Trump 62: Jack Smith Is Hot On Grandpa Ranty's Case

[GreyhoundFan]

His legal troubles seem to be escalating daily. And, Lordy, there are tapes.

"It’s not just Mar-a-Lago: Trump charges highlight his New Jersey life"

Quote

The 49-page indictment against Donald Trump for allegedly mishandling classified documents and obstructing justice is largely focused on how boxes of sensitive documents ended up crammed into the nooks, crannies and even a chandelier-adorned bathroom of Trump’s Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago.

But two of the indictment’s most vivid scenes took place about 1,200 miles to the north.

Prosecutors accuse Trump of showing off classified documents to employees and others not authorized to see them — not once, but twice at his sprawling golf club on the rural plains of New Jersey.

According to the indictment, Trump bragged in July 2021 about a sensitive military plan with two of his staffers, as well as the writer and publisher of a then-forthcoming book from his former chief of staff, Mark Meadows, during a session at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster.

In an audio recording of the session near the club’s pool, Trump can be heard acknowledging the secrecy of the documents to the group — who included communications staffers Liz Harrington and Margo Martin, according to people familiar with the matter, some of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the criminal case.

“See, as president I could have declassified it. Now I can’t,” Trump tells the group on the recording, which was obtained this week by The Washington Post. “Isn’t that interesting? It’s so cool.”

One or two months later, according to the indictment, Trump showed a sensitive government map to an employee of his political action committee during a meeting at Bedminster. No similar incidents are described at Trump’s club in Florida, where the indictment was filed.

Trump’s behavior in New Jersey is yet another data point showing that the former president did not simply stash the boxes of sensitive documents, unopened and untouched, in the basement of his Florida club and forget about them. Instead, advisers said he was personally attached to and hyper-aware of the boxes, instructing that at least some of them accompany him from place to place, and appeared aware of what was inside.

Federal authorities have asked witnesses extensive questions about activities at Bedminster, including about how the documents were packed, sent and returned, people familiar with the matter said.

Unlike Trump’s Florida property, the New Jersey club was never searched by FBI agents, but current and former advisers said Trump regularly transported boxes of government documents to and from Bedminster, where he holds residence each year for the summer.

By the time the FBI conducted a court-ordered search in August, agents had collected surveillance video that showed boxes of documents being moved at Mar-a-Lago and conducted interviews with staff about Trump’s habits in Florida. People familiar with the case said they did not believe there was enough evidence to persuade a judge to order a similar search in New Jersey.

The people said that as the investigation proceeded and more information was gathered, there was little desire to order an involuntary search of a second home of the former president — particularly because his lawyers were in communication with authorities about searches they were conducting to ensure no more records were in Trump’s possession. Investigators have long believed the large majority of documents Trump took from the White House were stored in Florida.

After raiding Mar-a-Lago last year, federal prosecutors pressed Trump’s legal team to certify that he had no additional classified material in his possession. A discussion about when and how to search the New Jersey club for additional documents set off a rift between Trump’s lawyers that ultimately contributed to some of them quitting the team this year.

‘Wouldn’t you want to be buried here?’

Bedminster is not a private home. Rather, it is a club frequented by hundreds of visitors and a destination for large events.

The vast estate on 500 acres of sleepy farmland featuring a red-brick manor house was purchased in 1981 for $3.5 million by John Z. DeLorean, the independent car manufacturer best known for creating the gull-winged stainless steel sports car featured in the 1985 film “Back to the Future.” At the time, it was the most expensive residential real estate deal ever brokered in New Jersey.

But DeLorean struggled with legal and financial problems for years and, in 2000, finally declared bankruptcy and auctioned off the bucolic estate to a golf course developer. Trump purchased the course and estate two years later for what he claimed at the time was “substantially” less than $35 million.

Trump opened his Trump National Golf Club Bedminster for business in 2004 over the July Fourth weekend. Pre-presidency, the club served as a destination for high-profile golf and tennis tournaments, as well as a venue for Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner’s lavish wedding. “Wouldn’t you want to be buried here?” he told the Wall Street Journal in 2015.

During his presidential transition, he interviewed candidates for his cabinet there, resulting in a made-for-television spectacle that was broadcast across network news.

While president, Trump would frequently decamp from Washington to his New Jersey club and hold meetings with top government officials there, particularly in the summer months. There, he installed a makeshift office among the luxury cottages that surround the club’s 25-meter swimming pool and has resided in a separate cottage in the same complex, where he stores his belongings, according to people who have visited.

At least some of his prized “beautiful mind paper boxes” — a phrase used by aides to describe his complicated and disorganized filing system that only he seemed to understand — usually trailed close behind him, staying in his private cottage.

People familiar with his unofficial filing system said Trump was keenly aware of the contents of the boxes — and exactly what was being taken to and from the clubs.

“There was this false notion he didn’t know what was in the boxes,” said a person closely involved in his operation who has been interviewed by federal authorities. A different aide described Trump rifling through boxes looking for a particular newspaper clipping, somehow knowing exactly where the old story would be found.

Above one of the cottages, while Trump was president, staff installed a sensitive compartmented information facility, or SCIF, an ultra-secure room where officials and government contractors can review highly classified material, where Trump held sensitive meetings as president and reviewed secret documents.

Aides said they preferred when Trump vacationed at Bedminster while president than when he spent time at Mar-a-Lago, which he frequented in winter months. One adviser said there were fewer “crazies” among the membership of the less flashy New Jersey club and fewer opportunities to bend his ear around the pool or over dinner about their pet issues.

After Trump left office in January 2021, he spent his first months out of office in Florida.

According to the indictment, by then, dozens of boxes filled with government records shipped to Florida from the White House had been carted around the Palm Beach club, moved from the White and Gold Ballroom to the club’s business center to a chandeliered bathroom. But in May, the indictment alleges, “Trump caused some of his boxes to be brought to his summer residence at The Bedminster Club.” Prosecutors note in the indictment that, at the time, the club was “not an authorized location” for storing or reviewing classified records.

At Bedminster, Trump’s habits and routines at the club were strikingly consistent with his life at Mar-a-Lago, according to people familiar with his schedule.

After waking, he would spend hours watching television, play golf four or five days a week, then change and venture into his office for meetings before dinner at the club.

The Bedminster club inherited one feature of Trump’s life in the White House of which he was especially fond — a roughly $50,000 room-size “golf simulator” game, surrounded by two walls featuring oversize presidential seals, that was transferred to the club from his personal quarters in the White House after he had it installed in 2019 to play virtual rounds at golf courses all over the world.

Trump’s personal aide, Waltine Nauta, who worked for him in the White House while enlisted in the U.S. Navy and then moved to Florida to serve him in private life, often slept in bedrooms located on the upper floor of the cottage where Trump keeps his office — part of the building designed for staff offices. Nauta has been indicted along with Trump and has been charged with helping him hide government records from federal authorities.

Due to space constraints, Trump’s staff has utilized the porch off one of the cottages as a waiting room of sorts for visitors.

Trump often plays the role of DJ, curating music for guests, or emcee, surprising a bride and groom during their wedding — an occurrence that is sometimes documented on the social media accounts of the couple or their guests.

In keeping with his habit of mixing work, business and pleasure, he hosted a tournament last year for LIV Golf, the Saudi-backed league, an event that netted him millions of dollars, according to people familiar with the arrangement.

‘This is secret information’

Still, the club has a distinctly more low-key vibe than his Palm Beach resort, people who have visited both clubs said. While membership still carries a hefty price, more families with children spend time at the New Jersey club, creating a different environment than the more socialite-heavy crowd at Mar-a-Lago, they said.

In his book, “The Chief’s Chief,” Meadows wrote that the July 2021 meeting where Trump described the military invasion plan for Iran took place not far from the Bedminster pool.

“The sound of children laughing drifts into the room from the club’s pool, which sits just outside of the president’s new office,” he wrote. “The boss leans back in his chair, dressed in a sport coat and a crisp white shirt that’s open at the neck. He looks at least twenty pounds lighter than he was in office.”

On the audio recording, Trump can be heard shuffling papers and telling the group that the document was “highly confidential.” The recording, according to people familiar with the investigation, was discovered late in the probe and is viewed as one of the government’s strongest pieces of evidence.

“Secret. This is secret information,” Trump said, adding later that “this is still a secret.”

“Yeah, now we have a problem,” responded a staffer, who people familiar with the matter identified as Liz Harrington.

Harrington did not respond to requests for comment other than to point to a statement from a Trump spokesman who said that the audio shows Trump was “speaking rhetorically and also quite humorously” and that the former president “did nothing wrong at all.”

Investigators learned of the audio in recent months, and it quickly emerged as a key piece of evidence in the case.

Responding to the audio on Tuesday, Trump said in a statement: “As we’ve been saying from the moment President Trump rode down the golden escalator, the President did nothing wrong.”

A lawyer for Martin declined to comment about her participation in the meeting.

Also present at the meeting was Kate Hartson, a publishing veteran who co-founded a conservative imprint called All Seasons Press in 2021 that put out the Meadows book, and another person involved with the project, Sean McGowan. Hartson did not respond to request for comment, and McGowan could not be reached. Neither responded to messages left through the publishing house.

In the indictment, prosecutors allege that none of the four held a security clearance “or any need-to-know any classified information about a plan of attack on Country A,” which has been identified by people familiar with the session as Iran.

The audio suggests that the session was a breezy and light one.

“It’s incredible, right?” Trump said to the group before announcing, “Hey, bring some Cokes in, please.”

According to the indictment, Trump also showed an unnamed representative of his political action committee a classified map of what is described as “Country B” in August or September of 2021, commenting that military action in the country was not going well. He allegedly told the person that he knew he shouldn’t be sharing the map and urged them not to get too close.

‘Wanting to take the boxes’

The following year, as Trump prepared to return to Bedminster from Mar-a-Lago, he had been clashing for months with the government over sensitive documents he had kept after leaving the White House. In May 2022, authorities sent him a grand jury subpoena seeking the return of any document with classification markings.

According to the indictment, Trump delayed his departure for New Jersey so that he could be present when his lawyer, Evan Corcoran, met with personnel from the Justice Department and FBI who visited Mar-a-Lago on June 3, 2022, to recover documents with classification markings.

In the days leading up to the meeting, Trump and Nauta corresponded extensively, as Nauta moved approximately 64 boxes from the storage room to Trump’s residence, the indictment alleges. An unidentified Trump family member texted Nauta on May 30, 2022, after noticing the boxes in Trump’s residence, to warn him about packing too many boxes on the plane when the family left for Bedminster.

“We will NOT have a room for them. Plane will be full with luggage. Thank you!” the text read, according to the indictment.

Nauta responded that he thought Trump “wanted to pick from them” and didn’t “imagine him wanting to take the boxes,” according to the indictment.

Nauta and others then loaded “several of Trump’s boxes along with other items on aircraft that flew Trump and his family north for the summer,” according to the indictment.

On Aug. 8, the FBI conducted a court-ordered search of Mar-a-Lago, seizing 102 documents with classification markings from Trump’s office and the club’s ground-floor storage room.

In October 2022, Trump’s lawyers hired an outside team to conduct searches of his properties beyond Mar-a-Lago to see if any additional records were still at his facilities. It came as Trump’s legal team was being pressed by a federal judge in sealed court proceedings to attest that it had fully complied with the May grand jury subpoena to turn over all classified materials.

But Trump’s lawyers clashed with one another over searching Bedminster, with Boris Epshteyn questioning the need and expressing concerns, according to people familiar with the matter.

Other lawyers favored the New Jersey search, and at least three of them have quit since then, privately citing differences with Epshteyn. One lawyer, Timothy Parlatore, said in an appearance on CNN on May 20 that Epshteyn “didn’t want us doing the search, and we had to eventually overcome him.”

The Bedminster search was ultimately conducted in late October, and Trump’s lawyers informed the Justice Department that the outside team did not find any new classified document.

Espshteyn declined to comment.

When Trump’s indictment was unsealed this month, the former president was, as usual, at Bedminster. Members of his campaign and legal teams hustled to New Jersey to join him there. Trump was said to be dining on the patio in the evening and playing golf the next day.

Recently, Trump’s legal team has hunkered down on the property in a room painted olive green in the main clubhouse, according to people familiar with the team’s activity. Alina Habba, a lawyer on Trump’s team, has conducted interviews from the room, appearing in television appearances sitting between an American flag and a black-and-white silhouetted portrait of Trump’s scowling face.

 

 

Continued from here:

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Awwww, his fee-fees have been hurt. Cry me a river, Cheeto.

 

[Xan]

Trump is on Truth Social crowing about the recent Supreme Court ruling on affirmative action.

That's pretty rich coming from a guy who only got into college because of his connections.  If schools were truly merit-based, Donny would never have been accepted.

I only hope this get overturned by a later court.  And Trump wallowing in this is just disgusting.  The only thing worse that a poor loser is a bad winner.

[fraurosena]

Grandpa Ranty is going to have a conniption as more subpoenas are issued in the documents case.

Investigation of Trump Documents Case Continues After Former President’s Indictment

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Three weeks after former President Donald J. Trump was indicted on charges of illegally retaining national security records and obstructing the government’s efforts to reclaim them, a federal grand jury in Miami is still investigating aspects of the case, according to people familiar with the matter.

In recent days, the grand jury has issued subpoenas to a handful of people who are connected to the inquiry, those familiar with it said. While it remains unclear who received the subpoenas and the kind of information prosecutors were seeking to obtain, it is clear that the grand jury has stayed active and that investigators are digging even after a 38-count indictment was issued this month against Mr. Trump and a co-defendant, Walt Nauta, one of his personal aides.

Prosecutors often continue investigating strands of a criminal case after charges have been brought, and sometimes their efforts go nowhere. But post-indictment investigations can result in additional charges against people who have already been accused of crimes in the case. The investigations can also be used to bring charges against new defendants.

When the office of the special counsel Jack Smith filed the charges against Mr. Trump and Mr. Nauta in the Southern District of Florida, the 49-page indictment offered an unusually detailed picture of the former president holding on to 31 highly sensitive government documents at Mar-a-Lago, his private club and residence in West Palm Beach, Fla. Among the documents were some that concerned U.S. nuclear programs and others that detailed the nation’s potential vulnerabilities to attack.

The indictment was strewn with vivid photographs of government records stored in boxes throughout Mar-a-Lago in a haphazard manner. Some of the boxes were piled up in a storage room, others in a bathroom and on a ballroom stage.

Several of Mr. Trump’s aides and advisers appeared in the indictment, identified only as Trump Employee 1 or similar descriptions. In one episode, the indictment recounted how Mr. Trump displayed a classified map to someone described as “a representative of his political action committee” during a meeting in August or September 2021 at his golf club in Bedminster, N.J.

The representative of the PAC was Susie Wiles, one of the top advisers for Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign, according to two people briefed on the matter. A Trump spokesman declined to comment.

Ms. Wiles’s appearance in the indictment was reported earlier by ABC News.

The fact that Ms. Wiles could become a prosecution witness should Mr. Trump’s case go to trial, even as she is helping run his third bid for office, underscores the complexities that the former president now faces as he deals with both a presidential campaign and a criminal defense with an overlapping cast of characters.

During the meeting with Ms. Wiles, the indictment says, Mr. Trump commented that “an ongoing military operation” in an unnamed country was not going well. He then showed Ms. Wiles, who did not have proper security clearance, a classified map of that country, the indictment says, even while acknowledging that he should not be displaying the map and warning Ms. Wiles “to not get too close.”

Many of Mr. Trump’s aides and employees at Mar-a-Lago were questioned as part of the investigation that resulted in his indictment, and Mr. Trump has been barred from discussing the facts of the case with them even though many work in close contact with him. Mr. Trump has made defending himself against the charges a central part of his political and fund-raising messages, adding to the level of overlap that exists between his legal and political worlds.

Other aides who have been close to Mr. Trump are featured in the indictment, such as “Trump Employee 2,” who has been identified as Molly Michael, an assistant to Mr. Trump in the White House and his post-presidential office. The portion of the indictment describing the transcript of an audio recording in which Mr. Trump described what he said was a plan to attack Iran given to him by the Pentagon lists someone as a “staffer,” who three people identified as Liz Harrington, a spokeswoman for Mr. Trump.

Some Trump aides and employees who had initially caught the attention of investigators were mentioned in the indictment only in passing.

At one point, for example, prosecutors under Mr. Smith appeared to be focused on Mr. Nauta’s dealings with a maintenance worker at Mar-a-Lago, Carlos Deoliveira, who helped him move boxes into a storage room at the compound. The movement of those boxes — at Mr. Trump’s request, prosecutors say — ultimately lay at the heart of a conspiracy charge in the indictment accusing Mr. Trump and Mr. Nauta of obstructing the government’s attempt to retrieve all of the classified materials in Mr. Trump’s possession.

In a previously unreported detail, prosecutors obtained a warrant to seize Mr. Deoliveira’s phone as part of their investigation, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Records from the phone eventually showed that Mr. Deoliveira called an I.T. specialist who worked for Mar-a-Lago last summer around the time that prosecutors issued a subpoena to Mr. Trump’s company, the Trump Organization, demanding footage from a surveillance camera near the storage room where the boxes of documents were kept.

But Mr. Deoliveira is referenced as “an employee of the Mar-a-Lago Club” in only a single paragraph in the indictment.

 

[Dandruff]

2 hours ago, fraurosena said:

Many of Mr. Trump’s aides and employees at Mar-a-Lago were questioned as part of the investigation that resulted in his indictment, and Mr. Trump has been barred from discussing the facts of the case with them even though many work in close contact with him.

Honor system?

[GreyhoundFan]

[Xan]

They keep coming out with this "Trump is the least racist or the only one with no slave holding ancestors" stuff about living presidents.  There are only 6 living presidents - Biden, Trump, Obama, Bush, Clinton, and Carter.  Not only is Trump NOT the least racist, he's probably the most.  And the only reason that his ancestors didn't have slaves is that they came over after the Civil War.

[backyard sylph]

What are these polls he's going on about leading in record numbers? I have not personally been asked who I think is the most brain-addled dishonest public figure who insists on not going away and leaving us alone, so I doubt these polls exist. 

[GreyhoundFan]

This is extra odd:

 

[Dandruff]

54 minutes ago, GreyhoundFan said:

This is extra odd:

Dubbed over video of him sleepwalking?

[fraurosena]

He's trying to look tough and grim but only succeeds in looking like a zombie.

[GreyhoundFan]

TFG is trying to get Obama killed. It’s horrifying. 

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Yeah, he got some news:

 

[GreyhoundFan]

I think Nauta will probably go down with the ship.

[GreyhoundFan]

I agree with Ron:

 

[front hugs > duggs]

7 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

Yeah, he got some news:

 

But when will someone teach him how to spell “stolen”!?!?

[GreyhoundFan]

Because of course:

 

[Xan]

Trump is showing up today in Pickens, SC -- a town with 3,400 residents.  The theories are that: 1) The crowds will look bigger in the smaller area, 2) He probably hasn't offered (and won't offer) to pay for any costs, and 3) Since it's a redder-than-red area, he'll get a lot of adoring fans which he needs right now in the midst of his legal problems.

[GreyhoundFan]

Is anyone surprised by this? "Trump pressured Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey to overturn 2020 election"

Quote

In a phone call in late 2020, President Donald Trump tried to pressure Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey (R) to overturn the state’s presidential election results, saying that if enough fraudulent votes could be found it would overcome Trump’s narrow loss in Arizona, according to three people familiar with the call.

Trump also repeatedly asked Vice President Mike Pence to call Ducey and prod him to find the evidence to substantiate Trump’s claims of fraud, according to two of these people. Pence called Ducey several times to discuss the election, they said, though he did not follow Trump’s directions to pressure the governor.

The extent of Trump’s efforts to cajole Ducey into helping him stay in power has not before been reported, even as other efforts by Trump’s lawyer and allies to pressure Arizona officials have been made public. Ducey told reporters in December 2020 that he and Trump had spoken, but he declined to disclose the contents of the call then or in the more than two years since. Although he disagreed with Trump about the outcome of the election, Ducey has sought to avoid a public battle with Trump.

Ducey described the “pressure” he was under after Trump’s loss to a prominent Republican donor over a meal in Arizona earlier this year, according to the donor, who like others interviewed for this story spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. The account was confirmed by others aware of the call. Ducey told the donor he was surprised that special counsel Jack Smith’s team had not inquired about his phone calls with Trump and Pence as part of the Justice Department’s investigation into the former president’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election, the donor said.

Ducey did not record the call, people familiar with the matter said.

Now out of public office, the former governor declined through a spokesman to answer specific questions about his interactions with Trump and his administration.

“This is neither new nor is it news to anyone following this issue the last two years,” spokesman Daniel Scarpinato said in a statement. “Governor Ducey defended the results of Arizona’s 2020 election, he certified the election, and he made it clear that the certification provided a trigger for credible complaints backed by evidence to be brought forward. None were ever brought forward. The Governor stands by his action to certify the election and considers the issue to be in the rear view mirror.”

A spokesman for Trump declined to respond to questions about the call with Ducey and instead falsely declared in a statement that “the 2020 Presidential election was rigged and stolen.” The spokesman said Trump should be credited for “doing the right thing — working to make sure that all the fraud was investigated and dealt with.”

It is unclear if Ducey has been contacted by Smith’s office since meeting with the donor. Investigators in the special counsel’s office have asked witnesses about Trump’s calls with governors, including the one to Ducey, according to two people familiar with the matter. It is unclear if prosecutors plan to eventually bring charges or how the calls figure into their investigation. Prosecutors have also shown interest in Trump’s efforts to conscript Pence into helping him, according to witnesses and subpoenas previously reviewed by The Washington Post.

Trump phoned the governor’s cellphone on Nov. 30, 2020, as Ducey was in the middle of signing documents certifying President Biden’s win in the state during a live-streamed video ceremony. Trump’s outreach was immediately clear to those watching. They heard “Hail to the Chief” play on the governor’s ringtone. Ducey pulled his phone from out of his suit jacket, muted the incoming call and put his phone aside. On Dec. 2, he told reporters he spoke to the president after the ceremony, but he declined to fully detail the nature of the conversation. Ducey said the president had “an inquisitive mind” but did not ask the governor to withhold his signature certifying the election results.

But four people familiar with the call said Trump spoke specifically about his shortfall of more than 10,000 votes in Arizona and then espoused a range of false claims that would show he overwhelmingly won the election in the state and encouraged Ducey to study them. At the time, Trump’s attorneys and allies spread false claims to explain his loss, including that voters who had died and noncitizens had cast ballots.

After Trump’s call to Ducey, Trump directed Pence, a former governor who had known Ducey for years, to frequently check in with the governor for any progress on uncovering claims of voting improprieties, according to two people with knowledge of the effort.

Pence was expected to report back his findings and was peppered with conspiracy theories from Trump and his team, the person said. Pence did not pressure Ducey, but told him to please call if he found anything because Trump was looking for evidence, according to those familiar with the calls.

A representative for Pence declined to comment.

In each of the calls, Ducey reiterated that officials in the state had searched for alleged widespread illegal activity and followed up on every lead but had not discovered anything that would have changed the outcome of the election results, according to Ducey’s recounting to the donor.

After learning that Ducey was not being supportive of his claims, Trump grew angry and publicly attacked him.

It is unclear if Ducey and Trump had additional conversations. Publicly, the governor said the state’s election systems should be trusted, even as Trump and his allies sought to reverse his loss.

In Arizona, Trump and his attorney, Rudy Giuliani, called then Speaker of the House Rusty Bowers (R) on Nov. 22, 2020. They asked the speaker to convene the legislature to investigate their unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud, which included that votes had been cast en masse by undocumented immigrants and in the names of deceased people. Weeks later, on Dec. 31, 2020 the White House switchboard left a message for the chair of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, Clint Hickman, seeking to connect him with Trump. The supervisor, a Republican, did not return the call.

Trump and his allies made similar appeals to officials in Michigan and Georgia. On Jan. 2, 2021, Trump called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) and said he wanted to undo his loss there by finding additional votes. The next night, the White House switchboard left Hickman another voice mail seeking to connect him to Trump. Hickman did not call back.

Investigators with Smith’s office interviewed Raffensperger this week, and they interviewed Giuliani last week. “The appearance was entirely voluntary and conducted in a professional manner,” said Giuliani spokesman Ted Goodman.

More than half a dozen past and current officials in Arizona contacted by Trump or his allies after his defeat have either been interviewed by Smith’s team or have received grand jury subpoenas seeking records, according to four people familiar with the interviews. Those interviewed include Bowers, the former Arizona House speaker, and three current members of the governing board of Maricopa County, the largest voting jurisdiction in the state that affirmed that Biden won.

Spokespeople for Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs (D) and Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes (D), told The Post this week that their offices have not received correspondence from Smith’s team seeking records about the 2020 election. The Arizona Secretary of State’s office received a grand jury subpoena dated Nov. 22, 2022, that sought information about communications with Trump, his campaign and his representatives, according to an official familiar with the document but not authorized to publicly speak about it.

During his time as governor, Ducey navigated a hot-and-cold relationship with Trump. Ducey, who struck a more conventional approach to governing, was slow to embrace Trump during his first bid for the White House. The two men warmed to each other, and amid the pandemic and Trump’s second bid for the White House, Ducey campaigned for him.

But after Ducey certified Arizona’s election results, affirming the wins of Biden and other Democrats, Trump ridiculed him on social media: “Why is he rushing to put a Democrat in office, especially when so many horrible things concerning voter fraud are being revealed at the hearing going on right now … What is going on with @dougducey?”

That same day, allies of the president gathered in Phoenix to air unproven claims of widespread fraud and claim that state lawmakers could reject the will of voters. Giuliani attended the event, along with Republican lawmakers and activists; Trump dialed in.

The president invoked Ducey repeatedly in the days that followed, according to an archive of his tweets. On Dec. 3, Trump asked if “allowing a strong check of ballots” in Arizona would “be easier on him and the great State of Arizona.” On Dec. 5, Trump wrote that Ducey and Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) “fight harder against us than do the Radical Left Dems.”

A week later, Trump attacked the men again, asking “Who is a worse governor?” He labeled them “RINO Republicans” and baselessly claimed that “They allowed states that I won easily to be stolen.”

Ducey, long eyed by national Republicans as a formidable candidate for the U.S. Senate, passed on a 2024 bid after his standing with the Trump base cratered after Trump’s attacks. After leaving office in January, he was a fellow at the Sine Institute of Policy & Politics at American University, where he spoke about the policies he enacted while in office. Earlier this month, Ducey announced that he is leading a free-enterprise focused political action committee, Citizens for Free Enterprise.

 

[Xan]

Lately, Donald has been pointedly having pictures taken of himself with law enforcement people on his campaign stops.  He did it again today in South Carolina.  I suppose he's hoping that the police will step up and protect him if anyone tries to arrest him.  I'd feel sorry for his pathetic ass if I didn't hate him so much.

[fraurosena]

6 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

It is unclear if Ducey has been contacted by Smith’s office

6 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

After Trump’s call to Ducey, Trump directed Pence, a former governor who had known Ducey for years, to frequently check in with the governor for any progress on uncovering claims of voting improprieties, according to two people with knowledge of the effort.

Pence was expected to report back his findings and was peppered with conspiracy theories from Trump and his team, the person said. Pence did not pressure Ducey, but told him to please call if he found anything because Trump was looking for evidence, according to those familiar with the calls.

If smith has interviewed Pence, and has spoken with people with knowledge of the call, he doesn’t really need Ducey.

[GreyhoundFan]

He’s looking very disheveled. I guess the pressure is getting to him. 

 

[fraurosena]

4 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

He’s looking very disheveled. I guess the pressure is getting to him. 

 

Isn't it gross that a 77 year old man needs to surround himself with girls that are half a century younger than him in order to feel good?

[fraurosena]

 

[Shrubbery]

His speech is horrifying - that goes without saying these days, unfortunately - but I’m surprised by how fluently he’s speaking and not derailing or improvising. Seems his handlers have hit on a good combo of his meds.