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Conservative lawyer Ken "The Cheese" Chesebro was deeply involved in the legal aspects of Donald Trump's coup attempt. A new dump of over 1,400 pages of documents reveals in even more detail the scheming going on behind the scenes to find some legal way to keep Trump in power after losing the 2020 election. This evidence could be valuable in both Special Counsel Jack Smith's case in D.C. and the Georgia RICO case. It shows what was going on, what the various actors were doing, and who knew about what and when.
Communications between Chesebro and Trump campaign lawyer Jim Troupis showed that as early as the day after the election, a key goal on the Trump side was to create a cloud of confusion by submitting dueling slates of electors. From a legal point of view, this makes no sense since only one slate's credentials would be signed by the governor, as required by law. But Chesebro's plan was to have two slates arrive at Congress and then have Congress pick the fake one, law or no law.
Chesebro's plans were much more fine-grained than was previously known. He was obsessed with details, such as how much debate would be allowed when a senator and a representative objected to the electoral votes from some states. Chesebro's strategy was to slow the process down to give the state legislatures time to send in new slates of electors so he could then argue that the Constitution allowed them to bypass the voters and just send in their own slates. He fretted when the House and Senate adopted rules on Jan. 3 that foiled some of his plans. He wanted unlimited debate in both chambers to give the state legislatures enough time to come up with fake slates of electors. The Jan. 3 rules didn't allow that. He was also focused on the possibility of the contingent election that would happen if the House rejected enough electoral votes to get Joe Biden below 270. He was afraid that then-speaker Nancy Pelosi might delay the vote indefinitely and then become president herself when no president or vice president had been certified. He covered all the bases.
The documents make clear that Chesebro was focused like a laser on the areas of the transfer of power that had few to no guardrails. He believed that the vulnerable areas could be exploited to keep Trump in power using bizarre legal theories. As time went on, court after court shot down his plans. In the end, it was up to Mike Pence to reject legitimate electoral votes, and Pence refused to do so. Chesebro was crushed when he learned that Pence was not going to play ball.
On Jan. 6, Chesebro marched to the Capitol but did not enter the building. When all was lost after Pence refused to delay the count, he then began to traffic in conspiracy theories, blaming "antifa" for the riot.
What Chesebro did and who knew what he was up to is important because he was charged in the Georgia RICO case. He pled guilty and as part of the deal he agreed to testify against Trump and the others when the case comes to trial. The more he knew, the greater the damage he could inflict on Trump and other indictees. (V)