As Michael Cohen has said in the past?
Trump never ‘tells’ you to commit a crime….
He ‘hints’ at it….
He’s still doing this apparently….
Throughout the call, Raffensperger and his office’s general counsel rejected his assertions, explaining that Trump is relying on debunked conspiracy theories and that President-elect Joe Biden’s 11,779-vote victory in Georgia was fair and accurate.
Trump dismissed their arguments.
“The people of Georgia are angry, the people in the country are angry,” he said. “And there’s nothing wrong with saying, you know, um, that you’ve recalculated.”
Raffensperger responded: “Well, Mr. President, the challenge that you have is, the data you have is wrong.”
At another point, Trump said: “So look. All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state.”
The rambling, at times incoherent conversation, offered a remarkable glimpse of how consumed and desperate the president remains about his loss, unwilling or unable to let the matter go and still believing he can reverse the results in enough battleground states to remain in office….
Note….
Just to recap. In the national vote,
won 81,283,098 votes (51.3%) and
won 74,222,958 votes (46.8%). All 50 States & DC certified the results. On Dec. 14, the Electoral College affirmed Biden won 306 Electoral Votes to Trump’s 232. (270 needed to win)
Listening to the audio of Trump on that call is nauseating.
Crooked as the day is long….
And other GOPer’s carrying g the water for the Big Guy…
Disgusting….
Matt McDermott
@mattmfm
Every network should be breaking into coverage right now with a Special Report to share with viewers Donald Trump, on tape, threatening a Secretary of State to manufacture votes to steal an election. The most damning tape since Watergate.
A Gangster doing what a gangster does.
Kyle Griffin
@kylegriffin1
Paul Ryan: “It is difficult to conceive of a more anti-democratic and anti-conservative act than a federal intervention to overturn the results of state-certified elections and disenfranchise millions of Americans.”
He ends: “Joe Biden’s victory is entirely legitimate.”
Josh Marshall
@joshtpm
The President is committing multiple crimes in a criminal conspiracy to overturn an election. Numerous elected officials and a dozen senators are conspiring with him. https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/trump-georgia-secretary-of-state-raffensperger-hourlong-call-overturn-election-results… via
@TPM
Trump demanded Georgia’s secretary of state ‘find’ him votes to overturn election result in hour-long harangue
Hayley Miller·Senior reporter, HuffPost
Sun, January 3, 2021, 1:41 PM EST
Hayley Miller · Senior reporter, HuffPost
Sun, January 3, 2021, 1:41 PM EST
President Donald Trump on Saturday pressured Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a fellow Republican, to recalculate the state’s tally of presidential election votes to overturn President-elect Joe Biden’s win.
In the hour-long phone call, a recording of which was first obtained by The Washington Post, Trump pushed baseless conspiracy theories about voter fraud and told Raffensperger that Georgians are “angry” with the election results.
“We have won this election in Georgia,” Trump falsely claimed during the call. “And there’s nothing wrong with saying that, Brad. You know, I mean, having the correct ― the people of Georgia are angry. … And there’s nothing wrong with saying that, you know, that you’ve recalculated.”
Raffensperger can be heard pushing back on Trump’s request, telling the president that the data he used to back up his claims are “wrong.”
“All I want to do is this: I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have,” Trump told Raffensperger at another point in the conversation. “Because we won the state.”
With less than three weeks left until the presidential inauguration, Trump still has not conceded the race to Biden and continues to falsely claim that the election was “rigged” against him. He has focused special attention on Georgia, which he won in 2016 but lost to Biden in November by fewer than 13,000 votes.
But top Georgia officials ― including Raffensperger and Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican who was a vocal supporter of the president leading up to the election ― have said the state’s election process was free and fair and that the results are legitimate.
Neither the Justice Department nor election officials nationwide have found any evidence of widespread voter fraud or ballot-counting irregularities.
During the Saturday call, Trump told Raffensperger that he “should want to have an accurate election” and pointed out that the secretary of state is a Republican.
“We believe that we do have an accurate election,” Raffensperger said.
Trump later accused Raffensberger of committing a “criminal offense” by knowingly covering up a conspiracy against the president and warned the secretary of state that his actions would be “very costly in many ways.”
“I think you have to say that you’re going to reexamine it,” Trump said. “And you can reexamine it but reexamine it with people that want to find answers.”
The Post published audio clips of the call hours after Trump and Raffensberger exchanged barbs on Twitter. The president had claimed the Georgia secretary of state was “unwilling” to answer questions about so-called voter fraud during their conversation Saturday.
“Respectfully, President Trump: What you’re saying is not true,” Raffensberger tweeted in response. “The truth will come out.”…
Raffensperger told Trump Saturday that he stands by the state’s election numbers and reminded the president that he can pursue challenges to those numbers in the court system if he deems it necessary.
“You would be respected, really respected if this thing could be straightened out before the election,” Trump told him. “You have a big election coming up on Tuesday.”…
https://news.yahoo.com/trump-georgia-secretary-of-state-pressure-184119233.html
DSD I moved ur comment to the post on this…..
Turns out there where others on the call including Meadows who tried to help Trump get someone TO commit a crime….
For anyone else?
This WOULD qualify for conspiracy ….
The offer IS the crime in this case…
There IS an intent…
Jack?
Preet Bharara
@PreetBharara
The odds of Trump declaring a self pardon just went up a bunch
Or he quits and has Pence pardon him?
Fox News has nothing about this right now….
They haven’t played the tape because I assume Raffensperger (or whomever) did not send it to them.
Raffensperger recorded it (legally) and sent it to the media. He has some major cojones. Good for him.
And it’s not like the election would even hinge on Georgia.
Trump is just completely desperate for Biden to get less electoral votes than he got in 2016. He is a very sick person and there are far too many enablers.
The Big Guy is just in an Alternate Universe….
And NOT well…..
This gets BIGGER by the minute….
Really?
I think those support him will continue to support him on this.
“See he’sfighting ,the election was stolen, he has to take extreme actions “etc etc etc.
They aren’t going to stop defending the gangster now!
You just don’t get it.
I can’t see any prosecutor trying to prosecute this.
Does the action rise to the level of a crime for ANYONE except Trump as President?
Trump could shoot someone in cold blood and his supporter’s would back him…
That is NOT the question….
Ur view on The law?
The action does seem to meet the definition of the crime….
One can make an argument that he was soliciting a criminal act.
He would argue that he really believed he won and he was just urging That the Sec of State confirm it.
It doesnt matter.It isn’t going to be prosecuted.
Thanks…..
“…the only morality they recognize is that which will further their cause,meaning they reserve to themselves to commit any crime,to lie,to cheat in order to attain(power)..”
Ronald Reagan referring to the old Soviet Union.,1981
A pretty good summation of Trump and his supporters.
What I gathered from the excerpts I heard do seem to rise (or sink) from an earnest inquiry, expressed strongly, into a criminal attempt to queer a legitimate election result through intimidation and pressure.
No democracy, and no republic based on laws, can tolerate strong-arming an election official to falsify a vote.
It’s one thing to pressure or lobby Katherine Harris or Brian Kemp to count ballots more accurately (or to ask about voting machines); it’s another to more-than-imply a criminal prosecution (when as President you oversee the U.S. Department of Justice) or political retribution (this week or next year) if the Secretary of State comes up with numbers unfavourable to you.
In MY mind this IS a crime and those with him part parties to it….
But Jack IS correct….
Donald J Trump IS the President of the United States of America….
Nothing will come of this except embarrassment for some other Republicans….
Trump would the same thing again in a heartbeat….
I would think that any attempt to alter election results is potentially criminal – although I agree there is no chance he would be prosecuted. In truth, this conversation Trump had is not significantly any different from many of his other recent conversations.
What a shame eh Z?
For those with time on their hands and great deal of patience,
here’s the transcript of Trump’s call:
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/03/politics/trump-brad-raffensperger-phone-call-transcript/index.html
and here’s the audio recording:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/c/embed/3f9426f4-7937-4718-8a8e-9d6052001991
Thanks DSD….