The House Jan. 6 Committee released more transcripts of its depositions with key witnesses on Thursday and revealed new details regarding Donald Trump Jr.’s role in the scheme to overturn the 2020 presidential election and keep his father in power.
CNN’s Wolf Blitzer broke the news on Thursday evening and brought in CNN’s senior legal affairs correspondent Paula Reid to explain what she saw in the newly released transcripts.
“CNN is still going through this new material, hundreds and hundreds of pages. But what are you seeing so far?” Blitzer asked Reid.
“That’s right, Wolf. Our teams continue to mine these transcripts for any new details. Let me share some things that stood out to me. First, let’s talk about some of these text messages from the former president’s son, Donald Trump Jr,” Reid began, adding:
There’s one text message on November 5th and it’s from Donald Trump Jr. To then White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. And it lays out a plan, a way to keep his father in power by subverting the electoral process. And what’s significant is that the plan that he shares and outlines is almost identical to the one that was adopted by the former president and his allies in the months that follow.
Now, Trump said he was not the original architect of this plan. He can’t even remember who sent it to him. But he said he wanted to share this specific idea with Meadows because he said it was, quote, ‘the most sophisticated and detailed and that it sounded plausible.’
“Now, initially, Meadows didn’t respond or engage in this text message exchange, but when Trump followed up, Meadows said much of this had merit working on this for Pennsylvania, Georgia and North Carolina already. So here, Wolf, you see the seeds of this effort to subvert the election. These being planted two months before the violence at the Capitol. And in this exchange, this involves the former president’s son and his chief of staff — talk about inner circle,” Reid added before detailing some notable exchanges by Trump White House officials and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC).
“Now, also notable from these transcripts, several high-profile politicians wanting to help push these false claims about voter fraud,” Reid continued, adding:
For example, Senator Lindsey Graham, we learned about his efforts in the transcript from the former president’s lawyer, Christina Bobb. She testified that Lindsey Graham told again Mark Meadows that Graham would become a champion of the president’s fraud claims. All he needed was, quote, ‘five dead voters.’
She recalls, he said, give me, you know, an example of illegals voting. Just give me a very small snapshot that I can take and champion. And this exchange, Wolf, came just a few days before January six, but it shows the White House was trying to get some high-profile allies to amplify these false claims. But here’s the kicker. His legal team actually followed up with Graham. They gave him a memo titled: Chairman Graham Dead Votes Memo for Your Consideration. Now, Bobb testified Graham didn’t do anything with that.
“Graham’s office has not responded to our requests for comment. But one of the big themes that we’ve taken away over the past week in all of these transcripts, Wolf, is that all roads go through the former chief of staff, Mark Meadows, a lot of this questionable conduct, these schemes that they were hatching, everything, appearing to go through the former chief of staff,” Reid concluded.
Watch the full clip above via CNN
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