Trump trial shown disturbing footage of lawmakers ‘hunted’ by Capitol mob

Democrats revealed disturbing new recordings of the mob attack on the US Capitol last month as they presented their case on Wednesday in the historic second impeachment trial of Donald Trump.

House impeachment managers constructed a timeline which they said showed that the former president was “singularly responsible” for the deadly assault, which brought a violent mob within footsteps of the nation’s political leaders.

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Trump impeachment: new footage shows Mike Pence and Mitt Romney fleeing Capitol attack – video

New video shown during the second impeachment trial for Donald Trump has revealed Capitol police officer Eugene Goodman leading Senator Mitt Romney away from the rioters as well as the evacuation of former vice-president Mike Pence.

Representative Stacey Plaskett presented the previously unreleased security footage from the 6 January Capitol breach documenting Romney's close call as well as Pence and his family's escape as rioters chanted ‘hang Mike Pence’

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Trump impeachment: Senate to hear prosecution arguments against former president – live

Prosecutors in Fulton county, Georgia, have reportedly launched a criminal investigation of Donald Trump’s phone call to Brad Raffensperger, the Republican secretary of state, about the presidential election.

The New York Times reports:

On Wednesday, Fani Willis, the recently elected Democratic prosecutor in Fulton County, sent a letter to numerous officials in state government, including Mr. Raffensperger, requesting that they preserve documents related to Mr. Trump’s call, according to a state official with knowledge of the letter. The letter explicitly stated that the request was part of a criminal investigation, said the official, who insisted on anonymity to discuss internal matters.

The inquiry makes Georgia the second state after New York where Mr. Trump faces a criminal investigation. And it comes in a jurisdiction where potential jurors are unlikely to be hospitable to the former president; Fulton County encompasses most of Atlanta and overwhelmingly supported President Biden in the November election.
The Fulton County investigation comes on the heels of a decision Monday by Mr. Raffensperger’s office to open an administrative inquiry.

Related: 'I just want 11,780 votes': Trump pressed Georgia to overturn Biden victory

House impeachment managers are preparing to introduce new visual evidence during their presentation on Wednesday, as the trial begins in earnest following a vote to move forward with the proceedings.

The Democratic managers will lay out their case for why Donald Trump should be impeached, arguing that the former president committed “the most heinous constitutional crime possible” according to a senior aide on the impeachment manager’s team.

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Donald Trump ‘frustrated with lawyers’ as he watches impeachment trial on TV

Former president spent past three weeks at Mar-a-Lago resort and shunned golf course on Tuesday for trial coverage

As the historic second impeachment trial of Donald Trump got under way on Tuesday afternoon, the subject at the center of the case was more than a thousand miles away, muzzled by a social media ban and reduced to watching events unfold on TV.

Trump, who is charged with “incitement of insurrection” after his supporters stormed the US Capitol on 6 January, has spent the past three weeks holed up at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, with his schedule seemingly restricted to playing multiple rounds of golf. The one-term president has been at his resort, close to the golf club, since he left Washington DC at 8am on the day of Joe Biden’s inauguration.

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Congressman Raskin breaks down recounting Capitol breach – video

Jamie Raskin, the Democratic congressman, lead impeachment manager and constitutional law professor, fought back tears as he recounted his experience of the Capitol breach which happened the day after the death of his son. 'This cannot be our future': Raskin's 24-year-old daughter and his son-in-law were hiding in his office during the attack.

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Analysis: Democrats use Trump impeachment to show sometimes symbolism is the point

Analysis: faith in the US has been shaken and the impeachment trial is a test of accountability before a global audience

The Democratic congressman Jamie Raskin stood at the lectern, faced 100 senators and removed his black face mask to begin the historic second impeachment trial of former president Donald John Trump.

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Trump’s impeachment trial starts with graphic Capitol assault footage – video

Donald Trump's second impeachment trial opened in the Senate with graphic video of the attack on the Capitol on 6 January and his comments that spurred a rally crowd to become a mob.

The lead House prosecutor told senators the case would present 'cold, hard facts' against Trump, who is charged with inciting the siege of the Capitol to overturn the election he lost to Joe Biden

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‘Trump’s guilt is obvious’, impeachment managers say in new legal brief – live

The election arm of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), has brought out its final report on the US presidential election, concluding that it was well organised under the circumstances and there was no significant fraud.

The report also found that Donald Trump’s rhetoric and refusal to accept defeat undermined public faith in democratic institutions, and warned the US has long-term problems with providing equal voting rights for all.

Related: 'Jim Crow relic': Senate filibuster stands in way of Democratic voting rights push

Here’s where the day stands so far:

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Trump prosecutors pitch to the public in made-for-TV impeachment trial

Democrats hope harrowing audio and video from Capitol attack will make plain what no legal argument might deny

The lethal Capitol invasion by Donald Trump supporters that is at the heart of the former president’s second impeachment trial happened more than a month ago. But Democrats leading the prosecution of Trump are counting on an element of surprise.

Surprise, the impeachment prosecutors are calculating, because while most Americans understand the broad outlines of what happened during the 6 January attack on the Capitol, relatively few have come to grips with the shocking audio and video footage from that day – portraying a cauldron of violence, vandalism, bloodlust and fear.

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Senate leaders announce Trump impeachment trial rules – video

On the eve of Donald Trump's impeachment trial on a charge of inciting the deadly US Capitol attack, Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority and minority leaders, have laid out the framework for the trial. ’All parties have agreed to a structure that will ensure a fair and honest Senate impeachment trial of the former president,’ Schumer said. Each side will have 16 hours to present their arguments and the trial will break on Friday afternoon and resume on Sunday afternoon

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Democrats to open Trump impeachment trial by recounting Capitol attack

Impeachment managers will present scene in harrowing detail using video and audio recordings

House impeachment managers will open their prosecution of Donald Trump for “incitement of insurrection” by recounting the deadly assault on the US Capitol in harrowing and cinematic detail, rekindling for senators the chaos and trauma they experienced on 6 January.

Related: Donald Trump impeachment trial: what you need to know

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‘This fever will break’: Republican Jeff Flake on the slow fade of Trumpism

Anti-Trumpists are growing but very slowly – convicting Trump in his impeachment trial would help speed things along, says Flake

By now, Jeff Flake thought this would all be over.

Flake, the former Arizona Republican senator and outspoken critic of Donald Trump, concedes that he expected the ripple effects in the Republican party Trump’s loss of the White House to have been bigger by now.

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Liz Cheney raises possibility of criminal investigation of Trump for provoking violence

Republican pointed to former president’s tweet attacking vice-president Mike Pence after Capitol insurrection began

Liz Cheney, the third most senior Republican in the House of Representatives, has raised the possibility of Donald Trump being criminally investigated for provoking violence during the 6 January US Capitol insurrection, pointing to a tweet attacking his own vice-president, Mike Pence, that was posted after the assault had begun.

Related: Liz Cheney censured by Wyoming Republican party for voting to impeach Trump

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Trump lawyer requests to suspend impeachment trial during Sabbath

David Schoen’s request to postpone trial Friday sundown until Sunday presents managers with a scheduling dilemma

Donald Trump’s impeachment trial that opens on Tuesday could take longer than expected after a leading member of his defense team requested that the proceedings are suspended during the Sabbath so that he can meet his obligations as an observant Jew.

David Schoen, 62, has written to senior figures of both main parties in the US Senate asking for an agreement that the trial is postponed from 5.24pm on Friday until Sunday so that he can observe the Sabbath. In the letter, reported by the New York Times, the lawyer apologises for any inconvenience, adding that “the practices and prohibitions are mandatory for me … so I have no choice.”

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The crucial differences in Trump’s second impeachment trial

In some ways the trial will be a replay of last year’s – but Trump is the first to be tried by the Senate after leaving office, and it will likely be ‘dramatic’

It might be tempting to call it the trial of the century but it is just as likely to invoke a sense of deja vu. This week Donald Trump faces an impeachment trial in the US Senate. Yes, another one.

Trump stands accused of inciting an insurrection when he urged supporters to “fight” his election defeat before they stormed the US Capitol in Washington on 6 January, clashed with police and left five people dead.

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Liz Cheney censured by Wyoming Republican party for voting to impeach Trump

Cheney, the third ranking member of the House Republican leadership, was censured in a vote Saturday by her state’s Republican party

Liz Cheney, the third-highest-ranking Republican leader in the House, was censured by the Wyoming Republican party on Saturday for voting to impeach Donald Trump for his role in the 6 January riot at the US Capitol.

The overwhelming censure vote was the latest blowback for Cheney for joining nine Republican representatives and all Democrats in the US House in the 13 January impeachment vote.

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Donald Trump will refuse to testify at Senate impeachment trial, lawyers say

Democrats had challenged Trump to explain in next week’s proceedings why he disputed factual allegations

Donald Trump’s legal team has said the former president will not voluntarily testify under oath at his impeachment trial in the Senate next week, where he faces the charge from House Democrats that he incited the deadly insurrection at the US Capitol on 6 January.

The lead House impeachment manager, Jamie Raskin, a Democrat, wrote to Trump asking him to testify under oath before or during the trial, challenging the former president to explain why he and his lawyers have disputed key factual allegations at the center of their charge that he incited a violent mob to storm the Capitol.

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Biden pledges to ‘undo moral shame’ of Trump era with new orders on immigration – live

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) has been denounced as a “rogue agency” after new allegations of assaults on asylum seekers emerged, and deportations of African and Caribbean migrants continued in defiance of the Biden administration’s orders.

Joe Biden unveiled his immigration agenda on Tuesday, and his homeland security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas was confirmed by the Senate, but the continued deportations suggested the Biden White House still does not have full control of Ice, which faces multiple allegations of human rights abuses and allegations that it has disproportionately targeted black migrants.

Related: New claims of migrant abuse as Ice defies Biden to continue deportations

A hastily executed transfer of nearly 200 people in California’s prison system set off a public health disaster that endangered the lives of thousands of prisoners and staff and led to dozens of deaths, according to a new report from the state’s office of the inspector general (OIG).

The report published on Monday, the third in a series examining the Covid-19 catastrophe in California state prisons, details the circumstances of a May 2020 transfer of 189 people from the California Institute for Men (CIM) in Chino, California, to San Quentin state prison in the Bay Area and Corcoran state prison in the Central Valley.

Related: California prison transfer led to dozens of deaths and endangered thousands – state watchdog

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Donald Trump’s impeachment defence in disarray as lead lawyers quit

Butch Bowers clashed with Trump over strategy, according to reports, and leaves along with Deborah Barberi and three others

The ability of Republican senators who plan to acquit Donald Trump at his upcoming impeachment trial to pretend to have weighed the case on the merits has been endangered by the mass resignation of Trump’s legal team at the weekend.

The Senate has set a deadline of Tuesday for Trump’s lawyers to submit a preliminary memo laying out his defense. The House impeached Trump earlier this month on a single article charging “incitement of insurrection” – a historic second impeachment of a US president.

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