- Trump allegedly worked with a Justice Department attorney to oust the acting attorney general.
- He wanted to replace Jeffrey Rosen with attorney Jeffrey Clark, reports The New York Times.
- Trump has backed down after a group of top leaders of the DOJ said they would resign if Rosen was fired.
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Donald Trump has reportedly planned with a Justice Department lawyer to oust acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen so he can place a loyalist who will put pressure on lawmakers in Georgia to favor the election. times, The New York Times reported Friday.
The story is reminiscent of Trump’s final efforts to seize power in the days leading up to President Joe Biden’s inauguration.
According to Katie Benner of The Times, Trump and Jeffrey Clark have been working on ways to raise doubts about the election results. Rosen did not cooperate with Trump’s alleged plan, which prompted him to seek a willing candidate for Clark, reports The Times.
Top justice leaders threatened to resign if Rosen was fired, forcing Trump to abandon the idea, but not before Clark and Rosen addressed their opposing arguments to Trump, the newspaper reported.
Trump and Republican allies have lost dozens of lawsuits to block the election results.
Read more: Trump’s Republican threat to bolster could spark a serious legal battle over his ‘gold mine’ list of supporters who helped fill the GOP coffers with billions of dollars.
Allies, including pro-Trump attorney Sidney Powell, have argued an unfounded conspiracy theory that Dominion Voting Systems switched votes for Trump to votes for Biden in the election. Dominion filed a $ 1.3 billion defamation suit against Powell earlier this month.
According to The Times, Trump also pressured Rosen to appoint special advisers, specifically one who would investigate Dominion.
Insider could not reach Clark, and the Department of Justice did not respond to a request for comment during the publication.
Clark told The Times his report, which is based on interviews with four former Trump officials, has inaccuracies but did not specify what it was.
“Senior Justice Advocates, not uncommonly, provide legal advice to the White House as part of our duties,” Clark said. “All my official communication is in accordance with the law.”
In December, Rosen and Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue allegedly denied Clark’s request to the department hold a news conference, saying they were investigating the fraud allegations.
Trump focused on the state of Georgia, where Biden won by a small margin. The Trump administration put pressure on the then U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, Byung J. “BJay” Pak. Pak resigned from his post on January 4 and the Department of Justice replaced him the next day.
The Washington Post reported Thursday that the inspector general is now investigating Pak’s sudden departure.
Pak is not the only Georgia official who has tried to pressure Trump. Trump also pleaded with Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” additional votes to help him win.
In addition, The Times reported Clark had asked Rosen and Donoghue to send officials in Georgia a letter falsely stating that the department was investigating the state for voter fraud and that they should stop Biden’s victory. On December 31, Rosen and Donoghue told Clark that he was wrong because there was no evidence of fraud.
Read more: SCOOP: Trump taps his former chief of staff and accusation lawyers as the gatekeepers to his papers during his post-presidency
Over the weekend, Clark met with Trump and came back to tell Rosen that he would replace him before Jan. 6, when Congress met to ratify the vote.
Rosen refused to step down and worked with White House attorney Pat Cipollone to schedule a meeting with Trump later that evening, The Times reported.
Rosen, Donoghue and Clark met Trump, Cipollone and his deputy Patrick Philbin. Cipollone eventually convinced Trump that it would be unwise to fire Rosen.
Trump’s unfounded allegations of electoral fraud have been criticized as the spark that fueled the January 6 uprising attempt at the US Capitol. Trump supporters violated the building and clashed with law enforcement and halted the joint session of Congress as lawmakers would formalize Biden’s victory in the 2020 election. The riot resulted in the deaths of five people.
The House has indicted Trump on charges of inciting an uprising. The Senate will soon hold a trial and vote on whether the former president is convicted. This is the second accusation that Trump has held in his four years in office.