Summary
That’s it from me this evening. Here’s what happened today:
Donald Trump will appear in a Manhattan courtroom on Tuesday afternoon to hear the charges filed against him by Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg, which likely center on his alleged hush money payments to adult film actor Stormy Daniels.
Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation lawsuit against Fox News will go to trial.
Joe Biden does not want to talk about Trump’s indictment, but his press secretary said the president had no advance notice of the charges.
House Republicans again demanded documents and testimony from Bragg, and he again told them to take a hike.
American media organizations published a joint statement demanding the release of Evan Gershkovich, an American reporter detained in Russia.
Social media influencer Douglass Mackey AKA Ricky Vaughn was charged with election interference by the US attorney’s office of the eastern district of New York for conspiring to convince supporters of Hillary Clinton to vote in the 2016 election using text messaging or social media.
Updated
In other presidential election news, social media influencer Douglass Mackey, AKA “Ricky Vaughn,” was charged with conspiracy against rights for interfering in the 2016 election, according to an announcement from the US attorney’s office of the eastern district of New York.
Mackey, who had 58,000 followers on Twitter, is being charged with conspiring with other prominent accounts to use social media platforms such as Twitter to convince Hillary Clinton supporters to vote using text message or social media. The attorney’s office said that at least 4,900 unique telephone numbers texted “Hillary Clinton” to a number that Mackey and others deceptively shared on or around election day.
This is a far more significant verdict than the coverage from the blinkered prestige media suggests. It's already sending a shudder of fear through the far right, which relies on Twitter and other social media to attack democracy. https://t.co/Ps4XQ1gfqN
— Luke O'Brien (@lukeobrien) March 31, 2023
Here are some details from the US attorney’s office:
For example, on November 1, 2016, in or around the same time that Mackey was sending tweets suggesting the importance of limiting “black turnout,” the defendant tweeted an image depicting an African American woman standing in front of an “African Americans for Hillary” sign. The ad stated: “Avoid the Line. Vote from Home,” “Text ‘Hillary’ to 59925,” and “Vote for Hillary and be a part of history.” The fine print at the bottom of the deceptive image stated: “Must be 18 or older to vote. One vote per person. Must be a legal citizen of the United States. Voting by text not available in Guam, Puerto Rico, Alaska or Hawaii. Paid for by Hillary For President 2016.” The tweet included the typed hashtag “#ImWithHer,” a slogan frequently used by Hillary Clinton.
“Mackey has been found guilty by a jury of his peers of attempting to deprive individuals from exercising their sacred right to vote for the candidate of their choice in the 2016 presidential election,” stated United States attorney Peace. “Today’s verdict proves that the defendant’s fraudulent actions crossed a line into criminality and flatly rejects his cynical attempt to use the constitutional right of free speech as a shield for his scheme to subvert the ballot box and suppress the vote.”
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