The federal judge overseeing the prosecution of Donald Trump for his effort to overturn his loss in the 2020 election made more than 100 pages of allegations in the case public Wednesday, as part of a court fight over whether the presidency makes the former president immune to the charges.
The filing, which represents the largest batch of public information about Trump’s alleged crimes shared by federal prosecutors since the indictment last year, contains new details about Trump’s efforts to disrupt vote-counting in states he lost, arrange for false slates of electors to be presented to Congress, foment the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and then take advantage of the ensuing chaos.
It’s the most complete argument yet from special counsel John L. “Jack” Smith to prosecute Trump for an effort to overturn his loss in the 2020 election, made as part of Smith’s effort for the case to survive a July ruling from the Supreme Court that presidents are immune for actions taken in an official capacity.
The judge overseeing the case, Tanya S. Chutkan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, is now gathering information from both sides about which allegations prosecutors can pursue, which might be off-limits and how to handle other outstanding issues in the case.
Smith’s filing argued that Trump engaged in a monthslong effort as a private citizen and candidate for office, not as president, when he attempted to overturn the election. “Although the defendant was the incumbent President during the charged conspiracies, his scheme was fundamentally a private one,” the filing states.
It also lays out Trump’s public efforts such as his tweets and speech at the Ellipse on Jan. 6, 2021, as well as behind-the-scenes calls with officials to arrange the false slates of electors.
“When the defendant lost the 2020 presidential election, he resorted to crimes to try to stay in office. With private co-conspirators, the defendant launched a series of increasingly desperate plans to overturn the legitimate election results in seven states that he had lost,” the filing said.
Smith initially made the filing last week, and Chutkan released a redacted version of the filing Wednesday that withheld the identities of dozens of witnesses in the case, including private attorneys, campaign and party officials as well as state lawmakers.
Many of the allegations in the filing have been detailed elsewhere, such as the report by the House select panel that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. But Wednesday’s filing includes new details about Trump’s monthslong effort targeting seven states he lost.
The filing lays out the effort by Trump and his co-conspirators, which started with disruptions of vote-counting before the election was certified. In one incident laid out in the filing, a campaign staffer encouraged starting a riot at a tabulation center in Detroit.
The filing lays out more evidence than before about Trump’s efforts to arrange for false slates of electors to be presented to Congress on Jan. 6, 2021. That includes quotes from conversations Trump had with Vice President Mike Pence, as well as Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel seeking their support for the effort.
At one point McDaniel said she would not support Trump’s efforts to overturn the vote in Michigan based on a report about vote-counting in the state, the filing said, as she had been told the report was “f—ing nuts.”
The filing also sets up new battle lines in the case, as Smith has argued that Trump’s effort to enlist Pence to help overturn the election on Jan. 6 falls outside the immunity for official acts.
“The Executive Branch has no authority or function to choose the next President,” the filing said.
The filing also included information about Trump’s conduct during the attack on the Capitol, such as his conversations with advisers urging him to send a message for his supporters to go home. At one point a White House employee told Trump that Pence had been moved to a secure location for his own safety.
“So what?” the filing quoted Trump as responding.
Last month, Smith filed a new indictment in the case that kept the same charges, including conspiracy to defraud the United States and obstruction of an official proceeding.
But the new indictment removed many allegations around Trump’s conduct following the 2020 election that the Supreme Court said were off-limits, including Trump’s communications with Justice Department and White House officials.
In a filing Tuesday, Trump’s attorneys had opposed the release of the document, calling it a “politically motivated manifesto” meant to skew this year’s presidential election.
“The Office believes President Trump’s Constitutional rights to impartial jurors and fair proceedings—to say nothing of witness privacy and even safety—all take a back seat to the Office’s political goals,” Trump’s team argued.
Trump has made the alleged political nature of the prosecutions against him a key component of his reelection campaign but has not presented any evidence.
Attorney General Merrick B. Garland appointed Smith to take over already existing investigations into the former president after Trump announced his 2024 reelection bid.
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