Aides to the commission said the hearing would also show how Trump and his allies devised a scheme to present fake voter lists.
Trump’s campaign of pressure on government officials took place in many key states, where he lost to Joe Biden. The commission plans to focus on the actions Trump has taken to try to cancel the election, as well as the roles played by his lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, and then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows.
The aides said the commission intended to show that the then president had been warned that the actions he was taking by falsely claiming electoral fraud and pressure from state and local officials risked violence, but he did.
Aides to the commission said witnesses testifying in Arizona and Georgia on Tuesday would be able to talk about the White House pressure campaign and the reaction it received from Trump supporters.
Witnesses in Georgia include Rafensperger and its chief operating officer, Gabe Stirling, both facing relentless attacks by Trump after verifying the state election. Fulton County Election Officer Vandrea Arshaye “Shaye” Moss, who was falsely accused by Trump of ballot fraud, will also testify to the reaction she faced.
Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers, a Republican, will testify to the pressure he received from Trump and Giuliani, according to committee aides.
The commission plans to show video testimonies of testimonies of officials in other states, where Trump and his allies have been pressuring government officials to try to block Biden’s election victory.
The relationship with Meadows
Spokesman Adam Schiff, who will lead Tuesday’s hearing, told the Los Angeles Times on Monday that the hearing would show Meadows playing an “intimate role” in efforts to pressure Georgia lawmakers and election officials .
The California Democrat said the committee would release new text messages indicating that Meadows wanted to send autographed hats “Make America Great Again” to those conducting a post-election audit of Georgia.
The commission’s aides said the hearing would “demonstrate his involvement” in Georgia on the eve of January 6th.
Meadows has repeatedly turned to Rafensperger since the 2020 election, according to text reports received from CNN, and he participated in Trump’s January 2021 conversation, where the former president asked Rafensperger to “find” the votes needed by the then president to win.
As the call continued, Meadows sent messages to the Undersecretary of State urging him to end the call, which is now at the heart of the Fulton County investigation into whether any of the actions taken by Trump or his allies in connection with the Georgian election , were criminal.
Testimony to those who have responded to Trump’s attacks
Witnesses will be able to testify firsthand on Tuesday about the impact of the Trump campaign and false allegations of the election – as they were all subjected to attacks and threats.
Assistants said Bowers, Arizona’s secretary of state, would be able to testify about the “harassment campaign” he underwent on the eve of Jan. 6 and the months that followed.
Rafensperger and Stirling were attacked by Trump and his allies to verify Georgia’s choice. Stirling warned at a press conference in December 2020 that “everything has gone too far” after local election officials were subjected to threats and harassment.
Moss, who served in the Fulton County Elections in 2020, will testify to how her mother’s life and her life were turned upside down and they were forced into hiding after Moss was accused by Trump of carrying out a fake scheme. ballots, according to commission aides. She and another election official sued Giuliani last year.
In her written testimony Monday, Moss said false stories accusing her of voter fraud led to death threats.
Raffensperger’s winning lap
Rafensperger testified after easily defeating Republican Jodie Hayes in a Trump-backed primary challenge last month.
Trump has made the ouster of Rafensperger and Gov. Brian Kemp one of his top priorities after Georgian Republican officials refuted his false allegations of fraud in the 2020 state election and confirmed Biden’s election. But Kemp and Rafensperger easily won their races, noting a rare case in which Trump was defeated in an effort to oust Republicans who cut him off after the election.
Interestingly, Georgia is holding a second round of primary elections on Tuesday, an election for which Rafensperger and Sterling are said to be responsible at the same time as they testify before the House election commission.
The conspiracy of the fake voters
In addition to campaigning for pressure on civil servants, the elected commission plans to focus Tuesday’s hearing on efforts to present pro-Trump voter lists, which has emerged as a guiding principle for a broader plan to cancel the 2020 election.
CNN previously reported that Trump’s campaign officials have watched efforts to raise illegitimate voters in seven different states that Trump lost. The idea was that when Congress convened to verify the Jan. 6 election, states would have dueling voter lists so they wouldn’t be automatically awarded to Biden.
Federal prosecutors are reviewing fake college election certificates created by Trump’s allies, who falsely declared him the winner in seven states he lost in 2020. The fake IDs were sent to the National Archives in the weeks after the election and did not affect the election results. .
Georgia’s Fulton County Attorney’s Office, which is conducting a separate criminal investigation into Trump’s efforts to cancel the 2020 election, is investigating attempts to present fake voter lists as part of the investigation.
The hearings will not be chronological
Last week, the commission focused on the campaign of pressure that then-Vice President Mike Pence faced with Trump and his allies in the days before Jan. 6. Trump’s attention was focused on Pence.
The committee’s out-of-office hearings are probably due to timetable problems more than anything else. Last week, for example, the commission originally planned to hold a hearing with the Department of Justice the day before Pence’s hearing. This hearing is now expected this Thursday.
The change means the committee is focusing its hearings on various topics in the election cancellation campaign, instead of telling a natural chronological story of the scheme that was set up for what happened on January 6th.
However, the last two hearings will focus on the day of the Capitol uprising: first on the extremists who attacked the Capitol, and then on the response – or lack thereof – from Trump in the White House.
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