What a turd...

Trump legal team lays out strategy to argue he was right to doubt results of 2020 election

By Katelyn Polantz

Former President Donald Trump’s legal team has laid out a strategy to argue at his upcoming criminal trial that he was right to doubt the results of the 2020 election, bringing his continued political broadside against his loss of the presidency into court as the former president alleges a vast government conspiracy against him.

Trump’s defense team is asking for information from several past government investigations, including around the election results and about the recent classified documents probe into his former Vice President Mike Pence. He says these records could be exculpatory, helping in his defense.

Multiple investigations have found no evidence of widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election.

The requests came in a court filing late Monday night as part of the Trump legal team’s attempts to build a defense for his upcoming federal trial for attempting to obstruct the transfer of power at the end of his presidency.

“President Trump is entitled to all information supporting his position that his concerns regarding fraud during the 2020 election—rather than ‘knowingly false’ or criminal—were plausible and maintained in good faith,” Trump’s lawyers wrote. “To prop up the Biden Administration’s preferred political advocacy regarding the 2020 election, the indictment endorses the alleged views of ‘Senior White House Attorneys,’ ‘senior leaders of the Justice Department,’ ‘the Intelligence Community,’ the ‘Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.’”

It’s not determined yet if Trump will be able to make those arguments before a jury, and a judge will have to decide if his legal team can get the records he is seeking. The trial is set to begin in March.

Argues Pence could have been coerced

The Trump team’s request for information about the Pence investigation posits that Pence may have spoken with special counsel investigators to help himself while a separate inquiry looked at the handling of classified records.

The Pence classified records investigation came about earlier this year after Pence’s team found marked documents at his home in the wake of the criminal investigation into Trump’s mishandling of classified records. The Pence investigation ended with no criminal charges in June.

Pence testified to a federal grand jury in the 2020 election investigation in the spring.

“The potential criminal charges faced by Vice President Pence gave him an incentive to curry favor with authorities by providing information that is consistent with the Biden Administration’s preferred, and false, narrative regarding this case,” Trump’s lawyers wrote.

A spokesman for Pence declined to comment on Tuesday.

Pence’s confidential testimony in the Trump 2020 election case, some of his aides testified, was under oath before a federal grand jury, and a judge decided he must answer questions under subpoena.

Trump’s team is also seeking records about investigations into Russia and other foreign nation’s attempts to influence presidential elections –- a political reality that Trump had tried to distance himself and his campaign from for years after his 2016 win of the presidency.

“Evidence of covert foreign disinformation campaigns relating to the 2020 election supports the defense argument that President Trump and others acted in good faith even if certain reports were ultimately determined to be inaccurate,” Trump’s lawyers wrote in the court filings.