Jun 21 2022 23:55
The commission investigating the attack on the Capitol Building is trying to find out whether former US President Donald Trump pressured local officials in some major US states to cancel the November 2020 election result that brought Democrat Joe Biden to the White House.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Ravensberger is expected to testify about a phone call with Donald Trump in which the latter asked him to “find” nearly 12,000 ballot papers in his name, enough to defeat his opponent, Joe Biden, in the Republican-controlled southern state.
But Brad Ravensberger did not succumb to Trump’s pressure and was later subjected to threats like other state officials and received security protection.
Arizona House of Representatives Speaker Rusty Powers is expected to testify about the pressures exerted by the former president and his attorneys, Rudy Giuliani, and Jenny Thomas, the Republican activist and wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, to cancel the election results in this conservative state (southwest).
“We’re going to show the president’s role in trying to get states to appoint replacement electors,” Democrat Adam Schiff said Sunday, referring to the officials tasked with certifying votes.
In the US electoral system, large electors choose the winner of the elections in their states.
According to the Parliamentary Committee of Inquiry, Donald Trump wanted to replace senior voters with a number of his followers through false testimony.
Rep. Schiff added that for this plan to work, the respective state’s representatives would have had to accept the new slate of electors. “They didn’t do it and (Donald Trump’s team) kept putting pressure,” he said.
For more than a year, the inquiry, made up of seven Democrats and two Republicans, has been hearing more than 1,000 witnesses, including two of the former president’s sons, to shed light on Donald Trump’s actions before, during and after the Capitol attack.
The committee may also call in former Vice President Mike Pence for questioning about the extensive pressure that Donald Trump applied to trying to prevent him from certifying Joe Biden’s victory in the January 6, 2021 presidential election.
These pressures were the focus of the committee’s third session last Thursday.
Source: AFP
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