Grand jury returns an indictment

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) called Tuesday’s indictment of former President Donald Trump the “most serious and most consequential thus far.”

“This indictment is the most serious and most consequential thus far and will stand as a stark reminder to generations of Americans that no one, including a president of the United States, is above the law,” the two lawmakers wrote in a statement.

Schumer and Jeffries called the events that unfolded on Jan. 6. “one of the saddest and most infamous days in American history.”

“The third indictment of Mr. Trump illustrates in shocking detail that the violence of that day was the culmination of a months-long criminal plot led by the former president to defy democracy and overturn the will of the American people,” the two lawmakers wrote.

— Amanda Macias

The House select committee that investigated the riot on Capitol Hill on Jan. 6, 2021 said in their final report that Donald Trump raised nearly $250 million between Election Day and Jan. 6 as the former president’s tried and failed to fight the election results in court.

“Evidence gathered by the Committee indicates that President Trump raised roughly one quarter of a billion dollars in fundraising efforts between the election and January 6th.141 Those solicitations persistently claimed and referred to election fraud that did not exist,” the committee said in their final report.

The committee, which sent a criminal referral of Trump to the Department of Justice, lays out in detail within their final report how Trump and his team successfully convinced donors to fund their fight to overturn the results of an election many of Trump’s advisors knew he had lost.

The Republican National Committee “knew that President Trump’s claims about winning the election were baseless and that additional donations would not help him secure an additional term in office,” according to the report.

Still, the RNC ” walked as close to the line as they dared—making several changes to fundraising copy that seemingly protected the RNC from legal exposure while still spreading and relying on President Trump’s known lies and misrepresentations.”

– Brian Schwartz

While Trump stared down his third criminal indictment, President Joe Biden had his eyes on a different sort of bombshell.

The president and first lady Jill Biden arrived at a movie theater in Delaware on Tuesday evening to see “Oppenheimer,” the blockbuster film about the development of the atomic bomb, according to White House reporters.

The Bidens ate dinner beforehand at a nearby restaurant called Matt’s Fish Camp, described as “cute” by the press pool.

The first couple had arrived in Delaware on Friday for a vacation at their beach house in Rehoboth Beach. They were seen biking on Monday.

— Kevin Breuninger

The state of Georgia is mentioned by name 48 times in the Trump indictment, more than any of the other six states where the former president tried to reverse his loss in the 2020 election.

Georgia is also where a local prosecutor, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, soon could announce state criminal charges against Trump for his attempt to overturn President Joe Biden’s victory there in 2020.

Four pages in the new federal indictment detail Trump’s focus on Georgia, where he falsely alleged there had been election fraud.

“Wow! Blockbuster testimony taking place right now in Georgia. Ballot stuffing by Dems when Republicans were forced to leave the large counting room. Plenty more coming, but this alone leads to an easy win of the State!” Trump tweeted on Dec. 3, 2020, the indictment notes.

A month later, four days before Congress was due to certify the Electoral College’s results, Trump “and others called Georgia’s Secretary of State,” the indictment says.

“During the call, the Defendant [Trump] lied to the Georgia Secretary of State to induce him to alter Georgia’s popular vote count and call into question the validity of the Biden electors’ votes, which had been transmitted to Congress weeks before.”

— Dan Mangan

Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., chair of the now-defunct House select committee on the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol, said Trump and conspirators should receive a fair trial after news of the former’s president indictment dropped.

“January 6th was a test of American democracy, but the fair trials of those responsible will further demonstrate this Nation’s commitment to the rule of law and hold accountable those who attempted to undermine it,” Thompson tweeted Tuesday.

Trump was indicted for, among other things, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding while the results of the 2020 presidential election were being certified on Jan. 6, 2021.

— Chelsey Cox

Former President Donald Trump is back to fundraising off of the latest federal indictment against him just days after it was revealed that his allied political action committee has spent over $20 million on his legal fees.

The email appeal, which was blasted out within moments of the indictment’s release, follows a familiar pattern portraying Trump as a martyr.

“They know that I’m the only candidate who can dismantle the Deep State and end their stranglehold on our nation. So, their only hope is to try and send me to JAIL for the rest of my life,” the letter reads.

Trump calls on his supporters to donate to “show that you will NEVER SURRENDER our country to tyranny as the Deep State thugs try to JAIL me for life – for 1,500% impact,” He then calls on donors to give anywhere from $24 to $250 and shows a video of Trump in the background and an unconfirmed, scrolling list of donors, dubbed “patriots who declared ‘I will never surrender.'”

The House select committee that investigated the riot on Capitol Hill on Jan. 6, 2021, said in their final report that Trump raised nearly $250 million between Election Day and Jan. 6.

— Brian Schwartz

Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson said President Donald Trump is “morally responsible” for the violent mob attack against Congress on Jan. 6, 2021.

Hutchinson said the U.S. justice system will now determine whether Trump is criminally responsible for his attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election results.

Hutchinson has launched a longshot bid for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination on a more moderate platform than his rivals.

— Spencer Kimball

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy accused the Justice Department of trying to distract from recent allegations regarding Hunter Biden’s business dealings in his response to Trump’s new indictment.

McCarthy, R-Calif., laid out how he viewed the events leading up to the indictment, including accusations that Hunter, son of President Joe Biden, “received money from China (contradicting President Biden’s claim),” that the DOJ “tried to secretly give Hunter broad immunity” and that Biden “spoke with Hunter’s business associates over 20 times.”

“Everyone in America could see what was going to come next: DOJ’s attempt to distract from the news and attack the frontrunner for the Republican nomination, President Trump,” McCarthy tweeted Tuesday. Recent polling shows Biden and Trump evenly matched if the election were to occur today.

McCarthy vowed that House Republicans will “continue to uncover the truth about Biden Inc. and the two-tiered system of justice.”

— Chelsey Cox