Donald Trump’s promise to pardon supporters who attacked the US Capitol on January 6 2021 was “the stuff of dictators”, Richard Nixon’s White House counsel warned.
Trump made the promise at a rally in Conroe, Texas, on Saturday.
More than 700 people have been charged in connection with the Capitol attack, around which seven people died as Trump supporters tried to stop certification of his election defeat, in service of his lie that it was caused by electoral fraud. More than 100 police officers were hurt…
John Dean, 83, was White House counsel from 1970 to 1973 before being disbarred and detained as a result of the Watergate scandal, which led to Nixon’s resignation in 1974. Dean responded to Trump on Twitter.
“This is beyond being a demagogue to the stuff of dictators,” he wrote. “He is defying the rule of law. Failure to confront a tyrant only encourages bad behaviour. If thinking Americans don’t understand what Trump is doing and what the criminal justice system must do we are all in big trouble!”
I hope more than half the voting Americans turn out to be “thinking” Americans, John.
Eideard 
⎕ “Trump told Giuliani to call the Department of Homeland Security to see if they could ‘take control of voting machines’: NYT report https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-asked-if-dhs-could-take-control-of-voting-machines-2022-2
⎕ NYT: “New accounts show that the former president was more directly involved than previously known in plans developed by outside advisers to use national security agencies to seek evidence of fraud.” https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/31/us/politics/donald-trump-election-results-fraud-voting-machines.html
⎕ “Trump advisers drafted more than one executive order to seize voting machines, sources tell CNN” https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/31/politics/trump-executive-orders-seize-voting-machines/index.html
Some of the White House records turned over to the House committee investigating the January 6 attack were ripped up by Donald Trump, the National Archives said. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/feb/01/trump-tore-up-records-turned-over-house-capitol-attack-committee
It also emerged on Tuesday that the former president thinks his own vice-president, Mike Pence, should be investigated by the committee, for failing to reject electoral college results on the fateful day.
Documents obtained by the January 6 panel include diaries, schedules, handwritten notes, speeches and remarks. The supreme court rejected Trump’s attempt to stop the National Archives turning them over to Congress.
The Presidential Records Act requires that all records created by presidents be turned over to the National Archives at the end of their administrations.
“Trump White House staffers frequently put important documents into ‘burn bags’ and sent them to the Pentagon for incineration, report says” https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-aides-put-documents-burn-bags-to-be-destroyed-wapo-2022-2
‘He never stopped ripping things up’: Inside Trump’s relentless document destruction habits
Trump’s shredding of paper in the White House was far more widespread and indiscriminate than previously known and — despite multiple admonishments — extended throughout his presidency. https://www.adn.com/nation-world/2022/02/06/he-never-stopped-ripping-things-up-inside-trumps-relentless-document-destruction-habits/
“The National Archives and Records Administration asked the Justice Department to probe former President Trump’s handlings of White House records, the Washington Post reports.
Why it matters: The request brings into question whether the former president could be investigated by federal law enforcement for a possible crime, according to the Post.
State of play: Last month, Trump had to return 15 boxes of documents that he took to Mar-a-Lago instead of handing over to the agency.” https://www.axios.com/national-archives-justice-department-trump-records-7b992a97-e133-442e-a1ec-bcb686aab168.html
“While President Trump was in office, staff in the White House residence periodically discovered wads of printed paper clogging a toilet — and believed the president had flushed pieces of paper, Maggie Haberman scoops in her forthcoming book, “Confidence Man.” https://www.axios.com/maggie-haberman-book-trump-papers-2d59d593-8b89-4edd-8623-8ef709af524f.html (see links)
Why it matters: The revelation by Haberman, whose coverage as a New York Times White House correspondent was followed obsessively by Trump, adds a vivid new dimension to his lapses in preserving government documents. Axios was provided an exclusive first look at some of her reporting.
Haberman reports Trump has told people that since leaving office, he has remained in contact with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un — whose “love letters,” as Trump once called them, were among documents the National Archives retrieved from Mar-a-Lago.
Archives officials found possible classified material in the returned boxes, The New York Times learned. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/09/us/politics/national-archives-trump-classified-material.html
Rep. Pete Aguilar, a member of the House Jan. 6 select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection, on Wednesday said former President Donald Trump “absolutely” was tampering with the panel’s witnesses by discussing potential pardons for defendants charged in relation to the attack.
“I think the question is more for my colleagues on the other side of the aisle. Where are they? Do they support this? When is enough enough?” Aguilar (D-Calif.) said in an interview on CNN. https://www.politico.com/news/2022/02/02/jan-6-committee-trump-witnesses-00004559
Trump has previously faced allegations of witness tampering, including for overtures he made to former national security adviser Mike Flynn and Trump 2016 campaign chair Paul Manafort during then-special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation. https://www.politico.com/story/2019/04/24/mueller-report-trump-evidence-1288798
Memo circulated among Trump allies advocated using NSA data in attempt to prove stolen election : The proposal to seize and analyze ‘NSA unprocessed raw signals data’ raises legal and ethical concerns that set it apart from other attempts that have come to light https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/02/03/trump-nsa-election/
Re: use of NSPM-13 (National Security Presidential Memoranda 13) see https://www.fifthdomain.com/congress/2020/03/13/after-tug-of-war-white-house-shows-cyber-memo-to-congress/
☐ “Trump’s incendiary Texas speech may have deepened his legal troubles, experts say
Promising pardons for insurrectionists and calling for protests if indicted could help make a case for obstruction of justice” https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/feb/07/donald-trump-incendiary-speech-texas-legal-troubles-experts
☐ “Top GOP lawmaker won’t condemn calling events of Jan. 6 ‘legitimate political discourse’ https://abcnews.go.com/US/top-gop-lawmaker-bidens-ukraine-approach-deterrence/story?id=82694649
☐ “The Republican Party is ever closer to the destination to which it has long been headed under former President Donald Trump — the legitimization of violence as a form of political expression.
The Republican National Committee’s censure of GOP Reps. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for probing the “legitimate political discourse” of the January 6 insurrection enshrined that principle in the party’s policy dogma. The move on Friday underscored the untethered extremism of large sections of one of America’s great political parties and the still malignant, dominant influence of the ex-President, who is ready for action with a $122 million war chest.” https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/07/politics/trump-republican-party-politics-of-violence/index.html
“Trump escalates racist rhetoric and plays on white grievance at recent rallies” (NPR 2/1/22) https://www.npr.org/2022/02/01/1077166847/trump-escalates-racist-rhetoric-plays-on-white-grievance-at-recent-rallies
“Trump alleged during a rally in Texas over the weekend that Black prosecutors investigating him are “racist,” and he is again flirting with mob violence, calling for mass protests if they do anything he deems to be “wrong or illegal.”
And after teasing a 2024 run — “to take back that beautiful, beautiful house that happens to be white” — he said one of his actions as president could be to pardon those convicted as a result of their actions during last year’s insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. More than 750 people and counting have been charged with crimes.”
Also: “Led by Trump, GOP increasingly casts White people as racism’s victims” https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/06/politics/supreme-court-vacancy-white-grievance/index.html
…In recent days former President Donald Trump has falsely accused Democrats of putting White people at “the back of the line” for coronavirus medical care and has blasted prosecutorial “racists” — a jibe at Black women in New York and Atlanta who are probing his conduct.