Page:Introductory Material to the Final Report of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol.pdf/35

 When Trump couldn’t convince Shirkey and Chatfield to change the outcome of the election in Michigan during that meeting or in calls after, he or his team maliciously tweeted out Shirkey’s personal cell phone number and a number for Chatfield that turned out to be wrong. Shirkey received nearly 4,000 text messages after that, and another private citizen reported being inundated with calls and texts intended for Chatfield.

None of Donald Trump’s efforts ultimately succeeded in changing the official results in any State. That these efforts had failed was apparent to Donald Trump and his co-conspirators well before January 6th. By January 6th, there was no evidence at all that a majority of any State legislature would even attempt to change its electoral votes.

This past October, Federal District Court Judge David Carter issued a further ruling relating to one of President Trump’s lawsuits in Georgia. Judge Carter applied the crime-fraud exception to attorney-client privilege again, and identified potential criminal activity related to a knowingly false representation by Donald Trump to a Federal court. He wrote: "The emails show that President Trump knew that the specific numbers of voter fraud were wrong but continued to tout those numbers, both in court and in public."

As John Eastman wrote in an email on December 31, 2020, President Trump was “made aware that some of the allegations (and evidence proffered by the experts)” in a verified State court complaint was “inaccurate.” Dr. Eastman noted that “with that knowledge” President Trump could not accurately verify a Federal court complaint that incorporated by reference the “inaccurate” State court complaint: “I have no doubt that an aggressive DA or US Atty someplace will go after both the President and his lawyers once all the dust settles on this.” Despite this specific warning, “President Trump and his attorneys ultimately filed the complaint with the same inaccurate numbers without rectifying, clarifying, or otherwise changing them.” And President Trump personally “signed a verification swearing under oath that the incorporated, inaccurate numbers ‘are true and correct’ or ‘believed to be true and correct’ to the best of his knowledge and belief.” The numbers were not correct, and President Trump and his legal team knew it.

In the weeks after the 2020 election, Attorney General Bill Barr advised President Trump that the Department of Justice had not seen any evidence to support Trump’s theory that the election was stolen by fraud. Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen and his Deputy repeatedly reinforced to President Trump that his claims of election fraud were false when they took over in mid-December. Also in mid-December 2020, Attorney General Barr announced his plans to resign. Between that time and January 6th, Trump spoke with Acting Attorney General Jeff Rosen and Acting Deputy Richard Donoghue repeatedly, attempting to persuade them and the Department of Justice to find factual support for his stolen election claims and thereby to assist his efforts to reverse election results.

As Rosen publicly testified, “… between December 23rd and January 3rd, the President either called me or met with me virtually every day, with one or two exceptions, like Christmas Day.” As discussed earlier, Justice Department investigations had demonstrated that these stolen election claims were false; both Rosen and Donoghue told Trump this comprehensively and repeatedly.