Judge in washington, d. C. As the nation and american democracy face a critical test. The former president is scheduled to be in court tomorrow. Last night federal prosecutors charged him with four separate counts in a sweeping indictment. The Special Counsel is alleging that trump was central in the plot to overturn the 2020 election and has charged him with conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of and attempting to obstruct an official proceeding, and conspiracy against rights. This historic indictment says that trump, quote, enlisted coconspirators to assist him in his criminal efforts. It repeatedly references six unindicted coconspirators. Cnn has been able to identify five of those six. Well be breaking down what roles they allegedly played in the effort to overturn joe bidens win coming up in a moment. Paula reid is with us now. What more do we know about the new charges that trump is facing . This is very much expect
Results of the president ial election. Coming up, well dig deeper into the indictment and the former president s defense. Can trump be charged with lying if he believes what he said was true . The answer may hinge, at least in part, at least on district judge Tanya Chutkan, a vet ran on cases involving january 6th defendants. What members of congress are claiming and will it be a jury of his peers or the electorate who render the final verdict . We begin with tomorrows arraignment in a d. C. Federal court where donald trump will be formally charged for repeatedly spreading lies as part of an elaborate criminal scheme with the ultimate goal to hang on to power by any means necessary. In fact, trump is raising four federal counts including three conspiracy, to defraud the United States, to obstruct an official proceeding and to impede the peoples right to vote. Ever since the news broke, the former president , his allies and attorneys have been working furiously to smear jack smith and t
legitimate election results and change electoral votes in order to cling on to power and the white house. i want to bring back andrew weissmann. seven key states, seven different strategies, disproven claims of vote dumps in michigan, phantom absentee ballots in pennsylvania, voter fraud in arizona, and then, of course, the pressuring and threatening of officials in georgia. help us get these claims into context here, in the context of the charges against the president, the former president of the united states. one of the schemes that s alleged is this pressure campaign with respect to the states that you mention. there are various forms that it takes. there are various alleged lies that are laid out. quite notably, chris, a number of the conspirators, their roles
in, quote, massive fraud. this is important because it is an example of how trump kept saying absolute nonsense, even after it was debunked to his face, in conversations, in meetings with him. the indictment alleges that his attorney general, then his ting ag and deputy ag all told him it was wrong. we know his cybersy, election security arm did the same. he kept saying it nonetheless. this was far from the only case where we had this kind of thing. another example was the so-called georgia suitcases full of ballots from under the table we heard so much, he was told directly by the secretary of state of georgia and the top department officials this was wrong, he kept saying it, he said pennsylvania had 205,000 more votes than voters, he had been told that was wrong by a top justice department official, but kept saying it. this nonsense about vote dumps, the late night dumps we heard about in detroit and elsewhere, attorney general barr and others told him that was nonsense. that was ju
100,000 more almost, you know, votes that were turned in. so when we talk about vote dumps. they are not dumps. more people are bringing in their election to the office rather than using these drop boxes and i do wonder if over time republicans are going to have to adjust to the fact that voters actually like the convenience of these various voting options and you are actually expressing your own potential. and also don t like to be intimidated or lied to. next as we wait for the big and potentially decisive update from maricopa county could be able to project the winner in this race. we will talk to the republican lawmaker who took on the former president and election deniers. rusty bowers, what he is seeing. and what s ahead with republicans jockeying for leadership positions in deciding whether to tie themselves tai tighter to the president or cast him aside as he prepares to grab the spot late from them m tomorrow.