Fraud allegations: Trump was ‘out of touch with reality’, says William Barr

For its second day of hearings, the committee is trying to illustrate that, on the night of November 3 to 4, 2020 – the date of the presidential election – Donald Trump had been clearly informed by his team that he had no reason to believe that the election had been plagued by massive fraud, and that he consciously decided to spread this lie.

William Barr, who was Attorney General of the United States under Donald Trump, notably claimed in a video extract that the ex-president was detached from reality with his theory of massive fraud and stolen elections.

I told him that his allegations of voter fraud were falsehe added.

The committee responsible for investigating the Capitol insurrection is in its second day of hearings.

Photo : Getty Images / Chip Somodevilla

We didn’t have the numbers

Quoting a family emergency, the former campaign manager of Donald Trump, who was also due to appear on Monday, finally gave up at the last minute. In fact, Bill Stepien was unable to appear before the committee because his wife was in labor, according to information provided by his attorney.

The committee therefore presented Monday excerpts from an interview it conducted with Mr. Stepien prior to his testimony. In this interview, Stepien says he advised President Trump to come before reporters on election night to say it was too early to declare a winner.

« We didn’t have the numbers to claim victory on election night. »

— A quote from Bill Stepien, former Donald Trump campaign manager

Several video clips of allegations made by Donald Trump following the election were shown Monday, during the second day of hearings before the committee responsible for investigating the attempted insurrection on Capitol Hill.

Photo : Getty Images

However, the principal concerned, Donald Trump, did the opposite of what Mr. Stepien advised him, preferring to follow the path suggested by his lawyer Rudy Giuliani who, according to one of the president’s advisers testifying before the commission, was clearly inebriated. In front of the press, Mr. Trump therefore claimed that the election had been stolen from him, an allegation he had already begun to propagate several months before the vote.

Following the confirmation of Joe Biden’s victory, the president is increasingly angry, says Bill Stepien. The leader then decides to change his teams to surround himself with people who support him in his crusade.

On November 19, this new legal team held a most confusing press conference. Sidney Powell, one of Donald Trump’s lawyers, accuses Venezuela, Cuba and the Democrats of having hatched an electoral plot.

At his side, Rudy Giuliani denounces a scandalous iron curtain of censorship. Under the heat of the spotlights, a brown liquid, hair dye, begins to drip down her temples.

Rudy Giuliani during a press conference on November 19, 2020.

Photo : Archyde.com / Jonathan Ernst

Four days later, Justice Secretary William Barr visits the White House. It was a bit awkwardsays the minister in a video broadcast Monday by the commission.

On several occasions, he said, the two men together examined the alleged electoral fraud advanced by Donald Trump. nonsense expressed by a man detached from realitybelieves the Minister of Justice who will resign on December 14.

The committee, made up of seven elected Democrats and two elected Republicans, is also trying to prove that between election night and the January 6, 2021 insurrection, these allegations of fraud made by Donald Trump allowed him to amass hundreds of millions of dollars from his supporters.

These funds were to be used for future legal struggles. According to the committee, some of this money was instead directed to certain businesses or properties owned by Donald Trump.

Statistically impossible

Chris Stirewalt, former political editor for Fox News, was also heard by the committee on Monday. It was Mr. Stirewalt who made the decision on election night to declare Joe Biden the winner in Arizona. And this is also the reason why he lost his job at Fox News, a TV network usually very favorable to Donald Trump.

Mr Stirewalt explained the reasons for his decision and how, statistically, the allegations of massive fraud made by Donald Trump were simply impossible.

Chris Stirewalt, a former Fox News employee, testified Monday before the committee responsible for investigating the attempted insurrection on Capitol Hill.

Photo : afp via getty images / Jonathan Ernst

The committee has been investigating for nearly a year the responsibility of Donald Trump in the assault on the Capitol by his supporters, who tried to interrupt the certification of the victory of Joe Biden, convinced of fraud in the presidential election of 2020.

On Thursday, during its first hearing devoted to the presentation of its conclusions, the committee plunged the United States back into the violence of the attack on the United States Congress on January 6, 2021, revealing never-before-seen videos of the assault.

Donald Trump has repeatedly denounced this investigation as a witch hunt which, according to him, shame in usa. His party has already promised to bury his work if he were to take control of the Chamber during the mid-term legislative elections in November.

Notably, this second day of hearings was, this time, broadcast by the Fox News network, which had not broadcast the work of the first day.

We will have to see what that means in the next primaries.mentioned in an interview on the show 24•60 Martine St-Victor, communications strategist. According to her, the broadcast of the hearings in the morning, at prime time and with a predominantly female audience who will vote more, might have a certain impact, especially with a view to improving the image of the Republican Party, which is not pro-Trump.