2020 Election: Predictions, Results and Reactions

[N.E. Brigand]

Meanwhile, Michigan attorney general charges 'false electors' over efforts to overturn the 2020 election

As previously quoted from CNN's piece on that July news:

The charged individuals are Kathy Berden, a Republican National Committeewoman from Michigan; William (Hank) Choate; Amy Facchinello; Clifford Frost; Stanley Grot; John Haggard; Mary-Ann Henry; Timothy King; Michele Lundgren, Meshawn Maddock, the former co-chair of the Michigan Republican Party; James Renner; Mayra Rodriguez; Rose Rook; Marian Sheridan; Ken Thompson; and Kent Vanderwood. All 16 individuals were charged with multiple felonies “for their role in the alleged false electors scheme following the 2020 U.S. presidential election,” Nessel’s office announced. The counts include one count of conspiracy to commit forgery, two counts of forgery, one count of conspiracy to commit uttering and publishing and one count of uttering and publishing – all of which carry a maximum of 14 years in prison – as well as one count of conspiracy to commit election law forgery and two counts of election law forgery, which carry a maximum of five years in prison. The group of 16 fake electors from Michigan includes current and former state GOP officials, the Republican National Committee member, a sitting mayor, a school board member and Trump supporters who were the plaintiffs in a frivolous lawsuit that tried to overturn the 2020 results. “This plan, to reject the will of the voters and undermine democracy, was fraudulent and legally baseless,” Nessel said in a video released Tuesday.

New today from the Associate Press: "Michigan Republican charged in false elector plot agrees to cooperation deal."

The state attorney general office announced that charges against James Renner, aged 77, have been dropped after they reached a cooperation agreement.

Edited to quote V's post on this, which he added after I started writing the information above and didn't see before submitting:

This news has been overshadowed by the news of Powell pleading guilty in Georgia, but this is also a big deal.

[N.E. Brigand]

Per a announcement today from the Department of Justice, a Maryland police officer named Justin Lee "has been indicted on felony and misdemeanor charges, including assaulting law enforcement, for his actions during the breach of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021." He's been "charged in a seven-count indictment unsealed today in the District of Columbia with felony offenses of civil disorder and assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers" plus some misdemeanors.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Next week, a man named Douglass Mackey will go on trial for his efforts to undermine the U.S. presidential election in *2016.* He was charged in January 2021. Mackey was apparently a prominent troll on social media using the nickname "Ricky Vaughan"; his true identity became public in 2018. Mackey is alleged, along with four unnamed co-conspirators, with having spread disinformation to Democratic voters in 2016 about how to vote. Today the judge in this case unsealed an order approving a request by prosecutors to keep the identify of one of Mackey's co-conspirators, who has pleaded guilty and is cooperating, secret from Mackey. Apparently Mackey only knew this person by his internet alias.

I'm noting this here because (1) I don't want to unearth the 2016 thread so and (2) journalists previously identified another of Mackey's alleged accomplices as Anthime Gionet, aka "Baked Alaska," who is "a pro-Trump white nationalist who was arrested on Jan. 16 [2021] for his involvement in storming the Capitol on Jan. 6. Gionet also participated in the deadly white nationalist 'Unite the Right' rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017." It took four years to charge Mackey for what he did in 2016. That tells me that three more years may pass before the final charges are brought for actions on January 6th.

It hasn't been quite 3 years, but Mackey's case is instructive. With regards to the reported content of the recent target letter sent to Trump.

Charlie Savage:
Ironic twist: Citation to §241 on target letter raises the possibility that Jack Smith is thinking about charging Trump with election fraud conspiracy (in trying to flip Biden's wins in Georgia, Arizona, etc.)

Brandon Van Grack:
People interested in recent prosecutions of Section 241 should look at the case of Douglass Mackey for interfering in the 2016 election.

Douglass Mackey aka Ricky Vaughan, a social media influencer in 2015-2016, was sentenced today to 7 months in jail for posting false voting information. The government had asked for 6-12 months' imprisonment. Mackey, pretending to be associated with Hillary Clinton's campaign, had posted urging Black voters to "avoid the line" and vote by text. He was prosecuted under the Ku Klux Klan Act.

I was tempted to put this in the thread about Trump's January 6 case based on the apt observation that Mackey's attorney's did a much better job on the issue than Trumps (because they are better attorneys), but I figured it should stay here. Now the only question is whether I will beat N.E.B. to posting it or not.

[N.E. Brigand]

New from the Washington Post: "Virginia grand jury indicts torch carriers in 2017 Charlottesville rally." The story is behind a paywall, so I'm not sure who was charged, nor with what.

Text of above referenced article by Salvador Rizzo:

Grand jury indicts torch carriers in 2017 Charlottesville rally

At least three men who marched with blazing tiki torches at the 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville are now facing criminal charges, according to indictments unsealed this week. A grand jury in Virginia indicted “multiple individuals” who carried torches at the Unite the Right rally in August 2017, Albemarle County Commonwealth’s Attorney James Hingeley said in a statement. Indictments had been unsealed Tuesday for three defendants who were extradited from their home states: Tyler Bradley Dykes of Bluffton, S.C.; Dallas Medina of Ravenna, Ohio; and Will Zachary Smith of Nacona, Tex. Officials said additional indictments remain under seal. Prosecutors allege the torch carriers violated a rarely enforced criminal statute, which makes it a crime to burn objects with intent to intimidate, when they marched around the University of Virginia campus on Aug. 11, 2017, while chanting “You will not replace us” and the Nazi slogan “Blood and soil.” ...

Since this thread contains the most recent references to the racist 2017 march in Charlottesville, VA, here's a notable update:



Burn, baby, burn.

[N.E. Brigand]

Since this thread contains the most recent references to the racist 2017 march in Charlottesville, VA, here's a notable update ...
Burn, baby, burn.

Elon Musk says that melting down a statue of the slaveholding traitor Robert E. Lee shows a desire for the "extinction" of white people.

[N.E. Brigand]

Just using this reference to Pat Philbin to note that in an entirely unrelated matter, he is representing former Fox News and current CBS journalist Catherine Herridge against a lawsuit brought by a Yanping Chen, a scientist who runs a graduate research program in Virginia who is suing the FBI, Dept. of Justice, and Dept. of Homeland Security for violating her privacy in 2017 because, after they closed a six-year counterintelligence investigation into her activities (they suspected her of working for the Chinese government), personal information about Chen from their investigation was leaked to Herridge who reported it on Fox. Chen wants a judge to force Herridge to reveal her source.

I don't care at all for Herridge, who regularly carries water for Donald Trump and Republicans, but I'm actually on her side here, although the law may not be, and although Philbin himself in the past took a hard line against leaks when he defended Donald Trump in the former president's first impeachment trial in January 2020. At that time, Philbin complained that Congressional Democrats "selectively leaked" testimony about Trump's actions "to a compliant media to establish a false narrative about the president," and he noted that such leaks if they had been of testimony to a grand jury "would have been a criminal violation."

Today the judge in this case ruled that Catherine Herridge must disclose her source to Yanping Chen.

Update: "Judge Christopher Cooper has ruled that despite press freedom concerns, precedent requires a reporter to divulge a source when a litigant with a legitimate case has explored every other avenue for getting the information. The scientist, Yanping Chen, has spent 5 years trying. Herridge, who is being repped by former White House lawyer Pat Philbin, has been fighting the subpoena for her testimony and apparently refused to disclose her source in a recent deposition. Contempt filings are imminent, and Cooper says it's possible the source will release her."

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Today there was a hearing for a Jan 6 defendant named Vitali Gossjankowski regarding whether he should be jailed while awaiting sentencing, for text messages targeting and doxing law enforcement. When the judge ruled that he should, he resisted arrest and had to be restrained by multiple officers.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

The oral argument for Steve Bannon's appeal of his conviction for contempt of Congress is scheduled for 11/9 and we now know that the panel will consist of two Obama appointees (Judges Pillard and Garcia) and one very conservative Trump appointee (Judge Walker). Both sides only have 10 minutes allotted.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

[Voronwë the Faithful]

It turns out that lying doesn't always pay off.

[N.E. Brigand]

It's Nov. 13, 2023, and the FBI continues to arrest people for their part in the events of Jan. 6, 2021.

Today Lawrence Billiter of North Dakota (who also owns a home in South Carolina) was arrested because, after posting on thedonald.win that he was going to the Capitol on Jan. 6th, he helped pull away the fencing that was meant to keep the crowd out, threw a metal pole at a police officer, spent more than an hour in the Capitol, and was back outside fighting with officers until the very end.

Someone reported Billiter's social media posts to the FBI way back on Jan. 14, 2021, and the FBI interviewed him in April of that year.

[N.E. Brigand]

I read the brief. Mr. Biss actually does quite a credible job, and I am now doubtful that the motion to dismiss will be granted, though I will be interested to see what CNN's attorneys say in response.

In two subsequent sentences on the very first page, the brief has the plural of Flynn as both Flynns ("video clearly featuring the Flynns") and Flynn's ("falsely accused the Flynn's"). On the second page there's a related typo: "CNN moved to dismiss the Flynn’s amended complaint" should be "CNN moved to dismiss the Flynns' amended complaint". That error is repeated twice on page 4 -- but at another point on page 4, the plural possessive is spelled correctly. If a lay reader like myself can spot those repeated typographical error in just 30 seconds of scanning the complaint (and further reading reveals similar mistakes throughout the document), I do wonder how the substance holds up.

However, I do trust your assessment of its merits, though I would call out one item. In support of the Flynns' claim that when they recorded themselves on video, in the company of their famous QAnon-supporting relative Michael Flynn, uttering the QAnon oath ("where we go one we go all," which the Flynns' complaint at one point bizarrely claims has no connection to QAnon), they claim they were only intoning a "simple, family, July 4 statement of support for each other" and they say that CNN was already told this: "Powell, a former federal prosecutor, made it crystal clear to CNN in a series of tweets that the oath taken by the Flynn family was not an oath or pledge to QAnon."

And who is "Powell"? Why that would be Sydney Powell, the sometime "Kraken" lawyer for Donald Trump, who has repeatedly promoted QAnon!

Based on the reporting I saw earlier today, I thought the Flynns were throwing Michael Flynn under the bus, and would claim that he misled them, but overall the response seems to want to have it both ways as to whether or not QAnon is a dangerous conspiracy.

Also, was it wise of the Flynns to allege this in their complaint (page 26): "As an agent of the Democratic Party, CNN chose to target the Flynn family"?

Anyway, I'm here for CNN getting discovery, so by all means let the case move forward. Ideally this leads to Sydney Powell taking the Fifth on the stand when asked about her support for QAnon and how far it extended to encouraging the January 6th insurrection, and to the Flynns testifying in court that their brother is the equivalent of a Nazi sympathizer.

- - - - - - - - - -
And speaking of Nazis, there's a new book by Wall Street Journal reporter MIchael Bender (titled Frankly, We Did Win This Election) that includes a previously unreported conversation between President Donald Trump and his chief of staff, John Kelly:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... ender-book

I had almost forgotten about this lawsuit, which is back in the news because:

"Michael Flynn and family pocketed leftover money from his legal defense fund, filing claims" (Semafor).

[N.E. Brigand]

Not easy to watch. This is raw video from the insurrection.
"Shooting and Storming of the US Capitol in Washington DC"

A valuable record of the events, but also at times self-incriminating: the person who filmed that and posted it to Youtube, "Jayden X," is John Sullivan, who has been charged with aiding the rioters, and who liberal activists had come to view over the past year as an agent provocateur for his actions at other protests.

When Donald Trump's lawyer Michael van der Deen today claimed that "One of the first people arrested [for the insurrection] was a leader of Antifa," he was apparently referring to Sullivan, who, as noted above, is not a leader of Antifa.

The Dept. of Justice has filed to seize more than $90,000 that Sullivan apparently made by selling his video to CNN, arguing that Sullivan provoked some of the insurrectionists into violence in order to make money. He can be heard on his own video saying things like "F---, yeah! We are all part of this history" and "It's our house, m---------" and "Let's burn this s--- down." He urged Capitol police officers to let the rioters proceed. There's other video of him admitting that he was only pretending to be a journalist. And right after the insurrection, he told a friend that he "brought [his] megaphone to instigate s---" and that as a result he stood to make "millions of dollars" from the footage he shot.

Also in news of who's to blame for the insurrection, Rep. Carlos Gimenez, Republican of Florida, said yesterday on CNN that it can't have been Donald Trump who incited the rioters because, "I know for a fact that I saw people in my hotel room that were saying they were going to do something at two o'clock. And that happened at nine o'clock in the morning." Please, Congressman, tell us more about the people who were plotting in your hotel room on the morning of the insurrection.

John Sullivan, who filmed the fatal shooting of Ashlii Babbitt on January 6th, is now on trial for his part in the events of that day. He took the stand in his own defense. Today he was cross-examined by prosecutors. And one of Sullivan's own witnesses may not have helped his case:

[N.E. Brigand]

John Sullivan, who filmed the fatal shooting of Ashlii Babbitt on January 6th, is now on trial for his part in the events of that day. He took the stand in his own defense. Today he was cross-examined by prosecutors. And one of Sullivan's own witnesses may not have helped his case.

Sullivan claimed to have been acting only as a reporter on January 6th, but a jury today found him guilty of all seven counts against him.

Edited to add Marcy Wheeler's reminder about how Rudy Giuliani plotted in January 2021 to use Sullivan as a scapegoat.

[N.E. Brigand]

I am very pleased to see that Judge Beryl Howell is not letting Guiliani get away with his bullshit stipulation without clarifying exactly what it means ...

Speaking of Rudy Giuliani:

"A veteran FBI agent told Congress that investigations into Giuliani and other Trump allies were 'suppressed''" (Business Insider).

This agent, Jonathan Buma, had submitted a statement to the Senate Judiciary about this claim in July. (I see that Marcy Wheeler feels some things Buma wrote give her pause about his credibility.)

Today Business Insider has new reporting on Buma. Per is statement, his job included handling confidential informants. According to that article, one of those informants, at least for the past couple years, has been the extreme libertarian, Trump-supporting tech billionaire Peter Thiel. (I first heard of Thiel because two of his companies are named palantír and Mithril.) The article's source is Charles Johnson, a far-right media figure funded by Thiel, who says that he also is an FBI informant who reports to Buma. I'm not sure how unusual this is. I believe that the FBI may often recruit well-connected individuals. There have been rumors for years that Donald Trump himself had been an informant (e.g., on his mob connections) which may have led the FBI to treat him with kid gloves as they started investigating possible Russian connections in 2016. Johnson says that Thiel "was directed by the FBI not to report on his interactions with Donald Trump or other US political figures." I think that also might be a standard policy to keep the FBI out of political affairs.

1. Two days ago, the FBI raided the home of former FBI agent Jonathan Buma on suspicion of mishandling classified information.

2. Also two days ago, Ukraine arrested former officials for treason: prosecutors claim they "worked with Russian intelligence services to destabilize Ukrainian politics." These officials also had worked with Rudy Giuliani in 2020 to provide dirt on Hunter Biden. Today CNN reports that Ukraine believes that effort was funded and directed by the Russian government.

[N.E. Brigand]

In Iowa, the Souix City Journal reports on the trial of Kim Taylor, the wife of Woodbury County Supervisor Jeremy Taylor, a Republican. A jury found Kim Taylor guilty on 26 counts of providing false information in registering and voting, three counts of fraudulent registration and 23 counts of fraudulent voting.

During the 2020 primary and general elections, Taylor, a Vietnam native, approached numerous Vietnamese voters with limited English comprehension and filled out and signed election forms and ballots on behalf of them and their English-speaking children.

It was all part of a scheme, government prosecutors said throughout the six-day trial, to stuff the ballot box for her husband, who ran unsuccessfully for the Republican nomination for a U.S. House seat in the 2020 primary before winning election to the Woodbury County Board of Supervisors that fall.

The scheme came to light when two of the people in whose name Taylor fraudulently voted requested ballots and were told that they had already voted. They hadn't.

Supervisor Taylor is described as an unindicted co-conspirator in his wife's case, and prosecutors say their investigation is ongoing. This was a federal case. The theoretical sentence is up to five years per count, but of course the actual sentence will be far less than that.

[N.E. Brigand]

In prosecutors' memo requesting that convicted January 6th participant Alan Hostetter be sentenced to more than 12 years' imprisonment, they note that as Hostetter drove to the District of Columbia for Jan. 6th (he drove rather than flew so that he could bring weapons for himself and a friend), he "recorded a video, where he called for the execution of political officials he viewed of as traitors: 'Some people, at the highest levels, need to be made an example of, with an execution or two or three.'" But apparently that's been known for a while. Marcy Wheeler seems to think the most significant revelation in the memo is that Hostetter recommended a January 6th protest to Ali Alexander, a key organizer of the January 6th events, on December 16, 2020, some three days before Trump announced that he would hold a rally on that day.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Also: "Court filing reveals Rep. Scott Perry’s vast web of contacts in bid to reverse 2020 election."

Most notable are exchanges between Perry (Republican of Pennsylvania) and Jeffrey Clark, one of Donald Trump's unindicted co-conspirators.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Trump doesn’t have presidential immunity from lawsuits over January 6, appeals court rules

This is hugely important, not only for allowing these lawsuits to go forward but also the implications for the criminal case against Trump. I suspect that Judge Chutkan has been waiting on this decision before ruling on Trump's motion to dismiss that case on the grounds that he has absolute immunity against criminal prosecution (which is nonsense). This decision (unless overturned by the Supreme Court) eliminates even any limited basis for that motion.

[N.E. Brigand]

Since Republicans took control of the House of Representatives last January, they have released selected Capitol video from January 6th and have repeatedly said they'll be releasing all such video. Today House Speaker Mike Johnson explained that the latest delay is to allow Republicans to blur the faces of people shown in this video so that they won't be prosecuted for the laws they broke that day.

Edited to add, courtesy of George Conway:

[Voronwë the Faithful]

America's mayor coward.

Giuliani’s no-show prevents courtroom confrontation with Georgia election workers