pointe du hoc on d-day as he urges americans here at home to defend democracy, stand up to aggression abroad, and be part of something bigger than ourselves. the biden campaign message of democracy and freedom as the election gets closer, but is it landing? the defense calls its first witness at hunter biden s federal gun trial. key members who could take the stand and the impact they might have on this case. and polling says the rfk jr. could have an impact on the election. will challenges keep him off the ballot in some major states. we ll explain what it could mean and who is behind the effort. begin with president biden s appeal to americans to protect democracy and freedom. the president delivering that message more than 4,000 miles away at pointe du hoc in france. the dramatic backdrop at the stop where 80 years ago u.s. army rangers scaled the cliffs overlooking omaha and utah beaches as allied forces helped turn the tide of world war ii. to believe, to require
director of the rnc s platform committee, which drafts the policies the party will run on in november. martin is best known for his push to overturn trump s 2020 loss and marching on the capitol on january 6th. ryan reilly is following this for us. walk us through more about who this is and what his role will be at the rnc. sure, so he s closely tied to a lot of the key figures in the stop the steal movement. the website of his group actually referred to him as one of the key organizers of the stop the steal movement, and he spoke on january 5th just outside of the u.s. capitol outside of what had then been established as a perimeter. he was in the vip section, the trump speech, and then he ended up at the capitol, calling it fake news. saying it was a rowdy crowd but it wasn t anything out of hand. meanwhile, on the other side of
entirety of those 18 individuals guilty or not guilty pleas here. so we are still waiting for the formal mug shot and fingerprinting process. that s where we expect rudy giuliani within the next two weeks as well as others to come in here to maricopa county to formally go through that process here. but we are watching this process play out, and if, in fact, each of these individuals pleads not guilty as part of this conspiracy and fraud charges, each of them facing nine counts, we could see this process here move forward, but this is notable here this morning that you said it, the former chief of staff less than 24 hours after donald trump campaigned to return to the white house, his former chief of staff entering a not guilty plea here in maricopa county. vaughn hillyard, thank you for that. while some 2020 election deniers face criminal charges, one very vocal stop the steal supporter is now on the payroll of the rnc. ed martin, former chair of the missouri republican party has bee
it s a rare defendant that knocks it out of the ballpark. so we will see. he doesn t have to. there s no need to. why put him through that because then it opens up the door to asking a whole bunch of other things about his credibility. but if they feel at the end of this that they have not mounted a defense that s likely to work, would they do it? obviously it s up to him, so i m saying, you know, i m saying they won t, but if he wants to, he will. but you know, that s very close. i think through their cross examination questions, i would argue they ve built enough reasonable doubt. we ll see if the jury believes the same. ken dilanian, mike memoli, and catherine christian, thank you all very much. and coming up, inside the rnc s decision to hire a stop the steal advocate to help craft its party s platform for decision 2024 and how much influence his election conspiracy theories could have on republican policy making.