SCOOP: Jan. 6 panel subpoenas unseen Trump tapes
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With help from Eli Okun and Garrett Ross
DRIVING THE DAY
SCOOP: The House select committee investigating Jan. 6 sent a subpoena last week to ALEX HOLDER, a documentary filmmaker who was granted extensive access to President DONALD TRUMP and his inner circle, and who shot interviews with the then-president both before and after Jan. 6. The existence of this footage is previously unreported.
A source familiar with the project told Playbook on Monday night that Holder began filming on the campaign trail in September 2020 for a project on Trump’s reelection campaign. Over the course of several months, Holder had substantial access to Trump, Trump’s adult children and VP MIKE PENCE, both in the White House and on the campaign trail.
According to the subpoena, which was obtained exclusively by Playbook, the committee wants three main things from Holder:
(1) Raw footage from Jan. 6.
(2) Raw footage of interviews from September 2020 to present with Trump, Pence, DONALD TRUMP JR., IVANKA TRUMP, ERIC TRUMP and JARED KUSHNER.
(3) Raw footage “pertaining to discussions of election fraud or election integrity surrounding the November 2020 presidential election.”
Holder is expected to fully cooperate with the committee in an interview scheduled for Thursday. Read the full subpoena","link":{"target":"NEW","attributes":[],"url":"https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000181-8458-de12-add1-bc5824520000","_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7cf0000","_type":"33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df"},"_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7cf0001","_type":"02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266"}”>Read the full subpoena
TODAY’S JAN. 6 HEARING — At 1 p.m., the committee will gavel in for a hearing that centers on the pressure campaign Trump and his allies mounted to get state officials to overturn the 2020 election, including attempts to advance slates of “alternate electors” to flip the results in Trump’s favor.
As our Nicholas Wu and Kyle Cheney report this morning, that plan was concocted even before the election was actually called. “On Nov. 5, 2020, conservative attorney CLETA MITCHELL — who had been leading pre-election preparations for Trump’s legal team — reached out to [JOHN] EASTMAN with a request” for a memo outlining the idea, they write. That memo was eventually forwarded to the Oval Office, while Eastman “began consulting directly with state legislators, encouraging some to simply retabulate their popular votes in order to show Trump in the lead.”
Per a committee aide, today’s hearing will show that Trump’s efforts “perpetuated the public’s belief that the election was stolen and tainted by widespread fraud and lies that ultimately contributed to the violence of Jan. 6” — and that Trump was warned in advance that his actions “risked inciting violence,” including intimidation and threats against state officials and election workers.
The logistics … Chair BENNIE THOMPSON (D-Miss.) and Vice Chair LIZ CHENEY (R-Wyo.) are expected to open the hearing, and Rep. ADAM SCHIFF (D-Calif.) will play a key role. There will be four witnesses broken up over two panels.
— The first panel features (1) Arizona House Speaker RUSTY BOWERS, (2) Georgia Secretary of State BRAD RAFFENSPERGER and (3) his deputy, GABRIEL STERLING.
Bowers is expected to describe the pressure campaign from Trump, RUDY GIULIANI and VIRGINIA THOMAS, the wife of Supreme Court Justice CLARENCE THOMAS. In one phone call, Trump and Giuliani pushed Bowers to change Arizona law retroactively “to allow the Legislature to choose a different slate of presidential electors than picked by voters.”
Raffensperger and Sterling are more well known nationally. Sterling held multiple press conferences as Georgia tallied its votes in 2020, at one point blasting the harassment and threats election workers were receiving. Famously, in a phone call on Jan. 2, 2021, Trump pushed Raffensperger to help him “find” just enough votes to help him win the state, and threatened him with “a criminal offense.”
— The second panel has just one witness: SHAYE MOSS, an election worker in Georgia. She and her mother processed ballots in 2020 and were targets of a smear campaign by Trump allies. David Wickert at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution has a deep dive on Moss, who was accused “of rigging the November 2020 election for Joe Biden with ‘suitcases’ of ballots on election night. The pair were featured in a video that Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani called a ‘smoking gun’ for voting fraud.”
A committee aide said that Moss would outline how “being targeted by the former president has upended her life and that of her mother. … They were subjected to death threats, intimidation, coercion, forced to go into hiding.”
Happy Tuesday. Today is the official start of summer. Thanks for reading Playbook. Drop us a line: Rachael Bade","link":{"target":"NEW","attributes":[],"url":"mailto:rbade@politico.com","_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7d20004","_type":"33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df"},"_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7d20005","_type":"02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266"}”>Rachael Bade, Eugene Daniels","link":{"target":"NEW","attributes":[],"url":"mailto:edaniels@politico.com","_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7d20006","_type":"33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df"},"_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7d20007","_type":"02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266"}”>Eugene Daniels, Ryan Lizza","link":{"target":"NEW","attributes":[],"url":"mailto:rlizza@politico.com","_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7d20008","_type":"33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df"},"_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7d20009","_type":"02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266"}”>Ryan Lizza.
BIDEN’S BIG CHALLENGE — A week after telling the AP in an interview that a recession is not “inevitable,” President JOE BIDEN reiterated his position on Monday: “I was talking to LARRY SUMMERS this morning, and there’s nothing inevitable about a recession,” Biden told reporters, per Bloomberg’s Jenny Leonard and Josh Wingrove.
And speaking of Summers, the former Treasury secretary wasn’t far behind with his own analysis on Monday: “We need five years of unemployment above 5% to contain inflation — in other words, we need two years of 7.5% unemployment or five years of 6% unemployment or one year of 10% unemployment,” Summers said in remarks in London, per Bloomberg’s Philip Aldrick. “There are numbers that are remarkably discouraging relative to the Fed Reserve view.”
MUST-READ FROM UVALDE — “‘If there’s kids in there, we need to go in’: Officers in Uvalde were ready with guns, shields and tools — but not clear orders,”","link":{"target":"NEW","attributes":[],"url":"https://www.texastribune.org/2022/06/20/uvalde-police-shooting-response-records/","_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7d2000e","_type":"33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df"},"_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7d2000f","_type":"02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266"}”>“‘If there’s kids in there, we need to go in’: Officers in Uvalde were ready with guns, shields and tools — but not clear orders,” by The Texas Tribune’s Terri Langford: “The Texas Tribune has reviewed law enforcement transcripts and footage that federal and state investigators are examining after the May 24 tragedy.”
PRIMARY PREVIEW — “Republican voters will effectively pick the next member of Congress for a handful of open, deep-red congressional seats in Tuesday’s primaries — including a Senate seat in Alabama that’s been the subject of one of the strangest and most dramatic races of 2022,” Zach Montellaro writes in his preview of today’s big races.Here are the races worth watching:
Alabama’s GOP Senate runoff is the day’s biggest prize.
In two competitive House seats in Virginia, the GOP will put forward nominees who aim to oust Democratic incumbents:
- In VA-07, “the race to challenge Democratic Rep. ABIGAIL SPANBERGER … is a crowded and tight one,” with four candidates earning the NRCC’s “on the radar” designation for potential top recruits. ICYMI: WaPo on the primary
In three deep-red seats, the GOP will nominate candidates who immediately become general election frontrunners:
- AL-05: Madison County Commission Chair DALE STRONG is the favorite against former Assistant Secretary of the Army CASEY WARDYNSKI in the race to succeed Mo Brooks.
- GA-06: Frontrunner JAKE EVANS has Trump’s endorsement. He faces RICH MCCORMICK, who has the backing of Sen. TED CRUZ (R-Texas), the Club for Growth and Americans for Prosperity.
- GA-10: Businessman MIKE COLLINS faces Dem-turned-Republican former state Rep. VERNON JONES. The fight has a familiar dividing line: Jones has Trump’s support, while Collins was endorsed by Gov. BRIAN KEMP, who Trump unsuccessfully targeted in a primary last month.
BIDEN’S TUESDAY:
— 10:30 a.m.: The president and VP KAMALA HARRIS will receive the President’s Daily Brief.
— 12:45 p.m.: Biden and Harris will have lunch together.
— 2:30 p.m.: Biden and first lady JILL BIDEN will visit a local Covid vaccination clinic hosted by the District of Columbia’s Department of Health.
— 3:45 p.m.: Biden will deliver remarks on Covid vaccines for children.
Press secretary KARINE JEAN-PIERRE will brief at 1 p.m.
The White House Covid-19 response team and public health officials will brief at 10 a.m.
THE HOUSE will meet at noon, with votes postponed until 6:30 p.m. The Jan. 6 committee will hold its latest hearing at 1 p.m.
THE SENATE will meet at 3 p.m., with a vote at 5:30 p.m. on ANA DE ALBA’s judicial nomination.
BIDEN’S WEEK AHEAD:
— Saturday: The president will depart for Schloss Elmau in southern Germany to attend the G-7 Leaders’ Summit.
PHOTO OF THE DAY
PLAYBOOK READS
ALL POLITICS
2024 WATCH —NYT’s Maggie Haberman has the download from MIKE PENCE’s Monday speech at the University Club of Chicago, where the former VP “sounded very much like a candidate — but not much like someone interested in discussing the specifics of what he lived through” during the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. The position that Pence finds himself in — to some, a hero; to some, a pariah — provides “potential benefit and peril as he considers running for president,” Haberman writes.
California GOP strategist ROB STUTZMAN: “The irony is that Pence was arguably the primary enabler of Trump. … He was the mainstream traditional conservative Republican who would go to donors and not just defend Trump and his policies, but with a straight face insist that Donald J. Trump was a good man.”
— Related read: Pence spoke to Fox News’ Brooke Singman for an exclusive interview, during which he said “he ‘will not allow the Democrats’ to use January 6 to ‘distract attention from their failed agenda’ and praised former President Trump’s record, while indicating, though, that his decision on whether to run for the White House in 2024 will not be impacted by Trump’s own re-election plans.”
NOW WE GOT BAD BLOOD —Olivia Beavers and Meridith McGraw have the deets on the tiff between Rep. ELISE STEFANIK (R-N.Y.) and New York GOP Chair NICK LANGWORTHY. It all began when Langworthy “jumped to support Rep. LEE ZELDIN (R-N.Y.) for his gubernatorial bid while [Stefanik] was weighing her own statewide run,” Olivia and Meridith report. Now, the rift “is spreading to fronts that could hurt the GOP further. Langworthy’s political director for the state party restricted fundraising and voter contact data Stefanik’s team could access before the Republican National Committee intervened to restore it, according to one person familiar with the matter. Stefanik’s team suggested the RNC stop sending money to the New York GOP to pay for staff and instead hire New York-based RNC-paid staffers.”
GREITENS’ VIDEO GETS FLAGGED FOR VIOLENCE — Social media giants cracked down on a campaign video that Missouri GOP Senate candidate ERIC GREITENS released in which he called supporters to join him in “RINO hunting,” and depicted him raiding a house with men dressed in military-style fatigues. “There’s no bagging limit, no tagging limit and it doesn’t expire until we save our country,” Greitens says in the video.
But Facebook and Twitter took measures to limit the video’s exposure. “Facebook said the video was removed ‘for violating our policies prohibiting violence and incitement.’ Twitter said Greitens’ post violated its rules about abusive behavior but said it was leaving it up because it was in the ‘public’s interest’ for the tweet to be viewable. The company’s move prevented the post from being shared any further,” writes AP’s Brian Slodysko.
— Related Missouri news: JOHN WOOD is a former federal prosecutor who clerked for Supreme Court Justice CLARENCE THOMAS and Judge J. MICHAEL LUTTIG. Now, he’s the lead attorney for the House Jan. 6 select committee. But some see another path for Wood: an independent bid for the Senate seat being vacated by Republican ROY BLUNT. “On Monday, a committee headed by former U.S. Sen. JACK DANFORTH launched a website to encourage” Wood to run, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch’s Kurt Erickson reports.
JUDICIARY SQUARE
SCOTUS WATCH — There are still 17 cases that the Supreme Court needs to work through before it can close out its term in the coming weeks. The WSJ has a helpful roundup of eight of the highest profile ones that await decisions. Reminder: This week, the court will issue opinions today and Thursday.
JUST POSTED — “Inside the Democratic strategy sessions planning the post-Roe campaign” by our colleague Elena Schneider
THE WHITE HOUSE
BIDEN MULLS GAS TAX HOLIDAY — Biden said on Monday that he’s hoping to have a decision on whether to implement a federal gas-tax holiday by the time the next federal holiday rolls around. “White House officials say the July 4 weekend, when tens of millions of people are expected to hit the road, is a target for announcing new measures to help lower record-high gas prices,” NBC’s Peter Alexander, Carol Lee and Kristen Welker write. Biden “could make a decision on pausing the federal gas tax by the end of this week.”
JAN. 6 AND ITS AFTERMATH
NEW THOMAS DETAILS EMERGE — Two months after the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, Virginia Thomas attended a “gathering of right-wing activists where a speaker declared to roaring applause that Trump was still the ‘legitimate president,’” WaPo’s Emma Brown, Isaac Stanley-Becker and Rosalind Helderman report, citing video from the event. The significance: “While text messages and emails unearthed in recent weeks have shown that Thomas was involved in those efforts before Jan. 6, her attendance at the Orlando gathering indicates that her alliance with election deniers continued even after Joe Biden was inaugurated.”
BEYOND THE BELTWAY
CLIMATE FILES — “Second heat wave expected to bring temps above 100 for 20% of people in U.S.,”","link":{"target":"NEW","attributes":[],"url":"https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/20/weather/record-heat-wave-southeast-second-week-monday/index.html","_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7d90002","_type":"33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df"},"_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7d90003","_type":"02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266"}”>“Second heat wave expected to bring temps above 100 for 20% of people in U.S.,” by CNN’s Elizabeth Wolfe, Robert Shackelford and Theresa Waldrop
AMERICA AND THE WORLD
NUMBER OF THE DAY — “Since July 2021, USCIS has received over 46,000 applications from Afghans hoping to come to the U.S. through the parole process,” according to USCIS numbers reported by CBS’ Camilo Montoya-Galvez. “As of June 2, only 297 parole requests from Afghans had been approved by USCIS.”
WHAT IT MEANS —WaPo’s Samantha Schmidt has the report on the ground in Bogotá, Colombia, where the election victory of GUSTAVO PETRO notched another win for “Latin America’s left.” Next up: “All eyes are now on Brazil, the largest country in Latin America, where former president LUIZ INÁCIO LULA DA SILVA leads polls to unseat President JAIR BOLSONARO in October. A Lula victory would mean all of the largest countries in the region, including Mexico and Argentina, are led by leftist presidents.”
FOR YOUR RADAR — “Israel’s Government Collapses, Setting Up 5th Election in 3 Years,”","link":{"target":"NEW","attributes":[],"url":"https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/20/world/middleeast/israel-election-government-collapse.html","_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7d90008","_type":"33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df"},"_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7d90009","_type":"02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266"}”>“Israel’s Government Collapses, Setting Up 5th Election in 3 Years,” by NYT’s Patrick Kingsley and Isabel Kershner: “The decision plunged Israel back into paralysis and threw a political lifeline to BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, the right-wing prime minister who left office just one year ago … [and] is currently standing trial on corruption charges but has refused to leave politics, and his Likud party is leading in the polls.”
PLAYBOOKERS
Sam Bankman-Fried, the 30-year-old crypto billionaire, “gave more than $800,000 to the DNC in May,” making him the party’s largest single donor that month, per NYT’s Shane Goldmacher.
Ben Collins introduced us to a revolting-looking Salem delicacy: the chop-suey sandwich.
Dmitry Muratov, the Nobel laureate Russian journalist, auctioned off his Peace Prize on Monday to raise money for Ukrainian child refugees. It sold for $103.5 million.
OUT AND ABOUT — MSNBC president Rashida Jones hosted a private dinner at Jams restaurant in Manhattan on Monday night to celebrate host Katie Phang and the launch of “The Katie Phang Show” on MSNBC and Peacock. SPOTTED: Naomi Tacuyan Underwood, Preet Bharara, Jin Ding, Molly Jong Fast, Jesse Rodriguez and Stephen Labaton.
— The Duke Ellington School of the Arts hosted a fundraiser, “The Excellence of Ellington: An Evening with Dave Chappelle,” on Monday night. During the event, Chappelle announced that the student theater would be renamed “the Theater for Artistic Freedom and Expression,” declining to have it renamed after him. SPOTTED: British Ambassador Karen Pierce, Wynton Marsalis, Nicole Venable, Meg Clerc, Annie Whatley, Kate Goodall, David Frum, Danielle Crittenden, Ari Fitzgerald, Sherrie Blount, Chris Isham, Brenda Morris, Kenneth Weinstein, Jeanette McCune, Amy Kauffman, Jennifer McGuire, Stacie Lee Banks, Ed Cohen, Wisdom Martin and Ami Aronson.
HISTORIC APPOINTMENT — Lynn Malerba, the lifetime chief of the Mohegan Indian Tribe, has been appointed treasurer of the U.S., becoming the first Native American to serve in the role. Treasury is also announcing a new Office of Tribal and Native Affairs. In addition, Janet Yellen will make the first visit to a Tribal nation by a Treasury secretary when she travels with Malerba to Rosebud Indian Reservation in South Dakota today.
TRANSITIONS — Ben Harney is joining Rich Feuer Anderson as a principal. He previously was deputy staff director for the House Oversight Committee and is a DCCC alum. … Nora Kohli is now comms director for Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.). She previously was comms director for Rep. Kathleen Rice (D-N.Y.).
ENGAGED — Johnny Koremenos, deputy executive director at the Republican Attorneys General Association, and Stephanie Beckman, a registered nurse at St. Luke’s hospital in Milwaukee, Wis., got engaged at Lake of the Clouds in Ontonagon, Mich., on Saturday. The two met in Milwaukee in October 2020. Pic","link":{"target":"NEW","attributes":[],"url":"https://static.politico.com/28/15/08013b5c4b51875878021b2bcb29/image3-2.jpeg","_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7db000a","_type":"33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df"},"_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7db000b","_type":"02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266"}”>Pic … Another pic","link":{"target":"NEW","attributes":[],"url":"https://static.politico.com/80/99/063766ff427197fa869baa305fab/image5.jpeg","_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7db000c","_type":"33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df"},"_id":"00000181-85ec-d281-a989-d5ecf7db000d","_type":"02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266"}”>Another pic
HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Rep. Michelle Steel (R-Calif.) … Oregon Gov. Kate Brown … Axios’ Mike Allen … Chad Wolf … NYT’s Elizabeth Williamson and Elizabeth Dias … Mary Beth Donahue … WaPo’s Laura Meckler … Cody Uhing … Shara Mohtadi … CNN’s Madeleine Morgenstern … David Makovsky … Bully Pulpit Interactive’s Caroline Weisser … Susan Tomai … POLITICO’s Delece Smith-Barrow, Wiktoria Brodzinska, Valerie Miller and Rachel James … Sanam Rastegar … Procurated’s Marc Sames … Gary Maloney … Jake Maccoby … Protocol’s Phoevin Mei and Tom Krazit … Brendan Summers … Campbell Millum … Forbes’ Emma Whitford … Brian Kamoie … Max Clarke … Greg Hitt of Dominion Energy … Sam Nunberg … former Reps. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.), Marjorie Margolies (D-Pa.) (8-0) and Dan Burton (R-Ind.) … Kate Kochman … Jill Farquharson … ABC’s Chris Francescani
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