The Guardian
Democrats ask the FBI to investigate Trump’s call in Georgia
Ted Lieu and Kathleen Rice say: ‘We believe Donald Trump was involved in soliciting, or conspiring to commit, a series of election crimes’ * US policy – live coverage Two Democrats have asked the FBI to open a criminal investigation into Donald Trump telephone call in which he pressured Georgia state officials to annul the presidential election in his favor. The US president scolded and begged Brad Raffensperger, Georgia’s top electoral official, to “find” enough votes to reverse Joe Biden’s victory in the state, according to an audio The recording went public on Sunday. The revelation sparked a heated debate over whether the call violated federal laws that prohibit interference in elections. Ted Lieu, of California, and Kathleen Rice, of New York, in the House of Representatives, demanded that a case be opened. “As members of Congress and former prosecutors, we believe that Donald Trump was involved in soliciting, or conspiring to commit, a series of criminal elections,” they wrote to FBI director Christopher Wray. “We ask that you immediately open a criminal investigation against the president.” Under United States law, it is a crime to deprive voters of a free or fair election “deliberately”. Eric Holder, a former attorney general, tweeted: “While you listen to the tape, consider this federal criminal status.” During the hour-long call on Saturday, Trump made refuted allegations of fraud and raised the vague possibility of a “crime” if the Georgia Secretary of State and other officials did not change the count of certified votes. “All I want to do is this,” said the president. “I just want to find 11,780 votes, one more than us. Because we won in the state. ”Raffensperger, a Republican, pointed out that Georgia had counted its votes three times before certifying Biden’s victory by 11,779 votes. “President Trump, we have had several cases and we have had to respond in court to the cases and disputes,” he said. “We don’t agree that you won.” Trump insisted: “I won this election by hundreds of thousands of votes. No way did I miss Georgia. ”He defended conspiracy theories circulating in the right-wing media, including that hundreds of thousands of votes mysteriously appeared in Fulton County, which includes Atlanta. Officials said there was no evidence of this. Interviewed at ABC, Raffensperger said: “It was pretty obvious very early on that we had debunked each of these theories in the beginning, but President Trump continues to believe them.” Gabriel Sterling, manager of the implementation of voting systems for the office of the Secretary of State of Georgia, gave a press conference during which he refuted, point to point, in detail, the statements of Trump and his team during Saturday’s call to Raffensperger. “This is easy, proven false,” said Sterling. “However, the president persists and, in doing so, undermines the faith of Georgians in the electoral system, especially the Georgian Republicans in this case.” Sterling pleaded with Georgians to vote for tomorrow’s second round, urging them to ignore the president’s baseless allegations.house had made 18 attempts to call Raffensperger in the past two months before giving in. Raffensperger said he did it against his best “He said more, we heard,” he said. “But I want to make it clear that the data he has is simply wrong. He had hundreds and hundreds of people he said were dead who voted. We found two. it’s just an example of his bad data. “Asked if he considered Trump’s request legal, the Secretary of State replied,” I’m not a lawyer. All I know is that we will follow the law, follow the process. The truth is important , and we’ve been fighting these rumors for the past two months. “Trump may have violated Georgia state laws by requesting electoral fraud. Raffensperger said,” I understand that the Fulton County District Attorney wants to take a look at this. Perhaps it is the appropriate place for this. Fani’s prosecutor Fani Willis said on Monday that he found Trump’s call “disturbing” and said that if she were forwarded to the case, she would “enforce the law without fear or favor.” State law is not subject to the presidential pardon power, which Trump recently used for allies and which some observers think he can try to apply to himself. As in so many previous outrages, the Republicans did not condemn the president. Kevin McCarthy, the party leader in the House, told Fox News: “The president has always been concerned with the integrity of the election, and the president believes that there are things that have happened in Georgia for which he wants to be held responsible.” The incident echoed a 2019 call in which Trump tried to strengthen the president of Ukraine to investigate Biden, while retaining military support. This led to impeachment, but a repeat seems unlikely just two weeks before Trump stepped down. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the second Democrat in the Senate, said that Trump’s conduct “deserves nothing less than a criminal investigation.” Bernie Sanders, an independent senator from Vermont told MSNBC: “It’s unprecedented. It is the most consequential attack on American democracy in the history of our country … This is what the mafia does … This is outrageous. This is not just impeachment, it is certainly a criminal offense. The revelations fueled anxiety that Trump would stop for nothing to cling to power. All 10 living ex-defense secretaries published a joint article in the Washington Post warning that the military should not be used to change the outcome of the election. The tape also threatened to suspend the second round of elections in Georgia that will determine Senate control. Republicans Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue supported Trump. Internal party fights may lead some voters to stay home in protest. Also on Monday, Atlanta’s top federal prosecutor stepped down, the day after the audio recording of Trump’s call on Saturday was made public, during which the president called him “never-Trumper.” “BJay” Pak, who was appointed by Trump, announced his resignation as United States attorney for the northern Georgia district in a statement, which did not say why Pak was leaving or what he planned to do next.