I’m running a bit late today. I had to go get my booster shot first thing this morning. It’s been an interesting week. We’ve had a bear wandering around the neighborhood getting into mischief. My neighbor had his trash can knocked over and ransacked. I found fresh bear scat in my backyard by my apple trees. An alert went out a few days ago about a large bear in the neighborhood! And there are almost daily reports in the police blotter published in the paper about bears in and around Bozeman. Perhaps the drought has affected them as well. So, for the first time since I’ve lived here, when I go out to get the paper in the morning before sunrise, which is in a box across the street, I am carrying bear spray. Hopefully the critters will hibernate soon and that will be that for a while!
And, speaking of threats – I read part of the majority report issued by the Senate Judiciary committee, entitled, “Subverting Justice; How the Former President and His Allies Pressured DOJ to Overturn the 2020 Election.” It’s an almost 400-page document that goes into great detail about the actions that Trump and his allies took to pressure the DOJ to intervene and overturn the 2020 election. I read the 43-page Executive Summary and some of the appendices and supporting documents. It is a truly frightening read if one cares at all about democracy in the United States, the U.S. Constitution, and the Rule of Law. This report is also just focused on the events between the White House and the Justice Department. It is not a report generated by the House Select Committee charged with investigating the events surrounding the January 6th insurrection.
The committee reported several findings and made several recommendations. This is also an ongoing investigation which Trump and his Republican allies are trying to subvert and block by asking participants to ignore legal subpoenas, invoking Executive Privilege in cases where it clearly doesn’t apply (Steven Bannon was not even employed by the government during this time!), and mounting a major PR campaign on Fox News and others to continue to perpetuate ‘the Big Lie,’ and revise history with respect to the January 6th insurrection. I will just report the findings and recommendations to save you all from plowing through the report – unless of course you want to in which case I’ve included the link below.1
FINDING 1: President Trump repeatedly asked DOJ leadership to endorse his false claims that the election was stolen and to assist his efforts to overturn the election results
FINDING 2: White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows asked Acting Attorney General Rosen to initiate election fraud investigations on multiple occasions, violating longstanding restrictions on White House-DOJ communications about specific law enforcement matters.
FINDING 3: After personally meeting with Trump, Jeffrey Bossert Clark pushed Rosen and Donoghue to assist Trump’s election subversion scheme—and told Rosen he would decline Trump’s potential offer to install him as Acting Attorney General if Rosen agreed to aid that scheme.
FINDING 4: Trump allies with links to the “Stop the Steal” movement and the January 6 insurrection participated in the pressure campaign against DOJ.
FINDING 5: Trump forced the resignation of U.S. Attorney Byung Jin (“BJay”) Pak, whom he believed was not doing enough to address false claims of election fraud in Georgia. Trump then went outside the line of succession when naming an Acting U.S. Attorney, bypassing First Assistant U.S. Attorney Kurt Erskine and instead appointing Bobby Christine because he believed Christine would “do something” about his election fraud claims.
FINDING 6: By pursuing false claims of election fraud before votes were certified, DOJ deviated from longstanding practice meant to avoid inserting DOJ itself as an issue in the election.
The recommendations that have been made are:
Recommendation #1: Strengthen DOJ-White House Contacts Policy Through Increased Transparency and Enforcement
Recommendation #2: Strengthen DOJ’s Longstanding Policy of Election NonInterference
Recommendation #3: Further Investigation of Clark’s Conduct by the District of Columbia Bar
Recommendation #4: Cooperation with the House Select Committee to Investigate Ties Between This Episode and the January 6 Attack
Keep in mind that this report is not based upon third hand accounts of these events but are based upon actual transcripts of phone calls, actual documents, and interviews with participants. The fact that this is descriptive of actions of a former president of the United States and his allies is extremely disturbing. The fact that so many senior Republican Congressman and Senators refuse to acknowledge and condemn these actions in the strongest possible terms is even more disturbing.
One of the hallmarks of virtually every authoritarian/totalitarian regime is how they weaponize the judicial systems after they come to power. Given what Trump and his allies tried to do as outlined in this report, you can be sure that if he is re-elected in 2024, he will most assuredly take over control of the DOJ and that could very well be the end of democracy in America. If anyone thinks that can’t happen here or that statement is just hyperbole, then I would gently suggest that they are not paying attention. And to add to that, I have included a link to an opinion piece that sums up why we should all be worried, if after reading the above you’re still not convinced.2