2/18/21
A criminal investigation in the state of Georgia. The expansion of a New York-based probe into Donald Trump’s business empire. Lawsuits brought by women who allege Trump assaulted them. Billion-dollar defamation suits launched against people acting on Trump’s demands. Angry enemies and former friends who see fresh legal vulnerability. And continued litigation and possible charges stemming from the deadly MAGA riot at the U.S. Capitol. Following last week’s speedy acquittal in former President Trump’s second Senate impeachment trial, Trump, his advisers, and his lawyers spent part of the long weekend celebrating his insulation from yet another legal hassle. But with the Senate trial in the rearview, Trump is now confronting a whole range of other legal dramas during his immediate post-presidency. No longer shielded by the considerable legal protection of the Oval Office, Trump has privately bemoaned that his foes are going to be investigating or “suing me for the rest of my life,” according to one person who’s discussed the matter with him in the past few weeks. The new lawsuits dealing mainly with his attempts to overturn the results of the election seem to grow weekly. On Tuesday, a new federal lawsuit was filed by the NAACP on behalf of Rep. Bennie Thompson, a Mississippi Democrat.
The suit, which was also filed against Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani, the Oath Keepers, and the Proud Boys, alleges that both men and the two groups violated the 1871 Ku Klux Klan Act when they attempted to halt the certification of Joe Biden’s 2020 win. The federal suit comes just as attorneys working in the D.C. attorney general’s office were still debating whether to charge the former president for violating local law when he allegedly incited the rioting. Though the riot was the culmination of Trump’s months of ham-fisted attempts to overturn the 2020 election, it’s hardly the only chapter in Trump and his allies’ efforts that has potentially left the ex-president legally exposed. On Feb. 10, prosecutors in Georgia embarked on a criminal probe into Trump’s conference call in early January (prior to the riot), during which the then-president pressured state officials to “find” the votes necessary to undo Joe Biden’s 2020 victory in that state. Smartmatic and Dominion Voting Systems have already lodged mammoth lawsuits against Giuliani, former Trump attorney Sidney Powell, and others. “Our legal team is looking at, frankly, everyone, and we're not ruling anybody out,” Dominion CEO John Poulos said in a CNN interview in late January.
www.businessinsider.com
