At various times, the gambit involved lawyers, state lawmakers and top White House aides.
The New York Times reported this month on legal memos that show some of the earliest known origins of what became the rationale for the use of alternate electors.
Key Developments in the Jan. 6 Investigation
Giuliani in talks to testify. Rudolph W. Giuliani, who was Donald Trump’s lawyer, is in discussions with the House committee about responding to its questions, according to three people familiar with the matter. It is not clear how much assistance he might provide in the investigation.
White House phone records. The House committee has discovered gaps in official White House telephone logs from the day of the riot. The sparse call records complicate efforts to recreate what Mr. Trump was doing during crucial moments of the attack.
The memos — from a lawyer named Kenneth Chesebro to James R. Troupis, a lawyer for the Trump campaign in Wisconsin — show how, just over two weeks after Election Day, Mr. Trump’s campaign was seeking to buy itself more time to undo the results. At the heart of the strategy was the idea that their real deadline was not Dec. 14, when official electors would be chosen to reflect the outcome in each state, but Jan. 6, when Congress would meet to certify the results.
The two memos were used by Mr. Trump’s top lawyer, Mr. Giuliani, and others like John Eastman as they developed a strategy intended to exploit ambiguities in the Electoral Count Act, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The subpoenas are the latest step the committee has taken to investigate the plans to use electors who falsely attested Mr. Trump had won their states.
Last month, the committee issued 14 subpoenas to people who claimed to be electors for Mr. Trump in states that he lost. Those subpoenas targeted individuals who met and submitted pro-Trump Electoral College certificates in seven states Mr. Biden won: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, New Mexico, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
Those who signed on to the fake slates of electors were mostly state-level officials in the Republican Party, G.O.P. political candidates or party activists involved with Mr. Trump’s re-election campaign.
Those subpoenas came after the Justice Department said it was investigating the fake electors.
Ultimately, Mr. Pence rejected plans to throw out the legitimate electoral votes in favor of those false slates for Mr. Trump.
Source Article from https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/15/us/politics/jan-6-subpoenas-trump.html
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