Biden wins the presidency: The latest updates
Here’s the latest action from the historic 2020 election.
2020 Elections
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Judge dismisses charges in Nevada fake electors case over venue question
Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford said he would take the case directly to the state Supreme Court.
A Nevada state court judge dismissed a criminal indictment Friday against six Republicans accused of submitting certificates to Congress falsely declaring Donald Trump the winner of the state’s 2020 presidential election, potentially killing the case with a ruling that state prosecutors chose the wrong venue to file the case.
Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford stood in a Las Vegas courtroom a moment after Clark County District Court Judge Mary Kay Holthus delivered her ruling, declaring that he would take the case directly to the state Supreme Court.
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Rudy Giuliani processed in Arizona in fake electors scheme
Giuliani pleaded not guilty in May to nine felony charges stemming from his alleged role in the fake electors effort.
PHOENIX — Rudy Giuliani, a former New York City mayor and Donald Trump attorney, was processed Monday in the criminal case over the effort to overturn Trump’s Arizona election loss to Joe Biden, the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office said.
The sheriff’s office provided a mug shot but no other details. The office of the Clerk of the Superior Court for Maricopa County said Giuliani posted bond of $10,000 in cash.
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3 Trump operatives charged in Wisconsin for 2020 election gambit
Kenneth Chesebro, Jim Troupis and Mike Roman were all charged with forgery for their efforts to assemble fake elector certificates.
Kenneth Chesebro, an architect of Donald Trump’s scheme to subvert the 2020 election, has been charged with felony forgery in Wisconsin, court records show.
Chesebro, who developed a strategy to send false slates of presidential electors — and to use them to stoke a conflict on Jan. 6, 2021 aimed at blocking Joe Biden’s Electoral College victory — was charged alongside Jim Troupis, a 2020 Trump campaign lawyer, and Mike Roman, a former Trump campaign operative.
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Giuliani pleads not guilty to felony charges in Arizona election interference case
Ten others, including former Arizona Republican Party Chair Kelli Ward, also pleaded not guilty to conspiracy, forgery and fraud charges related to the case.
PHOENIX — Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani pleaded not guilty Tuesday to nine felony charges stemming from his role in an effort to overturn Donald Trump’s 2020 election loss in Arizona to Joe Biden.
Ten others, including former Arizona Republican Party Chair Kelli Ward, also pleaded not guilty to conspiracy, forgery and fraud charges related to the case. Giuliani appeared remotely for the arraignment that was held in a Phoenix courtroom. His and Ward’s trials are scheduled for Oct. 17, about three weeks before the U.S. election.
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WABC Radio suspends Rudy Giuliani for flouting ban on discussing discredited 2020 election claims
The former New York City mayor had been warned twice not to discuss “fallacies of the November 2020 election.”
NEW YORK (AP) — Rudy Giuliani was suspended Friday from WABC Radio and his daily show canceled over what the station called his repeated violation of a ban on discussing discredited 2020 election claims. Giuliani said the station’s ban is overly broad and “a clear violation of free speech.”
Giuliani issued a statement saying he had heard of WABC Radio owner John Catsimatidis’ decision through “a leak” to The New York Times. Catsimatidis confirmed his decision in a text message to The Associated Press.
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Felons or dupes? Treatment of Trump’s fake electors has varied wildly by state
The disparities in legal consequences for the Republicans who posed as "alternate electors" in 2020 have generated discomfort among some legal experts.
Eighty-four Republicans in seven states falsely claimed to be Donald Trump’s presidential electors in December 2020. Three and a half years later, dozens of them are facing criminal charges that could land them in prison for years.
Dozens of others have not been charged at all.
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Inside the unusually aggressive Arizona grand jury that indicted Trump’s allies
The grand jury displayed remarkable independence, even charging two Trump lawyers after prosecutors said they were not under investigation.
The Arizona grand jury that recently indicted 18 people for their roles in former President Donald Trump’s scheme to subvert the 2020 election cast a far wider net than state prosecutors had publicly foreshadowed.
The panel of 16 Arizonans displayed unusual independence from the prosecutors supervising the investigation, according to a rare inside look at the secret proceedings based on interviews with eight people familiar with the probe and documents signed by a top prosecutor.
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Democratic officials criticize Meta ad policy, saying it amplifies lies about 2020 election
The secretaries of state said allowing ads that claim the 2020 presidential election was stolen will further erode trust in elections.
ATLANTA (AP) — Several Democrats serving as their state’s top election officials have sent a letter to the parent company of Facebook, asking it to stop allowing ads that claim the 2020 presidential election was stolen.
In the letter addressed to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the secretaries of state from Colorado, Maine, New Jersey, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington and Vermont said allowing such ads will further erode trust in elections and fuel threats of political violence against election workers, which already has led some to leave the profession. Also signing the letter was Wisconsin Secretary of State Sarah Godlewski, who does not oversee elections.
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Judge rejects Eastman bid to retain law practice while fighting disbarment
He has pleaded with the judge to consider delaying the impact of her ruling.
A judge in California turned down an urgent plea Wednesday from John Eastman — an architect of Donald Trump’s bid to subvert the 2020 election — to allow him to keep practicing law while he fights an effort to permanently revoke his license.
Judge Yvette Roland recommended Eastman’s disbarment in March after finding he repeatedly breached legal ethics in service of Trump’s scheme to stay in power. Though her ruling is not the final word — and Eastman plans to appeal — it triggered an automatic suspension of Eastman’s license.
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Arizona grand jury indicts Meadows, Giuliani, other Trump allies for 2020 election interference
The former president is listed as an unindicted co-conspirator.
An Arizona grand jury has indicted 18 allies of Donald Trump for their efforts to subvert the 2020 election — including former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and attorneys Rudy Giuliani and Boris Epshteyn.
The indictment, which includes felony counts of conspiracy, fraud and forgery, also describes Trump as an unindicted co-conspirator.
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John Eastman, architect of Trump’s 2020 election plot, should be disbarred, judge rules
"The most severe available professional sanction is warranted to protect the public," Judge Yvette Roland wrote.
A California judge on Wednesday recommended the disbarment of John Eastman, calling to revoke the law license of one of former President Donald Trump’s top allies in his failed last-ditch gambit to subvert the 2020 election.
Judge Yvette Roland, who presided over months of testimony and argument about the basis of Eastman’s fringe legal theories, ruled that the veteran conservative attorney violated ethics rules — and even potentially criminal law — when he advanced Trump’s efforts to overturn the election results based on weak or discredited claims of fraud.
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Judge tosses 6 charges in Trump Georgia indictment
But the judge emphasized that prosecutors may refile the charges in greater detail.
The state judge presiding over Donald Trump’s criminal case in Georgia has thrown out six of the indictment’s 41 charges, ruling that the state had failed to make specific enough allegations to support them.
The ruling affects three of the 13 felony counts Trump faces in the case, though not the central charge of a racketeering conspiracy aimed at overturning the results of the 2020 presidential election in the state.
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Arizona investigators issue grand jury subpoenas as state's 2020 Trump election probe accelerates
It’s a sign the state’s attorney general is nearing a decision about whether to bring criminal charges.
Arizona prosecutors in recent weeks issued grand jury subpoenas to multiple people linked to Donald Trump’s 2020 campaign, a sharp acceleration of their criminal investigation into efforts to overturn Joe Biden’s victory in the state.
The new steps, first reported here, are a sign that Attorney General Kris Mayes, a Democrat, is nearing a decision on whether to charge Trump’s allies in the state, including GOP activists who falsely posed as presidential electors in December 2020.
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No ruling on bid to disqualify Georgia prosecutors after another day of odd testimony
The judge said he would hear arguments on the evidence within the next two weeks.
A dramatic two-day hearing about whether the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office should be blocked from prosecuting Donald Trump and his allies ended Friday without an immediate ruling from the judge.
Judge Scott McAfee said he and lawyers for both sides will reconvene at the end of next week or early the following week for arguments on the evidence that emerged during the session, which the judge called to evaluate the defendants’ bid to disqualify District Attorney Fani Willis.
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Most Taylor Swift conspiracy theorists are also election deniers, poll finds
Almost three-quarters of those who believe the Swift conspiracy also believe the 2020 election outcome was fraudulent.
Americans who believe the conspiracy theory that Taylor Swift is part of an elaborate scheme to help Democrats win the November election are also more likely to not believe the 2020 election results, according to a new poll released Wednesday.
Almost three-quarters of those who believe the Swift conspiracy also believe the 2020 election outcome was fraudulent, according to the Monmouth University Poll.
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DC bar authorities file disciplinary charges against pro-Trump 2020 election lawyers
The charges are the latest in a slew of disciplinary proceedings against attorneys who aided Donald Trump’s bid to subvert the election.
Washington, D.C., bar investigators have filed disciplinary charges against three lawyers who aided Donald Trump ally Sidney Powell’s campaign to mount discredited legal challenges to the 2020 election results.
Filings made public Friday accused attorneys Juli Haller, Lawrence Joseph and Brandon Johnson of making knowingly false representations to courts about a slew of lawsuits they filed in the weeks after the 2020 election.
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The violent political threats public officials are facing amid Trump's legal woes
Trump's many legal problems have intensified — and so have the threats to prosecutors, judges and other public officials involved in his cases.
After Donald Trump was indicted last year for his alleged role in a scheme to pay hush money to a porn star, the threats toward the lead prosecutor in the case started coming in.
A letter containing death threats and white powder was addressed to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
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Court says even passive members of Jan. 6 mob can be convicted of disorderly conduct
The decision is a victory for the Justice Department on one of the most common charges lodged against Jan. 6 defendants.
A federal appeals court ruled Friday that Jan. 6 defendants can be found culpable of “disorderly” or “disruptive” conduct inside the Capitol even if they weren’t personally violent or destructive.
The decision is a victory for the Justice Department in cases against hundreds of defendants charged with misdemeanor counts of disorderly and disruptive conduct, one of the staple charges that has been applied to nearly every member of the mob that entered the halls of Congress.
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Arrest footage of Trump co-defendant provides glimpse into Jack Smith probe
“They were f--king relentless,” former Black Voices for Trump director Harrison Floyd said of his confrontation with FBI agents dispatched by the special counsel.
Special counsel Jack Smith’s probe of Donald Trump’s election subversion has mostly played out in stuffy conference rooms and secret grand jury chambers, but last February, it nearly turned violent.
During a tense confrontation with FBI agents who were trying to serve a subpoena, Harrison Floyd — a 2020 Trump campaign aide — considered grabbing one of the agents’ guns, Floyd told local police officers who arrived at his door shortly afterward. His exchange with the local police was captured in body camera footage obtained by POLITICO through a public records request.
