Lawyers: Trump had basis to question 2020 election
WASHINGTON – Donald Trump had a “good faith” basis to question the results of the 2020 election, his lawyers said in demanding that prosecutors turn over any evidence related to voting irregularities and potential foreign interference in the contest won by Democrat Joe Biden.
A defense motion filed late Monday in federal court in Washington asserts that Trump was not obligated to accept at face value the judgments of government officials who found no widespread fraud in the election. It raises the prospect that foreign actors might have influenced the race and alleges that the federal government gave “false assurances” to the public about the security of the election that exceeded what was actually known.
“It was not unreasonable at the time, and certainly not criminal, for President Trump to disagree with officials now favored by the prosecution and to rely instead on the independent judgment that the American people elected him to use while leading the country,” the lawyers wrote.
The filing is the clearest indication yet that Trump’s lawyers hope to sow doubt about the legitimacy of the race or make the case his skepticism was justified and not motivated by criminal intent. The lawyers seek permission to force special counsel Jack Smith’s team to produce information they say could aid his defense, including “the impact of foreign influence” and “actual and attempted compromises of election infrastructure” as well as evidence of potential “political bias” that could have shaped the intelligence community’s assessment of the election.
Courts around the country and Trump’s own attorney general have found no evidence of fraud that could have affected the outcome, and the Homeland Security Department’s cybersecurity arm pronounced the election “the most secure in American history.” Smith’s team alleges that Trump, a Republican, ignored all of those findings and launched an illegal plot to undo the election and block the peaceful transfer of power. But the Trump team asserts in the 37-page filing that he had reason to question the results.
The motion recounts Russian efforts in 2016 to undermine confidence in that year’s election, though it glosses over the intelligence community’s assessment that Moscow had a “clear preference” for Trump over his Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton.
It also revisits the intelligence community’s effort in 2020 to discern potential interference by countries including Russia, China and Iran. It quotes from a Jan. 7, 2021, memo from John Ratcliffe, the then-director of national intelligence and a close Trump ally, that said China sought to influence the election. And it seeks information from prosecutors about a Russian cyberespionage campaign in 2019 and 2020 that affected numerous federal government agencies, saying that intrusion calls into question the confidence being expressed by officials at that time in the security of the election.
Defense lawyers are also seeking to force prosecutors to turn over documents related to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol, when pro-Trump loyalists stormed the building in a violent confrontation with police in an effort to disrupt the counting of electoral votes.