Trump, Giuliani and Brooks urge judge to toss Jan. 6 lawsuits in hearing

[florida80]

1/10

Lawyers for former president Donald Trump, his attorney Rudolph W. Giuliani and Rep. Mo Brooks urged a federal judge Monday afternoon to reject allegations that they incited the violent Jan. 6 Capitol riot and to dismiss three lawsuits by Democratic House members and police officers seeking damages.

Trump, Giuliani and Brooks urge judge to toss Jan. 6 lawsuits in hearing
© Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images
Trump, Giuliani and Brooks urge judge to toss Jan. 6 lawsuits in hearing
Studies Reveal True Cost of a Financial Advisor
Ad
SmartAsset
Studies Reveal True Cost of a Financial Advisor
The courtroom showdown is the latest arena for a continuing national debate over Trump’s accountability for his role in the Capitol assault, which authorities said to led to five deaths and assaults on nearly 140 police officers as rioters delayed Congress’s confirmation of Joe Biden’s electoral college victory and forced the evacuation of lawmakers.

U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta set at least two hours of oral arguments in Washington to consider whether a federal jury may hear claims that the former president and others instigated and facilitated that day’s attack in violation of the Reconstruction-era Ku Klux Klan Act, which bars violent interference in Congress’s constitutional duties. The judge will also weigh whether a jury should consider whether Trump and his co-defendants are legally liable for injuries sustained by lawmakers and police during the deadly, hours-long breach of the Capitol by Trump supporters angered by his unfounded claims of election fraud.

The FBI and Justice Department have arrested more than 700 people in connection with the Jan. 6, 2021, attack. In addition, a House committee is investigating whether to recommend legal action against Trump and his aides, and other claims have been made in civil lawsuits.

Read House Democrats' argument on why their lawsuit should not be dismissed
Trump and his co-defendants have moved to dismiss three civil suits: one brought by Rep. Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.) with 10 other lawmakers; another by Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), a former prosecutor and Trump impeachment manager; and a suit by Capitol Police officers James Blassingame and Sidney Hemby. Thompson left his case in July after becoming co-chair of the House Jan. 6 committee. Another defendant, the Proud Boys, have not responded to the litigation. The Proud Boys have history of violent street clashes with left-wing groups and include people accused of leading parts of the Capitol attack.

In court briefs, Trump attorney Jesse Binnall said his client enjoys “absolute immunity” from civil suits on separation-of-powers and free-speech grounds. He argued that Trump was acting as president and carrying out his constitutional duty to ensure the faithful execution of the nation’s laws by opposing Congress’s vote on Jan. 6 to confirm Biden’s electoral college victory.

The allegations against Trump relate to the public speech of the then-sitting president and stem from the “political and personal animosity” of his foes, Binnall argued. “This Court should not be fooled. … The rule of law requires all people be treated equally. … There can be no exception to these stalwart constitutional protections merely because Plaintiffs do not want to extend these protections to their political nemesis.”

Separately, Giuliani’s defense called it “too far-fetched and outlandish” to believe the plaintiffs would successfully tie him and Trump to “a vast conspiracy to mastermind the attack on the Capitol.”

Pause
Unmute
LQ
CaptionsFullscreen
Mo Brooks urged a Jan. 6 crowd to ‘fight.’ Now his actions long before the insurrection face new scrutiny.
Those assertions were countered by plaintiffs and some First Amendment lawyers, scholars and liberal groups that filed friend-of-the-court briefs.

“The First Amendment does not protect the military-style incursion into the Capitol led by the Oath Keepers; nor does it shield Trump and Giuliani’s incendiary remarks, which aroused and mobilized the assembled crowd with the purpose, and having the effect, of violently disrupting official proceedings of Congress,” wrote House lawmakers’ legal team, led by Joseph M. Sellers.

Sellers, joined by attorneys for the NAACP, argued that Trump was not acting in his official capacity as president but as a failed political candidate and private citizen when he openly supported and encouraged those who used violence against election officials and his political opponents. In alignment with lead Swalwell attorney Caleb Andonian, Sellers also argued that Trump ignored warnings that violence was a foreseeable result and did nothing to calm the frenzied mob for more than an hour after rioting began, in a conspiracy to obstruct, by force or threat, the certification of the 2020 election results.

Read Trump’s latest motion to dismiss
“No one has a right to conspire, direct, and incite assaults on police officers … or to utter speech that is intended to incite violence or that is integral to criminal conduct,” added Patrick Malone and the Protect Democracy Project, which represent Blassingame and Hemby. Nor can the holder of even the nation’s highest office claim absolute immunity for “anything and everything he did … as long as he says he was acting as president and not as a sore loser candidate.”

The Democratic lawmakers’ suits assert that Trump’s baseless and incendiary statements for months claiming the election was being “stolen” by fraud and that an embrace of violence were part of a months-long conspiracy with others to subvert the results of the election, culminating with Brooks (R-Ala.) and Giuliani egging on the riot along with other speakers — including Donald Trump Jr. — at a fiery rally that morning at the White House Ellipse.

At the rally, the suits allege, the then-president whipped the crowd into a mob, encouraging attendees to “fight like hell” and march to the Capitol as he repeated false claims about the illegitimacy of the election.

The suits allege that during the rally and the later Capitol siege, Giuliani, acting as Trump’s attorney, urged lawmakers to delay the count in hopes of somehow preventing certification altogether and to pressure Trump’s running mate, Vice President Mike Pence, to overturn the result.

Rep. Eric Swalwell sues Trump over Jan. 6 riot, alleging he poses risk of ‘inciting future political violence’
The Democratic lawmakers cite the Klan Act, now part of a civil rights statute known as “Section 1985.” The act authorizes lawsuits against people who conspire to interfere with government, obstruct justice or deprive others of equal protection under the law, such as by threatening voters, candidates or the courts, as occurred during the Klan’s reign of terror to disenfranchise Black citizens and White supporters after the Civil War.

The lawsuits quote Trump claiming victory and declaring “a major fraud on our nation” even before votes were fully counted on Nov. 4. They assert he demonized election officials and others — including Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R), who rejected Trump’s hectoring to change certified and recounted results — as enemies of the people, criminals and traitors, leading to threats of assassination and other violence.

The lawsuits assert that Trump inspired political violence by failing to condemn such actions and repeating falsehoods about the election even after 60 courts rejected his and his allies’ claims. At least one election official and a former homeland security aide to Pence had predicted violence if Trump did not stop, the lawsuits said.

The lawsuits conclude, “And when hordes of Trump’s supporters did just that, Donald Trump reportedly was happy with the result.”

They cited similar criticism of Trump by former aides, including former chiefs of staff John F. Kelly and Mick Mulvaney, defense secretary Jim Mattis, attorney general William P. Barr, U.N. ambassador John Bolton and national security adviser H.R. McMaster.

Brooks is defending himself and argued that he cannot be sued, because he was acting as a federal employee and member of Congress when he spoke. The House and Justice Department refused to defend him, with government prosecutors stating, “Inciting or conspiring to foment a violent attack on the United States Congress is not within the scope of employment of a Representative — or any federal employee.”

At the rally, Brooks, the first member of Congress to declare that he would challenge the electoral college count certifying Biden’s victory, invoked bloodshed and asked the crowd, “Are you willing to do what it takes to fight for America?”

U.S. Capitol workers and other federal employees are dealing with trauma a year after the insurrection.
© John Minchillo/AP
U.S. Capitol workers and other federal employees are dealing with trauma a year after the insurrection.
An attorney for the Oath Keepers withdrew from the case in November, saying the group had stopped paying or communicating with his firm. But the attorney argued earlier that it was “conclusory and speculative” to assert that the group’s members planned anything other than to attend a speech of the president and march to the Capitol to make its views on the certification vote known to Congress.

Giuliani’s defense likewise argued that his call for “trial by combat” was clearly hyperbolic and not literal, that he immediately condemned the riots as “shameful” and that “no reasonable reader or listener would have perceived Giuliani’s speech as an instruction to … violently terrorize Congress.”

Friend of the court brief by First Amendment and legal scholars
Liberal legal scholars urged the courts to carve out a “categorical” exception from the First Amendment for speech integral to political intimidation or coercion of voters, lawmakers and government officials and not to require proof that a speaker intended a “true threat” of violence.

“The Constitution doesn’t reward a failed candidate with immunity when he incites an insurrection to halt the counting of electoral votes,” the scholars wrote. “To hold otherwise would require the Court to conclude the Constitution immunizes those who organize and incite a violent insurrection aimed at sabotaging the Constitution. Our founding document does not contain the seeds of its own destruction.”

The lawsuits are among several Trump is facing. Separately, an Atlanta-area prosecutor is investigating whether Trump’s or others’ “attempts to influence” state officials to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election result were unlawful. Other Trump team targets, including Dominion Voting Systems, have brought defamation lawsuits against Giuliani and pro-Trump lawyer Sidney Powell, alleging that they made dozens of statements promoting the “false preconceived narrative” that the election was stolen from Trump and blaming the company’s counting machines without any evidence.

Florida80 you’re fucking low life asshole! Posted all fucking stupid fake news , asshole!