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because if any of them had been pardoned, they could turn around the next day and the asked to testify against trump, and if they were, they can't plead the fifth, which jeffrey clark did 105 times. so, did former president trump not pardon them because it would hurt him? that's the question i have. >> and given that he pardoned roger stone and steve bannon and others, the self-interest seems to be a big issue here -- >> michael flynn, putin, making things better for paul manafort. but this would touch him, this would hurt him. >> all this talk about blanket pardons, this isn't bed, bath and beyond. you can't just say you get a pardon for everyone of our all-time, and wrap yourself in it. the nixon example is interesting, that the former lawyer for the white house mention. because you have to write it down. you point, if you start writing down what's your pardoning, obstructing of a proceeding, a plan inside the government to do selective prosecution, as we were discussing earlier, to abuse investigative findings -- those are all things coming out of the white house oval office of donald trump. so, yes, writing it out might
justice department seem to head. we got all this new information this week, about the fake elector scheme. we got right away the fbi serving subpoenas on people involved in the fake elector scheme. we now know, that all these revelations today about jeffrey clark. we've got fbi -- or at least federal investigators -- showing up at jeffrey clark's house and search in his house yesterday. the interplay between the criminal -- the active criminal investigations hearing with the committee is turning out has never been more acute and interesting that it was today. we are going to talk about that next, along with january 6th investigator congressman jamie raskin joining us live. we've got a lot of stuff to get. to stay with us. >> did you discuss this graph letter with the president of the united states? >> executive privilege, again, just restate it for the abundance of caution. >> okay, if you look again, for the draft letter, and the first paragraph, second sentence -- the department will update you
discern if this search warrant basically being effectuating that mr. clark's house is related to the fake elector scheme? or if this is a public sign of some other federal criminal investigation that we don't yet know about? >> i don't think we can answer that question, whether they are linked. although, it does seem if you are going to do all these events on the same day, oftentimes you do that because you don't want one to tip off the other. so, the nine simultaneous subpoenas on the same day as the search warrant, it does make sense that one has something to do with the other. because you don't want anybody tipping off anybody else. but the fact that they have taken this over step in that they had sufficient evidence to show to a judge that they had probable cause to believe a crime has been committed suggests to me that we are closer to the end than the beginning of an investigation, at least as to jeffrey clark. because you have to amass sufficient evidence to show probable cause. and you only go over to, as a search warrant is, after you've exhausted all the covert lines
focused, in part, on jeff clark. we knew to expect that today we would learn a lot about what the investigation found about mr. clark and what party allegedly played in trump's parts efforts to overthrow the government. but we did not know before today, though, is that in addition to the january 6th investigation in congress, being interested in him, apparently federal criminal investigators have been focused on him too. and it shall indications are that, in, fact the january six investigators in congress were just as surprised as the rest of us today, to learn about this predawn search of jeffrey clark's house yesterday. federal agents, among other things, apparently seized his electronic devices while executing that search warrant. so, we are going to be talking tonight about that bombshell development, later on this evening. we will be talking about, that what it means, how it relates to the committee's work. we will also be joined by a member of the january six investigation to talk about today's hearing and about this now a very dramatic backdrop for these hearings, what appears to be an active,
law professor kathy. but it would go to the nature of the offense. and what is the criminal act and what is the criminal intent that is required. of course, people can engage in criminal conduct on behalf of other people that is authorized and approved. and part of some kind of conspiracy or common plan. people can aid and abet and so on. but it's also possible to engage in a criminal act on behalf of another person without their knowledge. i would think that's unlikely here, given that there was clearly a lot of communication going on between donald trump and jeffrey clark. but having said that, as you know, we are trying to keep our focus as much as possible on the collective question of accountability for this whole political coup and insurrection that almost toppled our democracy and not, specifically, on individual crimes. obviously, that is important but that is not our job specifically. >> sir, please keep your law
justice department would essentially tell the country that trump was right, there really was tons of fraud, swing states won by biden, probably really were not won by biden. the justice department would in fact tell those swing states that they really should consider sending in trump electors to the electoral college instead of biden electors. that was the plan the justice department play at that role. and how they carry out that plan? the vehicle for this part of the plan was, this official, jeffrey clark. the plan was to fire the attorney general, or place him with the sky, and then this guy would and after the trump plan, to have states that biden won decertify their votes, to instead proclaim trump had won those states and to have those states cast their electoral college votes for trump. clark promised to carry it out. we got new detailed revelations about every step of how they tried to do that today. and we will have more on that coming up in just a moment. i think that it's pretty in
klukowski was simultaneously working with jeffrey clark to draft the proposed letter to georgia officials, to overturn their certified election. and, working with doctor eastman to help pressure the vice president to help overturn the election. we >> did not know these things were connected. we've got to john eastman, the architect of the whole fake elector scheme, apparently, he got his guy dropped into the justice department in the very last weeks of the trump administration. trump lost the election the first week of november. how do you then get a new justice department job in mid december? but this guy did. he got dropped into the justice department, drop specifically into geoff clark's office. eastman's guy. and eastman's cockamamie legal theories then get included in this letter, that the justice department is going to send out to overthrow the election in all the swing states that trump lost. eastman and trump's theory, thereby appears to emerge organically from inside the justice department, that they
know before is that trump had more than one in road into the justice department. he had jeffrey clark. he also had another man named ken klukowski. ken came to the justice department just 35 days before the inauguration. he came in the middle of december, right around the time that bill barr was leaving. can had previously, in that time between the election and his arrival at the justice department, worked with eastman, the lawyer who was working on the fake electors scheme. and he had worked with him before coming to doj. the committee made clear that those connections were really important, including by taking another look at that georgia letter. and pointing out that further down in the letter, you see some of that rhetoric around fake electors. a letter that jeffrey clark wanted sent to georgia -- not only says falsely the justice department thought that the election might have been rigged in georgia, but that it would be an opportunity for the state of georgia to take another look and figure out whether or not a new slate of electors would need to be
arguable, though, that will be remembered most here from today's hearing was the dramatic, almost cinematic testimony about how the top officials at the justice department tried to stop all of that from happening, down to the very last second. >> there was a bit of a scramble that afternoon to prepare for the oval office meeting. we had discussed on several occasions -- the attorney general and i -- whether we should expand the circle of people who knew what was going on. three of us knew, we also brought heather for canyon in, so that the four of us knew, but none of us aside from jeffrey clark, of course, knew what was going on until late that sunday afternoon and we chose to keep a close hold because we did not want to create a concern or panic in the justice department leadership. but at this point, i asked the acting ag, what else can i do to help prepare for this meeting at the oval office?
search warrant being affected at mr. clark's house is related in the fake electors scheme, or if this is a public sign of some other federal criminal investigation that we don't yet know about? >> i don't think we can answer that question whether they're linked. although it seems if you are going to do all of these events on the same day, oftentimes do you that because you don't want one to tip off the other, so the nine simultaneous subpoenas on the same day as the search warrant does make sense that one has something to do with the other, because you don't want anybody tipping off anyone else. but the fact that they had taken this overt step and that they had sufficient evidence to show to a judge that they had probable cause to believe a crime has been committed suggests to me that we're closer to the end than the beginning of an investigation. at least as to jeffrey clark. because you have to amass sufficient evidence to show probable cause, and you only go overt, as a search warrant is, as you've exhausted all of the covert lines of investigation. >> fascinating. "new york times" justice