This week, we’re doing a deep dive on the Big Lie. On Monday, we discussed the years of voter-fraud activism that laid the foundation. Yesterday, we talked about attempts to stop the certification of the 2020 election. Today, we’re talking about the Jan. 6 attack.
The myth of a stolen election built through the sheer force of a unified lie came to a head on Jan. 6, 2021, when a “Stop the Steal” rally led by Donald Trump turned into a violent mob that stormed the Capitol while lawmakers prepared to certify the presidential election results.
One Capitol Police officer and four Trump supporters died in the attack on the Capitol; four law enforcement officers who responded to the attack died by suicide in the following months.
Trump, like many Americans, watched the horrifying scene unfold on TV, but it took him hours to respond, ultimately releasing a video urging his supporters to go home while repeating the lie that had spurred them to action in the first place. washingtonpost.com/politics/trump…
Trump’s actions on Jan. 6 led to his second impeachment by the House of Representatives, and the events of the day are under investigation by a House select committee. americanoversight.org/from-voter-fra…
Even after the Capitol was secured hours later, eight senators and 139 House members still objected to the certification of election results in at least one state.
We have filed dozens of Freedom of Information Act and state and local records requests investigating what happened that day. americanoversight.org/questions-abou…
We’re suing for records of the White House’s communications during the attack and the delayed deployment of National Guard troops to help secure the Capitol. americanoversight.org/american-overs…
We are also investigating the intelligence and law enforcement failures that led to the pro-Trump mob overrunning the Capitol, and are looking into the actions of and the influences on state and local elected officials who participated in or enabled the attack.
Even after Biden’s inauguration Trump’s and his supporters continued their project of casting doubt on the election — with the goals of passing restrictive voting measures and sowing mistrust in future election results.
Check our Twitter again tomorrow for part 4 of our deep dive into the Big Lie. We’ll break down the efforts to pass new voting restrictions across the country. In the meantime, read our investigation here: americanoversight.org/from-voter-fra…
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New: The Arizona Senate has now asked Cyber Ninjas to make “audit” records available to the Senate. This follows yesterday’s order from the Arizona Supreme Court that effectively upholds lower court rulings that the documents are public records. americanoversight.org/document/ameri…
“[P]lease immediately make available to the Arizona State Senate all records within your custody or control...with a substantial nexus to the audit,” Arizona Senate President Karen Fann wrote to the Cyber Ninjas firm yesterday.
”[D]ocuments with a substantial nexus to the audit include without limitation all documents and communications relating to the planning and performance or execution of the audit, all policies and procedures used in connection with the audit…
Michael Gabelman, the lawyer hired to run Wisconsin’s bogus election investigation, has been consulting with Shiva Ayyadurai, an election conspiracy theorist.
Records we obtained show Ayyadurai and Gabelman’s connections to the Arizona “audit.” jsonline.com/story/news/pol…
On Aug. 1, Christina Bobb from One America News asked Arizona Senate President Karen Fann if she could share her contact information with former Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman. Fann replied, “Absolutely of course.”
Gableman was also in contact with Arizona “audit” spokesman Randy Pullen. Records we obtained show that in August, Pullen sent Gableman "three big political points" about the sham “audit.”
BREAKING: The Arizona Supreme Court has denied a petition from the Arizona Senate, leaving in place two lower court rulings that records in the physical custody of “audit” election contractor Cyber Ninjas are public records and must be released. americanoversight.org/arizona-suprem…
The court’s decision also dissolves the stay on a state judge’s order that the Arizona Senate produce documents held in the physical custody of election “audit” contractor Cyber Ninjas.
Each day this week, we’re breaking down an element of the Big Lie. Yesterday, we discussed the years of anti-voting activism that laid the foundation. Today, we’re talking about attempts to stop the certification of the 2020 election. americanoversight.org/from-voter-fra…
When polls closed on Nov. 3, 2020, the result of the presidential election was unclear, in part because of the additional challenges of counting absentee ballots. Four days after Election Day, all the major networks and news agencies called the race for Biden.
Trump and his supporters turned up their efforts to undermine confidence in the results, with a particular focus on the states where the vote had been the closest: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
NEW: County officials in Pennsylvania have been ordered to begin releasing election “audit” documents within 30 days in response to our records requests. americanoversight.org/pennsylvania-c…
Fulton County, Penn., was an early testing ground for the use of sham “audits” to cast doubt on the 2020 election — including the involvement of at least one company that would go on to play a major role in Arizona.
Fulton’s “audits” in Dec. 2020 and Feb. 2021, backed by pro-Trump Sen. Doug Mastriano and others, were conducted by the company Wake TSI — which worked as a contractor to a nonprofit operated by Sidney Powell, who represented Trump in election challenges. azmirror.com/2021/05/24/gro…
This week, we’re doing a deep dive on the Big Lie that the election was “stolen” from Trump because of voter fraud. First, we’re breaking down its roots: the decades-long campaign to hype the threat of voter fraud so as to impose restrictive voting laws. americanoversight.org/from-voter-fra…
I: Building the “Voter Fraud” Narrative: In the last decade and a half, a robust anti-fraud movement has grown out of a conservative backlash, giving rise to what Roll Call in 2012 called a “voter fraud brain trust.”
This included people like former Justice Department officials Hans von Spakovsky, who is now with the Heritage Foundation, and J. Christian Adams, who is head of the Public Interest Legal Foundation, a conservative legal group that pushes for aggressive voter-roll purges.