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    Eastman Attorney Rejects Potential Jan. 6 Plea Deal

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
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    4
    Elvert Barnes, CC BY-SA 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

    A lawyer for John Eastman rejected the prospect of accepting a potential plea deal from the Justice Department special counsel’s investigation into attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

    Eastman’s lawyer, Harvey Silvergate, confirmed to The Hill that his client is one of the unnamed co-conspirators mentioned in Tuesday’s indictment of Trump. (RELATED: Trump Served Third Criminal Indictment)

    In a statement, Silverglate said Eastman has not and will not be engaged in plea bargaining in the case with state or federal prosecutors.

    “With respect to questions as to whether Dr. Eastman is involved in plea bargaining, the answer is no,” the statement read. “But if he were invited to plea bargain with either state or federal prosecutors, he would decline. The fact is, if Dr. Eastman is indicted, he will go to trial. If convicted, he will appeal. The Eastman legal team is confident of its legal position in this matter.”

    The statement also said the recent indictment relies on a “misleading presentation of the record to contrive criminal charges against Presidential candidate Trump and to cast ominous aspersions on his close advisors.” It further states that Pence is on the record casting doubts on the validity of the 2020 election himself.

    “For example, the uninitiated reader of the indictment would have no idea that former Vice President Pence is on record stating that in the 2020 election there were ‘significant allegations of voting irregularities and numerous instances of officials setting aside state election law,’” the statement continues. “This is but one example of the indictment’s false presentation of the record; countless more will be revealed in time.”

    Trump Requests Judge Throw Out Jan. 6 Charges

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
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    4
    Donald Trump via Gage Skidmore Flickr

    On Wednesday, former President Trump asked to dismiss the whole of the government’s election interference case against him, arguing all his actions leading up to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol are protected by presidential immunity. 

    The Hill has more:

    “The prosecution does not, and cannot, argue that President Trump’s efforts to ensure election integrity, and to advocate for the same, were outside the scope of his duties. Instead, the prosecution falsely claims that President Trump’s motives were impure — that he purportedly ‘knew’ that the widespread reports of fraud and election irregularities were untrue but sought to address them anyway,” Trump’s attorneys wrote in the motion. 

    “But as the Constitution, the Supreme Court, and hundreds of years of history and tradition all make clear, the President’s motivations are not for the prosecution or this Court to decide. Rather, where, as here, the President’s actions are within the ambit of his office, he is absolutely immune from prosecution.”

    This is a breaking news story. Click refresh for the latest updates.

    Florida Judge Responds to Trump Team Request

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
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    0
    Gavel via Wikimedia Commons Image

    Florida Judge Aileen Cannon declined to issue a ruling after hearing arguments from Donald Trump and the Department of Justice regarding whether a special master should be appointed to independently review the documents recovered in the FBI’s August 8 raid of Mar-a-Lago.

    The Hill reported that Judge Cannon said a written ruling will come “in due course.”

    On Sunday, Judge Cannon said she was inclined to grant Trump’s request for a special master to independently review the seized materials due to the “exceptional circumstances presented” by the events at Mar-a-Lago.

    Cannon’s remarks triggered a harsh response from the Department of Justice in a Wednesday filing. In the filing, the DOJ picked apart Trump’s request a special master be appointed, calling the move “unnecessary” and even released photos of the recovered documents. (RELATED: Justice Department Responds to Trump’s Special Master Request)

    “Furthermore, appointment of a special master would impede the government’s ongoing criminal investigation and—if the special master were tasked with reviewing classified documents—would impede the Intelligence Community from conducting its ongoing review of the national security risk that improper storage of these highly sensitive materials may have caused and from identifying measures to rectify or mitigate any damage that improper storage caused,” the filing said. “Lastly, this case does not involve any of the types of circumstances that have warranted appointment of a special master to review materials potentially subject to attorney-client privilege.” 

    The DOJ also criticized Trump’s claim that the seized materials were protected by executive privilege.

    “The former President cites no case—and the government is aware of none—in which executive privilege has been successfully invoked to prohibit the sharing of documents within the Executive Branch,” it said. 

    Wednesday night, Trump’s legal team filed a last-minute response to the DOJ. Throughout the filing, Trump’s team argues the National Archives should have expected to find classified material among the documents Trump delivered in January from Mar-a-Lago because they were presidential records. This serves as a definite acknowledgment from Trump that he was in possession of classified material and also torpedoed his previous argument he “declassified everything.”

    Read the late-night filing from Trump below.

    gov.uscourts.flsd_.618763.58.0_4Download

    DeSantis Responds to Abrupt Trump Attacks

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
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    13

    Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is finally responding to the surprise attack from former President Donald Trump last week, calling it “noise.”

    DeSantis was asked by a reporter what he thinks about Trump’s “big announcement” tonight and his thoughts about Trump repeatedly attacking him. (RELATED: Trump Goes Nuclear on Gov. Ron DeSantis, Glenn Youngkin)

    “Well, you know, one of the things I’ve learned in this job is when you’re doing, when you’re leading, when you’re getting things done, you take incoming fire, that’s just the nature of it,” DeSantis said. “I roll out of bed in the morning, I’ve got corporate media outlets that have a spasm, just the fact that I’m getting up in the morning, and it’s constantly attacking, and this is just what’s happened.”

    “I don’t think any governor got attacked more particularly by corporate media than me over my four-year term,” DeSantis continued. “And yet, I think what you learn is all that’s just noise. And really what matters is: Are you leading? Are you getting in front of issues? Are you delivering results for people? And are you standing up for folks? And if you do that, then none of that stuff matters. And that’s what we’ve done.”

    “We focused on results and leadership. And, you know, at the end of the day, I would just tell people to go check out the scoreboard from last Tuesday night,” DeSantis continued. “The fact of the matter is, it was the greatest Republican victory in the history of the state of Florida.”

    Trump also targeted Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin in a shocking message. Both Republican governors have been floated as potential contenders for the Republican presidential nomination.

    Trump is expected to announce his 2024 presidential campaign in a Nov. 15th announcement from Mar-a-Lago.

    However, while DeSantis has decided to move past Trump’s comments the former president seems to be doubling down. In a Tuesday afternoon Truth Social message Trump targeted DeSantis again by pointing out a 2018 gubernatorial ad in which the Florida governor praises him.

    In a tongue-in-cheek ad, seemingly no longer available on his YouTube page, DeSantis was shown building a toy wall and reading a book about Trump to his children, brandishing himself as a “pit bull Trump defender.” 

    “Hopefully TODAY will turn out to be one of the most important days in the history of our Country,” Trump teased in another Truth Social post.

    Peter Navarro To Leave Prison Ahead Of RNC Appearance

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
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    1
    Image via Pixabay

    Sweet freedom…

    Former Trump economic adviser Peter Navarro is set to be released from prison Wednesday after serving a four-month sentence for refusing to comply with a congressional subpoena related to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. 

    After leaving prison Navarro is expected to take the stage at the Republican National Convention, according to an email from former President Trump’s campaign.  

    It’s unclear when Navarro will take the stage in Milwaukee, Wisc. where the GOP’s nominating event is taking place. The convention is scheduled to conclude Thursday evening, only one day after Navarro’s sentence ends. 

    Trump himself said in May he would “absolutely” rehire Navarro if reelected to the White House in November. Navarro has said he does not want a pardon from Trump if reelected or one from President Biden. 

    “I would absolutely have Peter back. This outrageous behavior by the Democrats should not have happened,” Trump said in a statement to The Wall Street Journal.

    I, DONALD TRUMP, WILL ACCEPT YOUR NOMINATION FOR PRESIDENT ON JULY 18TH! WILL YOU PLEASE DONATE ONE MORE TIME BEFORE I TAKE THE STAGE?

    Navarro was convicted last year of two counts of contempt of Congress — one for failing to produce documents related to the probe, and another for skipping his deposition before the House select committee that investigated the events surrounding the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. 

    “It’s crying out for the Supreme Court to do this,” Navarro said of his appeal the day he began his sentence. “But the tragedy here is, because I have not been released pending appeal, I will have already done my time before that is done. 

    “But that’s the price of living in Joe Biden’s America right now,” he added. “God bless you all. I’ll see you on the other side.” 

    YouTube Agrees To Pay Over 20 Million To Settle Trump Lawsuit

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
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    0

    YouTube has agreed to pay Donald Trump $24.5 million after preventing him from posting new videos to his channel after the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riots.

    According to the filing, $22 million will be used to support Trump’s construction of a White House State Ballroom and will be held in a tax-exempt entity called the Trust for the National Mall.

    Tyler Merbler, CC BY 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

    Another $2.5 million will go to the other plaintiffs in the lawsuit — including the American Conservative Union, Andrew Baggiani, Austen Fletcher, Maryse Veronica Jean-Louis, Frank Valentine, Kelly Victory and Naomi Wolf — according to the filing.

    “This Notice of Settlement and Stipulation of Dismissal shall not constitute an admission of liability or fault on the part of the Defendants or their agents, servants, or employees, and is entered into by all Parties for the sole purpose of compromising disputed claims and avoiding the expenses and risks of further litigation,” the filing stated.

    YouTube suspended Trump’s account following the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol, saying at the time that an uploaded video violated its policy for inciting violence. It restored Trump’s channel more than two years later, citing that voters could “hear equally from major national candidates in the run-up to an election.”

    Trump’s lawsuit alleged that YouTube prevented him from “exercising his constitutional right of free speech” by banning him indefinitely from the platform.

    YouTube, which is owned by Google parent company Alphabet, is the latest social media company to agree to settle with Trump this year over the suspension of his accounts following the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

    Meta agreed to settle with Trump by making a donation of $22 million to his presidential library and paying $3 million in legal fees in January.

    The Wall Street Journal quotes Trump lawyer John P. Coale, who brought the suits with lead litigation attorney John Q. Kelly.

    “If he had not been re-elected, we would have been in court for 1,000 years,” Coale said, suggesting that Trump’s return to power motivated the social media companies to settle. “It was his re-election that made the difference.”

    The report said the settlement comes as Google is “under pressure from the Justice Department to break up its ad businesses after a federal judge ruled this spring that the company had created a monopoly in advertising.”

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    Appeals Court Hands Mike Lindell Win

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
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    1
    Mike Lindell via Gage Skidmore Flickr

    Mike Lindell just scored a major legal win in his battle to expose election integrity concerns. On Wednesday, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in Lindell’s favor, tossing out a $5 million arbitration ruling that sought to award a tech contestant prize money from his 2021 “Prove Mike Wrong” challenge.

    In a unanimous decision, the three-judge panel said the arbitration panel overstepped its authority by rewriting clear contract terms to reward software developer Robert Zeidman. “Fair or not, agreed-to contract terms may not be modified,” wrote Judge James Loken in the ruling, reinforcing that legal agreements must be honored—not manipulated for political convenience.

    Lindell called the years-long legal fight a “setup” and declared the decision as “vindication.”

    “This opens a door that no man can shut. I am so excited. I mean, this is an answer to prayer,” Lindell told The Hill.

    The case stemmed from Lindell’s 2021 Cyber Symposium, where he challenged the public to prove that his data—allegedly showing Chinese interference in the 2020 election—wasn’t related to the actual vote. Zeidman submitted a rebuttal, but the internal judges ruled he hadn’t met the challenge’s high bar. When Zeidman took the issue to arbitration, the panel sided with him and awarded the $5 million. Now, that ruling has been reversed by the federal court.

    The appeals court made clear: the arbitration panel violated Minnesota contract law by using outside evidence to redefine what kind of data Lindell had to provide.

    “The panel effectively amended the unambiguous Challenge contract,” the court said.

    The ruling orders a lower court to vacate the arbitration award and halts any effort to force Lindell to pay the $5 million—another setback for those trying to financially crush voices challenging the official 2020 narrative.

    While Lindell continues to face ongoing lawsuits from companies like Dominion and Smartmatic, he remains defiant. Just last month, a Colorado jury hit him with a $2.3 million judgment for alleged defamation—but Lindell isn’t backing down.

    “You’re going to see the big win will be as you watch me melting down these machines and turning them into prison bars,” he declared boldly.

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    Trump Names Two People When Asked About Potential VP Picks

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
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    0

    Trump is narrowing down his search for his next running mate…

    During a weekend interview, former President Donald Trump said he has two potential candidates in mind.

    Trump mentioned Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) and South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem when asked during a Sunday interview with Maria Bartiromo

    “Well, I have a lot of good people. We have a lot of really good people,” Trump said. “I have a lot of good ideas, but I haven’t — and there’s no reason to do that quickly.”

    “I speak to everybody,” he said. “I called Tim Scott … and I said, ‘you’re a much better candidate for me than you are for yourself.’ When I watched Tim, he was fine, he was good, but he was very low-key, et cetera, et cetera.”

    However, Trump admitted he’s still a ways off from making any final decisions on a running mate. The GOP frontrunner told Bartiromo that his priority in choosing a running mate will be choosing “someone who would be a good president.”

    “I watched him in the last week defending me and sticking up for me and fighting for me,” he continued. “I said, man, I said, ‘you’re a much better person for me than you are for yourself’, because, for himself, he was low-key. For me, he’s been a real tiger. He’s been incredible. And others have too.”

    “Kristi Noem has been incredible fighting for me,” Trump added. “She said, I’d never run against him because I can’t beat him. That was a very nice thing to say.”

    On Monday, former Trump senior adviser Kellyanne Conway advised the President to consider choosing a person of color for VP during an op-ed published in The New York Times.

    “With a crisis on the border, economic dissatisfaction, fears about crime, a parents’ rights renaissance and multiple wars and threats across the globe, Mr. Trump’s deputy must be able to navigate chaos and challenges at home and abroad,” Conway wrote.

    “Taking all of this into consideration, if I were advising Mr. Trump, I would suggest he choose a person of color as his running mate, depending on vetting of all possibilities and satisfaction of procedural issues like dual residency in Florida,” Conway wrote. “Not for identity politics a la the Democrats, but as an equal helping to lead an America First movement that includes more union workers, independents, first-time voters, veterans, Hispanics, Asian Americans and African Americans.”

    Conway listed Sen. Tim Scott, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), and Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Fla.) among the potential options.

    This article originally appeared on American Liberty News. Republished with permission.

    Draft Tucker PAC Goes Silent After Threat From Carlson

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
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    1
    Photo via Gage Skidmore Flickr

    A recently launched PAC pressuring former Fox News host Tucker Carlson to run for president has gone silent after receiving a legal threat from Carlson’s lawyer.

    Carlson’s lawyer, Harmeet Dhillon, sent the PAC officers a cease-and-desist letter Monday.

    “Mr. Carlson will not run for President in 2024 under any circumstances, and therefore your misrepresentations are damaging to Mr. Carlson and defrauding his supporters,” Dhillon wrote in the letter, obtained by The Hill. “If you do not immediately cease and desist your efforts to solicit money to ‘draft’ Mr. Carlson, we will use every legal means at our disposal to vindicate his rights and protect his supporters from these misrepresentations.”

    Dhillon added that the PAC did “not have Mr. Carlson’s permission or support to use his name, image, or likeness in your efforts,” accusing them of doing so “for your own benefit” to later sell donor lists, and that taking funds would lead to donors’ “disappointment and frustration.”

    The move came days after the PAC aired a political ad on the conservative outlet Newsmax.

    Chris Ekstrom, the PAC’s chairman and one of its financial backers, told The Hill that the ad had raised only $212 online so far and that he contributed $35,000 of his own money. He noted that the PAC will either donate the funds raised to a charity that Carlson supports or refund it to those who contributed.

    Following the letter, the Draft Tucker PAC said it asked Newsmax to pull the Draft Tucker PAC ads currently running on the network.

    “Tucker’s attorney has contacted us to let us know that Tucker is not a candidate for president nor has any intentions of running and asked us to cease all activities on his behalf. We are going to honor that request,” spokesman and GOP consultant Charlie Kolean said in a statement.

    Carlson has repeatedly said that he would not run for president in 2024 but his influence on the right coupled with his recent ouster from Fox News has left some supporters wondering if he could ultimately change his mind.

    The ex-primetime host has teased the return of his show on Twitter but has yet to share specific details on the venture.

    Earlier this month, The Washington Post published a report that Carlson is in talks with former President Donald Trump to form a new Republican debate forum. (RELATED: Tucker Carlson In Talks With Donald Trump To Host GOP Forum)

    Carlson and his team have discussed the possibility of moderating a candidate forum outside of the traditional protocols surrounding the GOP primary debate system, according to two people familiar with the considerations. These people said the setup — as well as Carlson’s availability to take on that kind of role, given the noncompete constraints of his contract with Fox — remain unclear. But Carlson has personally expressed enthusiasm about the idea, according to people familiar with his comments. At least one major candidate — Trump — has told Carlson he’s interested, according to a person familiar with the exchange.

    Report: Manhattan DA Signals Openness To Delaying Trump Criminal Sentencing

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
    -
    1

    This could be big…

    The Manhattan district attorney’s office said it would not oppose delaying former President Trump’s sentencing, a significant step forward for Trump who has sought to delay sentencing until after the 2024 presidential election.

    In a two-page letter responding to Trump’s delay request that became public Monday, prosecutors said some of his other arguments had no merit, and “there are strong reasons” why Trump should not be permitted to appeal an unfavorable immunity ruling prior to sentencing.  

    “Nonetheless, given the defense’s newly-stated position, we defer to the Court on whether an adjournment is warranted to allow for orderly appellate litigation of that question, or to reduce the risk of a disruptive stay from an appellate court pending consideration of that question,” state lawyer Matthew Colangelo wrote in the filing.  

    Prosecutors also noted that “significant public safety and logistical steps” by numerous agencies are necessary when Trump appears in court, raising concern that such steps would be taken ahead of his sentencing and then “disturbed” by the former president’s appeals. 

    manhattan-da-response-to-trump-sentencing-delay-requestDownload

    Prosecutors’ letter went on to flatly reject Trump’s other arguments. Howeverm their lack of objection to delaying Trump’s sentencing raises a strong possibility that it will be pushed deeper into the campaign season or even past November’s election. 

    In May, Trump was found guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records in connection with a hush money deal his ex-fixer made with a porn actor who said she had an affair with Trump, which he has denied. It marked the first criminal conviction of any former president.  

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