Witnesses Detail Trump Bid to Pressure Justice Department 

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The congressional panel investigating the 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol heard testimony Thursday that former President Donald Trump pushed Justice Department officials to investigate voter fraud allegations even though he had been assured there were no widespread irregularities that would upend his reelection defeat. The panel focused its questions on the efforts of Jeffrey Clark, a former assistant attorney general specializing in environmental law, to be named attorney general in the last month of Trump’s presidency so he could pursue claims that Trump had been cheated out of a second four-year term. Such claims have been found to havemore

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New Witnesses to Detail How Trump Pushed Justice Department to Probe 2020 Election Fraud Claims

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The congressional panel investigating the causes of last year’s Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol is hearing testimony Thursday about how former President Donald Trump pushed Justice Department officials to investigate allegations of fraud in the 2020 election that he hoped would upend his loss to Democrat Joe Biden. House Select Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson said the panel would examine Trump’s “attempt to corrupt the country’s top law enforcement body,” much as state officials in Arizona and Georgia testified Tuesday that Trump unsuccessfully sought to get them to appoint bogus electors to help him stay in office for anothermore

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Biden Seeks Gas Tax Relief Amid War-Amplified Price Hikes

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The war in Ukraine is causing disruptions around the world, from what President Joe Biden terms a “Putin price hike” for American petroleum consumers to an impending global food crisis. On Wednesday, Biden said he was taking steps to try to offset the effects, something he said he’ll be focusing on ahead of two key summits and a Mideast trip. Anita Powell reports from the White House. …

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House January 6th Committee to Hold Next Public Hearing

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The House of Representatives committee investigating the January 6 , 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol will hold its next hearing Tuesday. The committee has sought to make its case against former President Donald Trump, saying his baseless and repeated claims of a stolen election incited his followers to violence. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi reports, …

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Trump Calls Hearings into January 6 Attack a ‘Theatrical Production’

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Former U.S. President Donald Trump Friday sharply criticized the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, in his first appearance since the committee began its public hearings. Speaking to a gathering of religious conservatives in Nashville, Tennessee, Trump said, “Let’s be clear, this is not a congressional investigation — this horrible situation that’s wasting everyone’s time.” “This is a theatrical production of partisan political fiction that’s getting these terrible, terrible ratings and they’re going crazy,” he added. The hearings have laid out how the attack on the Capitol occurred and Trump’s role in it bymore

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US County That Alleged Vote Machine Fraud Certifies Election Results

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A Republican-controlled county commission in New Mexico that refused to recognize election returns this month after citing unfounded conspiracy theories about voting machines bowed to legal pressure on Friday and certified the results.  Otero County commissioners voted 2-1 to certify the county’s June 7 primary election results, but only after the New Mexico Supreme Court ordered them to do so and after threats of legal action by the state’s Democratic attorney general.  The commissioner who still voted against certifying the results, Couy Griffin, did so hours after being sentenced for breaching the U.S. Capitol during the January 6, 2021, riot. more

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Trump Directed $250 Million in Donations to Leadership PAC 

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Former U.S. President Donald Trump raised $250 million in donations in the weeks after the November 2020 presidential election for an organization ostensibly intended to fund court challenges in support of his false claims that the election was fraudulent. Instead, he directed that money to an unrelated political action committee, or PAC, according to congressional investigators. In its second hearing about its findings, the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol made the case that the former president knew that he had lost the election but continued raising money from his supporters bymore

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False Theory Fueled Trump Pressure Campaign on Pence

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In the third day of congressional hearings on the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, U.S. lawmakers alleged former President Donald Trump waged a multiweek pressure campaign on his vice president, Mike Pence, to illegally overturn the results of the 2020 election. VOA’s congressional correspondent Katherine Gypson has more. …

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Lawmakers Ask Ginni Thomas, Wife of Supreme Court Justice, to Testify

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The House committee investigating the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the Capitol has asked Virginia Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, for an interview, the panel’s chairman said Thursday afternoon.  Thomas, a conservative activist, communicated with people in President Donald Trump’s orbit ahead of the attack and on the day of the insurrection, when hundreds of Trump’s supporters violently stormed the Capitol and interrupted the certification of Joe Biden’s victory.  “We have sent Ms. Thomas a letter, asking her to come and talk to the committee,” Mississippi Representative Bennie Thompson, the Democratic chairman of the panel,more

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January 6 Committee Postpones Wednesday Hearing

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The House of Representatives panel investigating last year’s January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol says it has postponed Wednesday’s planned hearing. No reason was given and the panel will still hold Thursday’s planned hearing. Monday’s hearing featured videotaped testimony by former U.S. Attorney General William Barr and numerous other White House and political aides to then-President Donald Trump who said they had repeatedly told him that his allegations of fraud in the 2020 election were baseless and that he had lost reelection. Barr said that many of Trump’s claims of election irregularities were “completely bogus and silly.” “I toldmore

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Trump Election Claims in Focus as Committee Holds January 6 Riot Hearing

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The panel investigating the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol last year holds its second public hearing Monday, with former President Donald Trump’s campaign manager among those testifying in a session focusing on Trump’s unfounded allegations of election fraud.  Committee members said Sunday much more evidence will emerge in upcoming hearings that Trump knew he had lost his bid for reelection and yet fomented the mayhem by telling supporters he had been cheated out of another four-year term.  Trump “absolutely knew he had lost,” U.S. Congressman Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat, told CNN’s “State of the Union” show. “Anymore

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House Passes Gun Control Bill After NY, Texas Deaths 

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The House passed a wide-ranging gun control bill Wednesday in response to recent mass shootings in Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas, that would raise the age limit for purchasing a semiautomatic rifle and prohibit the sale of ammunition magazines with a capacity of more than 15 rounds. The legislation passed by a mostly party-line vote of 223-204. It has almost no chance of becoming law as the Senate pursues negotiations focused on improving mental health programs, bolstering school security and enhancing background checks. But the House bill does allow Democratic lawmakers a opportunity to frame for voters in Novembermore

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Sources say Biden to Use Executive Action to Spur Solar Projects Hit by Probe

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President Joe Biden will use executive action on Monday to help bridge a solar panel supply gap and kickstart stalled U.S. projects after an investigation froze imports from key foreign suppliers, sources familiar with the matter said. The moves come amid concern about the impact of the Commerce Department’s months-long investigation into whether imports of solar panels from four Southeast Asian nations are circumventing tariffs on goods made in China. Biden also will invoke the Defense Production Act to drive U.S. manufacturing of solar panels and other clean technologies in the future, with the support of loans and grants, themore

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Senator, 2 Governors on Wisconsin Gunman’s List, Sources Say

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A gunman suspected of fatally shooting a retired county judge at a Wisconsin home had a list that included Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, Whitmer’s office and a law enforcement source said Saturday. Douglas K. Uhde, 56, who has not been charged, is suspected of killing retired Juneau County Judge John Roemer at Roemer’s house in New Lisbon on Friday, the Wisconsin Department of Justice said in a news release Saturday. Uhde was found in the basement of the home with a self-inflicted gunshot wound, following attempts by police to negotiatemore

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Biden Delays Possible Trip to Saudi Arabia, Israel, Reports Say

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U.S. President Joe Biden has pushed back a possible trip to Israel and Saudi Arabia, several U.S. media reported Saturday.  Biden confirmed Friday he was considering a trip to Saudi Arabia, which would be a stark reversal after he called for the kingdom to be made a pariah state.  The White House declined to comment on the potential delay, but according to CNN, NBC and Axios, the visit has been postponed until July.  The reported decision came shortly after Saudi Arabia addressed two of Biden’s priorities by agreeing to increase oil production, which could help tame U.S. inflation, and helpingmore

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Ex-Trump Aide Navarro Indicted; Meadows Won’t Be Charged

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Former Trump White House official Peter Navarro has been indicted on charges that he refused to cooperate with a congressional investigation into the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, but the Justice Department spared two other advisers, including the ex-president’s chief of staff, Mark Meadows, from criminal prosecution. The department’s decision to not prosecute Meadows and Dan Scavino, another adviser to former President Donald Trump, was revealed in a letter sent Friday by a federal prosecutor to a lawyer for the House of Representatives. The move was reported hours after the indictment of Navarro and a subsequent, fiery courtmore

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McCormick Concedes to Oz in Pennsylvania GOP Senate Primary

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Former hedge fund CEO David McCormick conceded the Republican primary in Pennsylvania for U.S. Senate to celebrity heart surgeon Dr. Mehmet Oz, ending his campaign Friday night as he acknowledged an ongoing statewide recount wouldn’t give him enough votes to make up the deficit.  McCormick said he had called Oz to concede.  “It’s now clear to me with the recount now largely complete that we have a nominee,” McCormick said at a campaign party at a Pittsburgh hotel. “Tonight is really about all us coming together.”  Before the recount, Oz led McCormick by 972 votes out of 1.34 million votesmore

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Lawmaker Pulls Out His Guns at US Gun-Control Hearing

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Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday objected to a Democratic attempt to advance new limits on gun purchases as one Republican legislator pulled out his handguns at a hearing to complain that they could be banned. The House Judiciary Committee met in an emergency session in the midst of a week-long Memorial Day recess as funerals were under way in Uvalde, Texas, for some of the 19 children and two teachers gunned down by an 18-year-old with an AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle last week. There were other mass shootings the week before and on Wednesday. Republican Representative Gregmore

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January 6 Committee Sets Prime-Time Hearing Date for Findings

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The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol will go public with its findings in a prime-time hearing next week, the start of what lawmakers hope will be a high-profile airing of the causes and consequences of the domestic attack on the U.S. government. Lawmakers plan to hold a series of hearings in June that they promise will lay out, step-by-step, how former President Donald Trump and his allies worked feverishly to overturn his loss in the 2020 presidential election, spreading lies about widespread voter fraud — widely debunked by judges and his own administration — thatmore

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Biden to Implore Congress to Approve New ‘Common-Sense’ Gun Restrictions  

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U.S. President Joe Biden, in a White House address Thursday night, will implore Congress to approve “common-sense laws” to attempt to curb the recent spate of mass shooting deaths that have shocked many Americans. The White House said Biden would call for the new restrictions “to combat the epidemic of gun violence that is taking lives every day.” It was not clear whether Biden would advocate for specific restrictions he favors, such as universal background checks for gun buyers or a ban on the sale of the rapid-fire, high-powered weapons that have been used in recent mass shootings.   Neithermore

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