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CORRUPTION

Facing Subpoena and Calls for Impeachment Embattled AG Barr Agrees to Testify Before Congress – In 5 Weeks

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Attorney General Bill Barr has agreed to testify before the House Judiciary Committee rather than risk a likely subpoena and court fight. His testimony will not be until July 28, nearly five weeks from today.

Barr’s spokesperson made the announcement, framing it as a casual appearance.

Barr is facing growing calls for his impeachment or for him to resign over what many – including two DOJ whistleblowers testifying before the House Wednesday – are calling his extreme politicization of the Justice Dept.

This will be the first time Barr has appeared before Congress to testify in more than a year. Barr was supposed to appear before the House on March 31 but did not. On June 1 he told House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler that “he would not appear at a hearing that the committee wanted to hold on June 9,” Roll Call reported.

Barr testified before the Senate on May 1 of last year. Also last year Barr testified before a House Appropriations subcommittee on April 9 and a Senate Appropriations subcommittee on April 10.

 

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CORRUPTION

JD Vance Says in 2020 He Wouldn’t Certify Election: ‘Let the Country Have the Debate’

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Ohio Senator JD Vance, the Republican vice presidential candidate, said Monday that if he were in former Vice President Mike Pence’s place, he would not have certified the election on January 6, 2021.

Speaking as part of a panel on the All-In Podcast, Vance told cohost Jason Calacanis the issue wasn’t necessarily Pence deciding not to “overturn the election results,” but rather that “Mike Pence could have done more to sort of surface some problems.”‘

Calacanis replied by asking Vance directly if he would have certified the election.

READ MORE: ‘BadgerPundit’: Top Trump Attorney in Fake Electors Plot Hid Secret Twitter Account

“I happen to think that there were issues back in 2020, particularly in Pennsylvania. Even some of the courts that refused to throw out certified ballots did say that there were ballots that were cast in an illegal way. They just refused to actually decertify the election results in Pennsylvania,” Vance said. “Do I think that we could have had a much more rational conversation about how to ensure that only legal ballots are cast? Yes. And do I think that Mike Pence could have played a better role? Yes.”

Calacanis asked Vance again if he’d have certified the election, and Vance appears to back the plan to send fake electors to cause confusion in the certification process.

“I would have asked the states to submit alternative slates of electors and let the country have the debate about what actually matters and what kind of an election that we have. That’s what I would have done,” Vance said. “The important part is we would have had a big debate. And it doesn’t necessarily mean the results would have been any different, but we would, at least, have had the debate in Pennsylvania and Georgia about how to better have a rational election system where legal ballots are cast.”

Democrats heavily criticized Vance’s statement.

“Donald Trump picked JD Vance as his running mate because he knows that Vance will do what his last vice president wouldn’t—undermine our democracy and help him try to overturn election results. Now, Vance is making it clear: instead of certifying the 2020 election, Vance ‘would have asked the states’ to send slates of fake electors and throw our election into chaos to help Trump stay in power. Vance is clearly laying out the stakes of this election for our democracy and our basic freedoms, and showing voters that if given the chance, he’ll try to replace the rule of law with the rule of Trump,” Alex Floyd, the rapid response director for the DNC, said in a statement.

Vance’s claims of there being illegal ballots in Pennsylvania appears to be based on a claim from former President Donald Trump in 2022. Trump said that a then-recent Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruling that ballots sent in undated envelopes will not be counted in that year’s election meant that the 2020 election was “rigged, but they’ll let that result stand.”

The Associated Press debunked Trump’s claim, reporting that not only did Trump misrepresent the court’s ruling, but even if his claim was accurate, throwing out these ballots would not have mattered in the election.

 

 

 

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CORRUPTION

Texas AG Ken Paxton Threatens Democrat-Leaning Counties Not To Mail Out Voter Registration Forms

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Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton threatened to sue two large, Democratic-leaning counties should they proceed with their plan to mail voter registration forms to eligible voters who are currently unregistered.

Bexar and Harris counties have proposed using third-party vendors to mail the forms. Though the plan is to only send them to people who are eligible to be registered, Paxton said that the forms could fall in the hands of those who are ineligible to vote, which would “encourage” them to register illegally, according to KSAT-TV.

“At worst, it may induce the commission of a crime by encourage individuals who are ineligible to vote to provide false information on the form,” Paxton said, according to KENS-TV. “Either way, it is illegal, and if you move forward with this proposal, I will use all available legal means to stop you.”

READ MORE: Angela Paxton Voted Against Being Barred From Voting in Husband’s Impeachment Trial

Bexar and Harris counties both have high Latino populations, with nearly 20% of all Texan Latinos living in Harris County, according to The Hill. Paxton has faced accusations of specifically trying to suppress the Latino vote. Following raids on the homes of Latino voting activists, the League of United Latin American Citizens called for an inquiry into alleged civil rights violations, according to USA Today.

At least six LULAC volunteers had their homes raided by police, and had voter registration materials seized, along with phones, computers and other electronic devices, USA Today reported. Paxton said the search warrants were “part of an ongoing election integrity investigation” into “allegations of election fraud and vote harvesting that occurred during the 2022 elections.”

LULAC says one of the people raided was Lidia Martinez, an 87-year-old member of the organization. On August 20, her home was raided, and she was interrogated for hours, according to LULAC.

There is no evidence of widespread voter fraud in the 2022 elections in Texas or elsewhere in the United States. Paxton’s most recent probe, despite the raids, has led to no charges thus far, according to the Texas Tribune.

Paxton has been conducting similar raids and probes into election fraud as far back as 2018, the Washington Post reports.

“The goal isn’t to get a conviction,” said Chad Dunn, legal director of the UCLA Voting Rights Project, who has defended Texans against election-fraud claims, told the Post. “It’s to set up a climate of fear around voting. He uses these witch hunts to gain attention and money.”

Last year, Paxton was impeached by the state House on 20 separate articles of impeachment. The Texas Senate, which skews Republican 19 to 12, voted to acquit him. The impeachment charges mostly centered around allegations Paxton used his position to help a campaign donor under investigation by the FBI for fraud.

 

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CORRUPTION

Nearly Half of Trump Supporters Expect 2024 Election Will Not Have Accurate Vote Counts

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Nearly half of former President Donald Trump supporters do not think the results of the November election will be fairly reported, according to a new poll.

A USA Today/Suffolk poll reported that 42% of Trump supporters said they were “not confident” the count will be accurate.

Even though 56% of those likely to vote for Trump expressed some confidence of a fair election, the vast majority of those, 45%, say they’re only “somewhat confident.” Only 11% said they were “very confident” the election will be fair. More than a quarter of MAGA voters say they likely wouldn’t accept the outcome if Trump loses.

Supporters of Vice President Kamala Harris are more confident in the fairness of the election. Just 2% expressed doubt in the accuracy of election results. Another 68% of likely Harris voters said they were “very confident” in the fairness, with 29% who were only “somewhat confident.”

READ MORE: Trump Ally’s Stunning Request: ‘If This Election Doesn’t Go Our Way the Next Day We Fight’

The USA Today/Suffolk poll has a margin of error of 3.1%, and polled 1,000 people via telephone between August 25-28.

Trump has been seeding doubts among his followers about the fairness of the election. He’s said he’ll commit to the election results only “if everything’s honest.” He’s said the same thing in the 2016 and 2020 elections, which he didn’t. In 2016, when he won, he accepted the results. But in 2020, he famously didn’t, and his followers rioted in the nation’s capital on January 6, 2021 in an attempt to stop the election certification.

Trump continues to say the 2020 election was “rigged,” even as recently as last week. Trump and his lawyer, Alina Habba, posted a New York Post headline to Trump’s social network Truth Social. The Post reported that the Biden administration pressured Facebook to censor COVID misinformation and that Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg said the platform should not have suppressed the reporting on Hunter Biden’s laptop.

“This is exactly what this administration (WHICH INCLUDES KAMALA) has done to our country. Censorship is what happens in communist countries not this republic. They have gagged my client, his lawyers in and out of courtrooms and his team. Now, we once again have proof that they are gagging our media and censoring America. Kamala is hiding because she can’t answer for her actions. Still have doubts? TRUMP 2024 Make America Free Again,” Habba wrote.

“This is what everyone’s been waiting for — THE 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION WAS RIGGED!” Trump added.

There have been substantiated allegations of impropriety in the 2020 election. But Trump himself has been blamed in those instances, facing accusations of election interference.

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