WASHINGTON (AP) — The judge overseeing the case of Donald Trump’s 2020 election interference made public Friday a heavily redacted set of documents that offer a small glimpse into the evidence prosecutors will present if the case ever goes to trial.
The nearly 1,900 pages of documents collected by Special Counsel Jack Smith’s team were initially kept under seal to help U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan decide which charges can go to trial, following the Supreme Court’s July opinion that broad immunity granted to former presidents for official acts they performed. take into office.
The information seen in the redacted version released Friday appeared to be material that had, for the most part, already been made public, including screenshots of Trump’s social media posts about the 2020 election and a transcript of the video statement that he took on January 1. He told the rioters who attacked the Capitol to go home, but added: “we love you” and “you are very special.”
The vast majority of the pages released Friday were white. The redacted files are believed to include transcripts of grand jury testimony, which remain secret due to grand jury confidentiality rules.
Other information available to the public includes passages from former Vice President Mike Pence’s book, excerpts of testimony from several witnesses to the House committee investigating the January 6 riot, and a transcript of the phone call from Trump in which he pressured election officials in Georgia to “find” enough. votes to reverse his election loss in the state to Democrat Joe Biden.
Other documents include fundraising emails from Trump’s 2020 campaign and Pence’s letter telling Congress on Jan. 6 that he could not claim “unilateral authority to determine which electoral votes should be counted and which should not.”
The filing was filed as a series of attachments to a 165-page brief released this month in which prosecutors revealed new evidence against Trump to support their argument that the former president is not entitled to immunity from prosecution.
Trump’s lawyers objected to the disclosure of the files so close to next month’s presidential election, but Chutkan on Thursday rejected their bid to delay the material until it became public after the election. She said it would be inappropriate to take the political calendar into account.
