The Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol has concluded its investigation and released its report.

The Committee referred Donald Trump to the Justice Department for prosecution of four crimes.

You can read the 154 page executive summary here.

Shorter version:

The central cause of of January 6th was one man, ...Donald Trump, who many others followed. None of the events of January 6th would have happened without him.

In response, Trump called the Committee a "Kangaroo Court". The four counts of referral are:[More...]

DOJ has responded to citizen Donald Trump's request (available here) that a special master review the documents seized from Mar-a-Lago during the execution of the search warrant. Among other reasons, he says this is necessary to determine whether the documents contain matters that are subject to executive privilege.

You can read DOJ's response and view the attached exhibits here.

Don't miss the exhibits, especially Exhibit "F".

I'm still shaking my head at the first paragraph of Trump's motion, link above, which identifies him as "President" and claims he is the "clear frontrunner" for the Republican party nomination in 2024, and should he decide to run, the clear frontrunner in the 2024 general election.

I don't think the Mar-a-Lago search and Trump's withholding of classified documents is Trump's biggest nightmare. I think Georgia's investigation into election fraud is what should keep him up at night.

Has Dick Cheney weighed in on Trump and the classified documents since his daughter lost the primary? (The graphic is from a post about AUSA Patrick Fitzgerald alleging in a pleading in the Scooter Libby case that Cheney, acting with the approval of former President Bush, had authorized Libby to disclose portions of the classified National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq to rebut some of the claims made by Valerie Plame's husband, Joseph Wilson. The government subpoenaed documents from Cheney and included in the response was a copy of Wilson's infamous Op-Ed with Cheney's handwritten notes asking if they had sent Wilson on a junket).

The Wall Street Journal has an "explainer" (free link through my subscription, courtesy of WSJ) on the different categories of classified documents. The Mar-a-Lago Affidavit is here. [More.]

The New York Times reports that Robert Costello, one of Rudy Giuliani's attorneys, has told the media that he has been informed that Giuliani is a target (not a witness or a subject) of the grand jury investigation into Trump and his advisors and lawyers attempts to overturn the Georgia election results in 2016.

One of Mr. Giuliani’s lawyers, Robert Costello, said in an interview that he was notified on Monday that his client was a target. Being so identified does not guarantee that a person will be indicted; rather, it usually means that prosecutors believe an indictment is possible, based on evidence they have seen up to that point.

How does Rudy get out of an indictment? He can testify (and risk a perjuryor obstruction of justice charge if they have evidence he lied to the grand jury). It worked for Karl Rove (who had a great lawyer in Robert Luskin). Rove testified four times before the grand jury investigating the leak of the identity of CIA Agent Valerie Plame. [More...]

Attorney General Merrick Garland gave a two minute press conference today on the search warrant that was issued and executed at Mar-a-Lago last week.

The transcript of his remarks is here.

This is not a historic disclosure. DOJ's filing a motion to unseal the warrant (but not the affidavit with the sworn facts supporting it) and the receipt for the property taken, copies of which were left at Mar-a-Lago at the time of the search, are unlikely to disclose anything that hasn't already been in the public arena.

It's the affidavit that bakes the cake (or causes its center to sink). And that's not being released.

This is news I wasn't expecting. The feds got a warrant to search Mar-a-Lago. Donald Trump must be seething.

The search for evidence related to Trump's handling of classified information -- whether he improperly removed classified documents to Mar a Lago. It was not about January 6.

Trump lawyer Christina Bobb, who was present during the FBI search, confirmed federal agents “seized paper.”

Trump was at Trump Tower in New York when news broke of the raid.

Trump and the Republicans are sure to use this search as a rallying cry against the F.B.I. and Democrats in their bid to win the November mid-term elections.

But didn't Trump once want Hillary indicted for allegedly mishandling classified information?

New York State has taken away Rudy Giuliani's ticket to practice law. The reason: His “false and misleading statements” about Trump's election loss. His conduct "immediately threatens the public interest." He calls the action "ridiculous".

His bizarre son Andrew "railed" against the license loss in a parking lot this afternoon.

Is he still running for Governor of New York? Apparently so. What a joke.

Donald Trump, who holds the record for the number of times an occupant of a desk in the oval office has been impeached in the House of Representatives, avoided conviction in the Senate today.

All 50 Democrats and seven Republicans voted “guilty,” falling 10 votes short of the two-thirds necessary for conviction.

Maybe now the media will finally stop its coverage of all things Trump. They have been reduced to an insignificant pebble in an otherwise mountain of smooth grains of sand.

Congress can can turn its attention to things that matter, like providing economic relief to the residents of this country and tackling the coronavirus and its mutations. [More...]

It's hard to believe it was 22 years ago that I attended the impeachment trial of former President Bill Clinton. Today it is private citizen Donald Trump who is on trial in the U.S. Senate for his conduct on January 6,2021 when rioters stormed the U.S. capitol. C-Span is covering it live.

They are now arguing over whether the Senate has the power to impeach someone who no longer occupies a desk in the oval office. Four hours has been alloted for these arguments. From the New York Times:

In a fast-paced and cinematic case, the House managers will argue before the Senate that Mr. Trump is guilty of inciting a deadly mob of his supporters to storm the Capitol on Jan. 6.

The prosecution plans to show videos captured by the mob, Mr. Trump’s unvarnished words and criminal pleas from rioters who said they acted at the former president’s behest. House managers are aiming for a conviction and to bar Mr. Trump from holding office again.

Democrats plan to both conduct the trial and work on passing federal coronavirus relief. The trial should be over this week.

Here is the Reply Brief filed today by the House Managers who are prosecuting the trial against Trump. Here are the procedural rules for the Clinton impeachment trial.

Donald Trump has been impeached for the second time by the House of Representatives. The vote was 232 to 197. 10 Republicans voted with the unanimous Democrats.

There will be a Senate trial after Joe Biden takes office. No timeline is set.

So long as he exits the White House and takes his children and son-in-law and top current and former aides with him, I don't care what label America ultimately tags him with.

Questions: Will he spend the next week issuing pardons to himself and his family and Rudy Giuliani? Will the Trump Organization face a slump in revenues? Will every hotel he's licensed his name to change its name and stop paying licensing fees? Will Deutsche Bank call his loans early or refuse to extend them?

Where will Ivanka and Jared go now that it's pretty obvious she won't be taking Marco Rubio's seat from him anytime soon? Will they be sorry they plopped $31 million down on a plot of land on a tiny island in Miami? Will Melania and her parents and Barron go back to New York? Will Donald move to Dubai? [More...]

The consequences to Donald Trump and the Trump Organization from last week's Capitol riot keep pouring in. Sunday night, the PGA announced it is terminating its contract with the Trump Organization to host its 2002 championship at Trump's golf course in Bedminister, New Jersey.

"The PGA of America Board of Directors voted tonight to exercise the right to terminate the agreement to play the 2022 PGA Championship at Trump Bedminster," said Jim Richerson, PGA of America president, in a statement.

Holding the tournament at Trump Bedminster, Richerson said, would be "detrimental" to the PGA of America's brand and put the organization's ability to function "at risk."

The predictable response by the Trump Organization: "This is a breach of a binding contract and they have no right to terminate the agreement. "

Mitch McConnell does it again. He's blocked the vote on the increased stimulus payments sought by most of Congress and Donald Trump.

McConnell brought the chamber back this week with one major goal: overriding Trump’s veto of the annual National Defense Authorization Act. He has not yet committed to bringing the $2,000 payment bill up for a vote, and it is unclear now how one would take shape.

Trump is also trying to get the Senate to pass something that will investigate (non-existent) election fraud in the presidential election.

Will Bernie Sanders follow through with a filibuster to block the overide vote on Trump's veto of the Defense Authorization bill? [More...]