Prosecutors have asked witnesses to testify before a grand jury in recent days about conversations with the former president, his lawyers and other close advisers about “voter fraud,” according to the Washington Post. Justice Department lawyers filed “hours of detailed questions about meetings Mr. Trump had in December 2020 and January 2021. His campaign to overturn the election; and what instructions he gave to lawyers and advisers of bogus voters and sending voters back to the states,” two sources told the newspaper on Tuesday. The sources, who were not named, told the newspaper that some questions focused on Mr. Trump’s direct role in the “fake voter” scheme, which was spearheaded by Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman. Prosecutors in April obtained the phone records of Trump’s top White House officials, including his then-chief of staff Mark Meadows, the Post reported. “The Washington Post and other news organizations have written in the past that the Justice Department is looking into the conduct of Eastman, Giuliani and others in Trump’s orbit. But the extent of prosecutors’ interest in Trump’s actions has not been previously reported, nor has the examination of phone records of senior Trump aides,” the paper said. Two people familiar with the investigation told the newspaper that there were two “main strands of the investigation that could ultimately lead to additional scrutiny of Trump.” The sources told the paper that the first includes rioting and conspiracy to obstruct a government process, the kind of charges already filed against leaders of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, who did not enter the Capitol on Jan. 6 but helped plan it. of what happened. there. The Post reports that the second could involve potential fraud tied to the “fake voter” scheme or the pressure on the Justice Department by Trump and his allies to falsely allege voter fraud. It comes the same day Attorney General Merrick Garland told NBC Nightly News that the Justice Department planned to prosecute anyone “criminally responsible for interfering with the peaceful transfer of power from one administration to another.” “Look, the Department of Justice has done the most extensive investigation in its history,” he said. “And the commission is also doing a huge broad investigation. It’s inevitable that there will be things they find before we find them. And it’s inevitable that we’ll find things they haven’t. This is what happens when two large-scale investigations are conducted at the same time.” Mr Garland gave a rare interview about an ongoing inquiry after he was the target of fury from the left over its pace and was accused on Twitter of slowing it down during an election year. But in recent days, former Vice President Mike Pence’s former chief of staff, Mark Short, and his lawyer, Greg Jacobs, both appeared before a grand jury in Washington. Trump was also in Washington on Tuesday, to give his first speech there since leaving the White House for Florida in January 2021. In his speech to the America First Policy Institute, Mr. Trump claimed to have ordered the Secret Service to clear out homeless encampments in Washington.
