criminal intent. what do you think about that? i think that s a really weak argument. besides the fact that there s good reason to believe that he didn t actually think that he won the election. imagine if he said to mike pence, i m going to break your legs and hurt your family if you don t throw out the electoral votes from wisconsin, even if trump believed that he had won the election, that would still be a crime. he d be using words that wouldn t be protected by the four first amendment. so it s besides the point what he secretly believed or publicly says about whether the election was stolen. it doesn t give him the right to engage in criminal conduct. that s what this indictment alleges. what do you think, danya? i completely agree with rick. that s not a defense. first of all, there is, of course, reams of evidence that show that everyone critical
that is actionable, and we ll see what a jury says, but perhaps we ll actually and in criminal conviction. let s talk about criminal intent, one of the most important aspects of this, and it clear that i think there s three prongs to the defense. criminalizing speech in front of conduct, he was relying on his lawyer s advice. and then this third one having to do with intent. i ll read here today from his lawyer saying i would like them to try to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that donald trump believed that these allegations were false. basically, rick, the notion that he is so, that he is essentially clinically deluded about the reality of the matter, despite the repeated evidence presented to him time and time again, said in the indictment. that clinical delusion means he is incapable of forming
they swore to something that was false, and then try to get the false statement entered as true. they tried to defraud the government. the facts are not in dispute. it was plainly a crime. it has been not one to all of us in an intuitive world stance, not new technical way, but we know this was wrong and violated something deep and profound. and there are other parts of the night monthly deal with the lies that trump used, and how he views those lies in the furtherance of conspiracy. but when smith and his team regularly lay out is that this was a crime. it was a vast criminal conspiracy, a multi pronged effort to stay in power, to steal the election, which culminated in the january six attempted coup, and now sets up, in the words of legal scholar rick hassan, the most important case in our nation s history. we catherine is professor of law in political science. you can read that piece on the importance of the trial in slate. com. danya perry is a former deputy attorney general, yeste