Former US President Donald Trump “resorted to crimes” after losing the 2020 presidential election, federal prosecutors said in a court filing unsealed on Wednesday.
Trump has falsely claimed that the 2020 election, which was won by current President Joe Biden, was stolen from him. In January 2021, pro-Trump protesters stormed the US Capitol as lawmakers gathered to count electoral votes.
The Wednesday filing is likely the last opportunity for prosecutors to present their case against Trump before the November 5 election, when he is set to face off against Vice President Kamala Harris.
What did the filing say?
The filing argued that Trump disregarded the advice of former Vice President Mike Pence and other aides and is not entitled to immunity from prosecution.
The document was submitted by special counsel Jack Smith’s team after the Supreme Court issued an opinion according to which presidents are afforded broad immunity for official acts taken while in office.
The filing argues that Trump’s attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election amounted to private rather than official acts and could still remain part of an indictment.
“Although the defendant was the incumbent President during the charged conspiracies, his scheme was fundamentally a private one,” Smith’s team said.
“When the defendant lost the 2020 presidential election, he resorted to crimes to try to stay in office,” the document read.
Trump has pleaded not guilty to four criminal charges accusing him of a conspiracy to obstruct the congressional certification of the election, defraud the US out of accurate results and interfere with voting rights. The former president has dismissed the charges and other cases against him as a political witch-hunt.
Trump disregarded Pence’s advice, prosecutors say
Among Trump’s efforts was an attempt to convince Pence to refuse to certify the counting of electoral votes on the afternoon of January 6, 2021.
The filing includes details of conversations between Trump and Pence, including one in which Pence argued the former president to “recognize the process is over” while not officially conceding as a “face-saving option.”
In another conversation, Pence urged Trump to accept the results of the election and run again in 2024.
The filing said that Trump “disregarded” Pence’s advice “in the same way he disregarded dozens of court decisions that unanimously rejected his and his allies’ legal claims.”
“He disregarded officials in the targeted states — including those in his own party — who stated publicly that he had lost and that his specific fraud allegations were false,” prosecutors said.
The document accuses Trump of producing a “steady stream of disinformation.”
“He used these lies to inflame and motivate the large and angry crowd of his supporters to march to the Capitol and disrupt the certification proceeding.”
Trump accuses Democrats of ‘weaponizing’ Justice Department
In response to Wednesday’s filing, Donald Trump accused the Democratic Party of using judicial procedures to mount a political campaign against him.
“Democrats are weaponizing the Justice Department because they know I am WINNING,” Trump said in a post on his social media platform, Truth Social, going on to call it a case of “prosecutorial misconduct.”
He called the filing a “hit job” and described the Justice Department as having become an “extension” of Kamala Harris’ campaign for president.
sdi/wd (AP, Reuters)
