A new report purports to show the inner workings of Donald Trump's campaign as it sought to fly fake elector ballots to D.C. in a "final push" to overturn the 2020 election.
The CNN exclusive report ties together texts, emails, and other research to show what happened two days before the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection attempt, as Trump's campaign desperately sought to get "phony" Trump ballots to then-Vice President Mike Pence. As CNN tells it: the plan "faced a potentially crippling hiccup: The fake elector certificates from two critical battleground states were stuck in the mail."
"So, Trump campaign operatives scrambled to fly copies of the phony certificates from Michigan and Wisconsin to the nation’s capital, relying on a haphazard chain of couriers, as well as help from two Republicans in Congress, to try to get the documents to then-Vice President Mike Pence while he presided over the Electoral College certification," according to CNN's report. "The operatives even considered chartering a jet to ensure the files reached Washington, DC, in time for the January 6, 2021, proceeding, according to emails and recordings obtained by CNN."
The report, which includes some texts and other information that was already reported by other news outlets, gives an insider view of the election effort through otherwise private campaign communications. It also implicates a Trump campaign lawyer.
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"The new details provide a behind-the-scenes glimpse of the chaotic last-minute effort to keep Donald Trump in office," it states. "Wisconsin Republican Party officials were annoyed at the request to courier the fake elector certificates to Washington. 'Freaking trump idiots want someone to fly original elector papers to the senate President,' a Wisconsin GOP official wrote to then-state party chairman Andrew Hitt on January 4, according to the January 6 committee report."
The article continues:
"Hitt – who has provided information to federal investigators about the efforts to get the fake elector certificates to Washington, according to a source familiar with the matter – told the January 6 committee that the couriering ended up being overkill, because the original documents that the state party had mailed to Washington actually made it in time."
