WASHINGTON, D.C — The U.S. House of Representatives will officially send its articles of impeachment to the Senate Monday evening, formally charging former President Donald Trump with “incitement of insurrection” at the U.S. Capitol on January 6. The nine House Democrats, appointed to serve as Impeachment Managers, will walk the articles over to the Senate chamber, signaling the beginning the second impeachment trial. Senate leadership has agreed to delay proceedings until the week of February 8.
“We are respectful of the Senate’s constitutional power over the trial and always attentive to the fairness of the process, noting that the former president will have had the same amount of time to prepare for trial as our Managers. Our Managers are ready to begin to make their case to 100 Senate jurors through the trial process,” Speaker Pelosi said in statement.
Read the articles of impeachment here.
###
LAST UPDATED: 2:15 PM ET
WASHINGTON, D.C — Department of Justice Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz announced today that the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) will investigate whether any former or current DOJ official tried to use the Department to overturn the 2020 election results. Today’s announcement follows new reporting by The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, showing that a senior DOJ lawyer played a key role in enabling Donald Trump’s plot to undo the election results.
Read the press release from the Office of the Inspector General here.
###
LAST UPDATED: 2:15 PM ET
WASHINGTON, D.C — Non-profit government watchdog group Campaign for Accountability filed an ethics complaint on Friday against Republican House Members Paul Gosar (R-AZ), Andy Biggs (R-AZ) and Madison Cawthorn (R-NC) regarding their role in the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol. The complaint charges the three Members with “inciting a riot as part of a seditious conspiracy to use force to prevent Congress from carrying out its constitutional and statutory duties to count the votes of the Electoral College.”
“Representatives Gosar, Biggs and Cawthorn deliberately misled Trump supporters and actively encouraged them to believe they could stop the certification of the election results. Their words helped light the match, resulting in death and destruction at the US Capitol,” Campaign for Accountability Executive Director Michelle Kuppersmith said in a statement.
The group is asking the Office of Congressional Ethics to recommend expulsion of the three Members from the U.S. House of Representatives.
Read the complaint by the Campaign for Accountability here.
###
LAST UPDATED: 1:15 PM
WASHINGTON, D.C — Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) filed a counter-complaint with the Senate Committee on Ethics on Monday morning, calling for an investigation into the conduct of seven of his Democratic colleagues who filed an ethics complaint against him and Senator Cruz last Thursday.
In the latest complaint, Hawley doubles down on his decision to object to the 2020 election results and asks the Committee to take disciplinary action against the seven Senators. In a separate letter addressed to the seven Senate Democrats, Hawley wrote, “The idea that one Senator who disagrees with another Senator can therefore have that Senator punished, sanctioned, censured, or removed is utterly antithetical to our democracy and the very idea of open, lawful debate.”
The response by Hawley follows the decision by Democratic Senators Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Tina Smith (D-MN), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Mazie Hirono (D-HI), Tim Kaine (D-VA), and Sherrod Brown (D-OH) to request a formal inquiry into how Senators Hawley and Cruz’s objections to the 2020 Electoral College certification may have aided in the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Read the counter-complaint filed by Senator Hawley here.
###
LAST UPDATED: 11:00 AM ET
WASHINGTON, D.C — Dominion Voting Systems filed a defamation lawsuit on Monday against Rudy Giuliani, the chief lawyer behind Donald Trump’s failed post-election litigation effort. The 107-page complaint, filed in federal court in Washington D.C, seeks damages of over $1.3 billion and accuses Giuliani of propagating false claims about election fraud, specifically how Dominion conspired to flip the 2020 election in favor of Joe Biden. Dominion Voting System has already filed a similar lawsuit against former Trump lawyer and “Kraken” conspiracy peddler Sydney Powell.
“As result of the false accusations disseminated to a global audience by Giuliani, his allies, and like-minded media outlets—who acted in concert to promote a false preconceived narrative about the 2020 election, despite the total lack of evidence to support it, and despite the mountains of paper ballots and the army of credible sources disproving it—Dominion has suffered unprecedented reputational and financial harm, and its employees’ lives have been put in danger.”
### LAST UPDATED: 10:00 AM ET
WASHINGTON, D.C — Seven Senate Democrats filed an ethics complaint on Thursday against Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO), calling for a formal probe into how the two Senators’ objections to the Electoral College certification may have played a role in inciting the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
“The Senate has the exclusive power to determine whether these actions violated its ethics rules, to investigate further conduct of which we may not be aware that may have violated these rules, and to consider appropriate discipline. The question the Senate must answer is not whether Senators Hawley and Cruz had the right to the object to the electors, but whether the senators failed to “[p]ut loyalty to the highest moral principles and to country above loyalty to persons, party, or Government department” or engaged in “improper conduct reflecting on the Senate” in connection with the violence on January 6. The Senate Ethics Committee should investigate their conduct to fully understand their role. The actions of which we know demand an investigation and a determination whether disciplinary action is warranted. Until then, a cloud of uncertainty will hang over them and over this body.”
Read the complaint to the Senate Committee on Ethics here.
###
LAST UPDATED: 6:00 PM ET