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Leaked Text Messages Outline Women for America First Was Coordinating With Trump’s White House for Jan 6: Report
Rolling Stone obtained text messages that show the coordination between Jan. 6 attackers of the U.S. Capitol and former President Donald Trump’s White House.
According to the report, rally organizer Amy Kremer was focusing on food instead of what was happening down the street of her hotel at the U.S. Capitol. Among other things, Kremer is the founder of Women For America First and is a long-time tea party activist.
Kremer’s text messages made it clear that she was speaking with the White House for events that happened after Trump’s loss in November.
First, she hosted the March for Trump bus tour that would come to Washington to protest the president’s loss.
“For those of you that weren’t aware, I have jumped off the tour for the night and am headed to DC. I have a mtg at the WH tomorrow afternoon and then will be back tomorrow night,” wrote Kremer in messages to followers. “Rest well. I’ll make sure the President knows about the tour tomorrow!”
She went on to explain that she and her daughter Kylie seemed to indicate that they were in communication with the Trump team. Chris Barron, the spokesperson for the Kramers, claimed all of the messages that Rolling Stone has are fake news.
“You are printing things that are 100 percent factually untrue that we can prove are not true,” Barron said. “You are printing things that are absolutely, factually untrue and, beyond being factually untrue, for anybody who knows Amy are like hilariously preposterous.”
When Rolling Stone asked for specifics, Barron refused to answer, merely repeating that they disputed the report.
In another text, marked Dec. 13, 2020, Kramer told the group she was “still waiting to hear from the WH on the photo op with the bus.” She explained that she didn’t have the permits yet so they couldn’t tweet that the event would be at the Ellipse until it was confirmed.
“We are following POTUS’ lead,” Kylie then wrote.
A text message from Jan. 3 between activist Dustin Stockton and Kylie again made it sound as if there was blatant coordination. She told Stockton that handling rally credentials for VIP were being organized with a “combination of us and WH.”
Stockton’s fiance, Jennifer Lawrence, not the actress, asked for specifics about the press credentials. Kylie said that the Trump campaign was navigating that piece of it.
The House Select Committee for Jan. 6 subpoenaed documents from the Kremers but it’s unclear if the information was turned over.
The morning of Jan. 5, Kremer texted organizers, “we are about to be part of a pivotal and historic moment in our nation’s history.”
“Thank you for taking this journey with Women For America First. I love you all and am grateful for each of you,” she wrote. “Let’s go save the Republic!”
Ali Alexander was organizing another group that would protest at the Capitol on Jan. 6.
“Two sources who were involved in the Ellipse rally planning previously told Rolling Stone they had concerns Alexander’s event could turn violent due to his apparent ties to militia groups and its location directly outside the Capitol,” Rolling Stone explained. “Those sources claimed Alexander initially agreed he would not hold the ‘Wild Protest’ and would allow the Ellipse rally to be the only major pro-Trump event in D.C. on January 6.”
The leaked texts show that there were internal arguments over Kramer’s protest and Alexander’s.
“Ali trying to rearrange our women for america (sic) seats,” a volunteer wrote. “Stop that sh*t,” Stockton replied.
Kylie noted on a Dec. 31 text that the only reason that the Alexander group was hosting their own was that his group was made up of “all the people who aren’t invited or POTUS won’t be associated with. How do yall not get it? Seriously. Everyone needs to get off that damn bus because you are all going crazy focused on things that don’t matter.”
Then another volunteer asked the group why the details of the event hadn’t been tweeted. Kylie responded by saying that Ellipse events are extremely rare and that they necessitated more red tape. She noted that she was working with “Team Trump” to get everything prepared.
“I am very frustrated and feel like you guys have NO IDEA the hoops we have been jumping through 24-7 lately. Google events at the Ellipse. Send me pictures that you can find of anything other than the Christmas tree light or menorah lighting that are official WH events. THEY DONT HAPPEN,” Kylie wrote. “Y’all this has got to stop. The back and forth. If anyone doesn’t like what … team trump and I are doing then you don’t have to come to January 6th.”
Arguments continued within the group with Amy Kramer going so far as to admonish her daughter in public on the text chain for drinking.
“Kylie, you need to slow your roll on the wine RIGHT NOW,” Kremer wrote. “We have so much work to do and not enough time to get it done.”
She then told the group, “There will be no more drinking on this trip.”
Rolling Stone even got access to the food order that Kremer made for the organizers who met in her Willard’s hotel suite. A Jan. 6 order also included a bottle of champagne at the same time Kremer’s organization was denouncing the violence. Napa Tea Party coordinator Pam Silleman told The Uprising that she drank champagne in the Kremer suite as they watched the storming of the Capitol on television.
A March for Trump team member revealed that the suite was one of the nicest in the hotel and the Kramers demanded “fresh lightbulbs” and other special requests. The organizer suggested that the orders may have tipped off law enforcement.
“I got the call from someone at the FBI asking why I used my card at the Willard in DC. … It was an exorbitant bill. The suite they were in, it was ungodly expensive because Kylie had to have the presidential suite. That was what made her comfortable,” the team member told Rolling Stone. “She had to have her waffles every morning. She would check the lightbulbs at every hotel. She would have maintenance change the lightbulbs.”
Another organizer remembered over a dozen people in the suite with wine flowing.
“She was sh*tfaced that night Kylie Kremer was,” the person recalled.
The following day, some were so disturbed by the Jan. 6 violence they wanted to make a public statement.
“I don’t think it is wise for us to talk to the press or have a press conference. Our statement yesterday was strong enough and we need to leave it at that,” Amy Kremer wrote on January 7. “Nothing god (sic) will come from us talking to CBS or any other mainstream media outlet. I hope you guys understand and agree.”
Then something of a disaster happened. Kremer got locked in her bathroom and texted the whole group for help.
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Donald Trump’s Friday morning claim Manhattan’s Criminal Courts Building is “heavily guarded” so his supporters cannot attend his trial was torched by a top CNN anchor. The ex-president, facing 34 felony charges in New York, had been urging his followers to show up and protest on the courthouse steps, but few have.
“I’m at the heavily guarded Courthouse. Security is that of Fort Knox, all so that MAGA will not be able to attend this trial, presided over by a highly conflicted pawn of the Democrat Party. It is a sight to behold! Getting ready to do my Courthouse presser. Two minutes!” Trump wrote Friday morning on his Truth Social account.
CNN’s Kaitlan Collins supplied a different view.
“Again, the courthouse is open the public. The park outside, where a handful of his supporters have gathered on trials days, is easily accessible,” she wrote minutes after his post.
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Trump has tried to rile up his followers to come out and make a strong showing.
On Monday Trump urged his supporters to “rally behind MAGA” and “go out and peacefully protest” at courthouses across the country, while complaining that “people who truly LOVE our Country, and want to MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, are not allowed to ‘Peacefully Protest,’ and are rudely and systematically shut down and ushered off to far away ‘holding areas,’ essentially denying them their Constitutional Rights.”
On Wednesday Trump claimed, “The Courthouse area in Lower Manhattan is in a COMPLETE LOCKDOWN mode, not for reasons of safety, but because they don’t want any of the thousands of MAGA supporters to be present. If they did the same thing at Columbia, and other locations, there would be no problem with the protesters!”
After detailing several of his false claims about security measures prohibiting his followers from being able to show their support and protest, CNN published a fact-check on Wednesday:
“Trump’s claims are all false. The police have not turned away ‘thousands of people’ from the courthouse during his trial; only a handful of Trump supporters have shown up to demonstrate near the building,” CNN reported.
“And while there are various security measures in place in the area, including some street closures enforced by police officers and barricades, it’s not true that ‘for blocks you can’t get near this courthouse.’ In reality, the designated protest zone for the trial is at a park directly across the street from the courthouse – and, in addition, people are permitted to drive right up to the front of the courthouse and walk into the building, which remains open to the public. If people show up early enough in the morning, they can even get into the trial courtroom itself or the overflow room that shows near-live video of the proceedings.”
READ MORE: Justices’ Views on Trump Immunity Stun Experts: ‘Watching the Constitution Be Rewritten’
Democratic U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is responding to Thursday’s U.S. Supreme Court hearing on Donald Trump’s claim he has “absolute immunity” from criminal prosecution because he was a U.S. president, and she delivered a strong warning in response.
Trump’s attorney argued before the nation’s highest court that the ex-president could have ordered the assassination of a political rival and not face criminal prosecution unless he was first impeached by the House of Representatives and then convicted by the Senate.
But even then, Trump attorney John Sauer argued, if assassinating his political rival were done as an “official act,” he would be automatically immune from all prosecution.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor, presenting the hypothetical, expressed, “there are some things that are so fundamentally evil that they have to be protected against.”
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“If the president decides that his rival is a corrupt person, and he orders the military, or orders someone to assassinate him, is that within his official acts for which he can get immunity?” she asked.
“It would depend on the hypothetical, but we can see that could well be an official act,” Trump attorney Sauer quickly replied.
SCOTUS Justice Sonia Sotomayor: “If the president … orders someone to assassinate [a rival], is that within his official acts for which he can get immunity?”
Trump attorney D. John Sauer: “It would depend on the hypothetical, but we can see that could well be an official act.” pic.twitter.com/RddEEYIUrR
— The Recount (@therecount) April 25, 2024
Sauer later claimed that if a president ordered the U.S. military to wage a coup, he could also be immune from prosecution, again, if it were an “official act.”
The Atlantic’s Tom Nichols, a retired U.S. Naval War College professor and an expert on Russia, nuclear weapons, and national security affairs, was quick to poke a large hole in that hypothetical.
“If the president suspends the Senate, you can’t prosecute him because it’s not an official act until the Senate impeaches …. Uh oh,” he declared.
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U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez blasted the Trump team.
“The assassination of political rivals as an official act,” the New York Democrat wrote.
“Understand what the Trump team is arguing for here. Take it seriously and at face value,” she said, issuing a warning: “This is not a game.”
Marc Elias, who has been an attorney to top Democrats and the Democratic National Committee, remarked, “I am in shock that a lawyer stood in the U.S Supreme Court and said that a president could assassinate his political opponent and it would be immune as ‘an official act.’ I am in despair that several Justices seemed to think this answer made perfect sense.”
CNN legal analyst Norm Eisen, a former U.S. Ambassador and White House Special Counsel for Ethics and Government Reform under President Barack Obama, boiled it down: “Trump is seeking dictatorial powers.”
Watch the video above or at this link.
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Legal experts appeared somewhat pleased during the first half of the Supreme Court’s historic hearing on Donald Trump’s claim he has “absolute immunity” from criminal prosecution because he was the President of the United States, as the justice appeared unwilling to accept that claim, but were stunned later when the right-wing justices questioned the U.S. Dept. of Justice’s attorney. Many experts are suggesting the ex-president may have won at least a part of the day, and some are expressing concern about the future of American democracy.
“Former President Trump seems likely to win at least a partial victory from the Supreme Court in his effort to avoid prosecution for his role in Jan. 6,” Axios reports. “A definitive ruling against Trump — a clear rejection of his theory of immunity that would allow his Jan. 6 trial to promptly resume — seemed to be the least likely outcome.”
The most likely outcome “might be for the high court to punt, perhaps kicking the case back to lower courts for more nuanced hearings. That would still be a victory for Trump, who has sought first and foremost to delay a trial in the Jan. 6 case until after Inauguration Day in 2025.”
Slate’s Mark Joseph Stern, who covers the courts and the law, noted: “This did NOT go very well [for Special Counsel] Jack Smith’s team. Thomas, Alito, and Kavanaugh think Trump’s Jan. 6 prosecution is unconstitutional. Maybe Gorsuch too. Roberts is skeptical of the charges. Barrett is more amenable to Smith but still wants some immunity.”
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Civil rights attorney and Tufts University professor Matthew Segal, responding to Stern’s remarks, commented: “If this is true, and if Trump becomes president again, there is likely no limit to the harm he’d be willing to cause — to the country, and to specific individuals — under the aegis of this immunity.”
Noted foreign policy, national security and political affairs analyst and commentator David Rothkopf observed: “Feels like the court is leaning toward creating new immunity protections for a president. It’s amazing. We’re watching the Constitution be rewritten in front of our eyes in real time.”
“Frog in boiling water alert,” warned Ian Bassin, a former Associate White House Counsel under President Barack Obama. “Who could have imagined 8 years ago that in the Trump era the Supreme Court would be considering whether a president should be above the law for assassinating opponents or ordering a military coup and that *at least* four justices might agree.”
NYU professor of law Melissa Murray responded to Bassin: “We are normalizing authoritarianism.”
Trump’s attorney, John Sauer, argued before the Supreme Court justices that if Trump had a political rival assassinated, he could only be prosecuted if he had first been impeach by the U.S. House of Representatives then convicted by the U.S. Senate.
During oral arguments Thursday, MSNBC host Chris Hayes commented on social media, “Something that drives me a little insane, I’ll admit, is that Trump’s OWN LAWYERS at his impeachment told the Senators to vote not to convict him BECAUSE he could be prosecuted if it came to that. Now they’re arguing that the only way he could be prosecuted is if they convicted.”
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Attorney and former FBI agent Asha Rangappa warned, “It’s worth highlighting that Trump’s lawyers are setting up another argument for a second Trump presidency: Criminal laws don’t apply to the President unless they specifically say so…this lays the groundwork for saying (in the future) he can’t be impeached for conduct he can’t be prosecuted for.”
But NYU and Harvard professor of law Ryan Goodman shared a different perspective.
“Due to Trump attorney’s concessions in Supreme Court oral argument, there’s now a very clear path for DOJ’s case to go forward. It’d be a travesty for Justices to delay matters further. Justice Amy Coney Barrett got Trump attorney to concede core allegations are private acts.”
Due to Trump attorney’s concessions in Supreme Court oral argument, there’s now a very clear path for DOJ’s case to go forward.
It’d be a travesty for Justices to delay matters further.
Justice Amy Coney Barrett got Trump attorney to concede core allegations are private acts.⬇️ pic.twitter.com/F3qXi47ZT6
— Ryan Goodman (@rgoodlaw) April 25, 2024
NYU professor of history Ruth Ben-Ghiat, an expert scholar on authoritarians, fascism, and democracy concluded, “Folks, whatever the Court does, having this case heard and the idea of having immunity for a military coup taken seriously by being debated is a big victory in the information war that MAGA and allies wage alongside legal battles. Authoritarians specialize in normalizing extreme ideas and and involves giving them a respected platform.”
The Nation’s justice correspondent Elie Mystal offered up a prediction: “Court doesn’t come back till May 9th which will be a decision day. But I think they won’t decide *this* case until July 3rd for max delay. And that decision will be 5-4 to remand the case back to DC, for additional delay.”
Watch the video above or at this link.
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