com/video/KyK4QPP7Ngyt/; John Fredericks (@jfradioshow), Twitter, Dec. 7, 2020 5:30 p.m. ET, available at https://twitter.com/jfradioshow/status/1336075668090654724; Jim Hoft, “Developing: President Trump Speaks with Georgia House Speaker David Ralston and Speaker Pro-Tem Jan Jones on Endorsing Special Session,” Gateway Pundit, (Dec. 7, 2020), available at https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/12/developing-president-trump-speaks-georgia-house-speaker-david-ralston-speaker-pro-tem-jan-jones-endorsing-special-session/.Show full note Speaker Ralston confirmed that he spoke to President Trump on December 7th about the election, during which he told the President that Georgia law made a special legislative session “very much an uphill battle.”²³⁹²³⁹ FYNTV FetchYourNews, “#BKP Has a Live Call-In with David Ralston,” YouTube, at 2:30 - 3:12 (Dec. 8, 2020), available at http://web.archive.org/web/20201224164814/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZdN5vNOl6F4&gl=US&hl=en (archived); Julie Carr, “Georgia Speaker of the House David Ralston Joins BKP Politics to Discuss His Call with President Trump and a Legal Path Forward,” Tennessee Star, (Dec. 20, 2020), available at https://tennesseestar.com/2020/12/20/georgia-speaker-of-the-house-david-ralston-joins-bkp-politics-to-discuss-his-call-with-president-trump-and-a-legal-path-forward/.Show full note

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