Good morning, and welcome to the Epoch Times News Brief for Tuesday, March 26, 2024. I’m Bill Thomas.
Former Defense Secretary Says Jan. 6 Committee Issued ‘Latent Threat’ to Keep Quiet
Former Trump Secretary of Defense Chris Miller revealed that he was pressured by the House Jan. 6 committee into staying silent about claims that President Donald Trump authorized the deployment of National Guard troops before the breach at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.Mr. Miller said that members of the committee used aggressive tactics after he spoke to the media about President Trump’s authorization. The committee’s final report claimed that President Trump did not authorize the deployment.
He said that his lawyer got a call from the Jan. 6 staff director who said, “Well, if your client has additional information he wants to share, we’d be happy to have him re-interviewed,” Mr. Miller told the Daily Mail on March 23.
“It was more that latent threat of, ‘If you want to keep going on TV, we’re gonna drag you in here again for additional hours of hearing testimony,’” he said, “It was the latent threat of the government continuing to intrude into my life.”
Mr. Miller stated that he did not have the resources to continue the battle with the committee and didn’t want to face more depositions. He believed that then-Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) was running the committee and was unhappy with his appearing on television and going against the panel’s anti-Trump narrative.
Ms. Cheney was one of only two Republicans on the committee.
Mr. Miller accused the committee of engaging in “political theater.”
His recent remarks contradicted his earlier statements to the committee.
“I was never given any direction or order or knew of any plans of that nature,” Mr. Miller told the House Jan. 6 committee at the time. “There was no order from the president.”
Mr. Miller’s claims come as House Republicans released a transcript that the Jan. 6 panel kept hidden from the public, which revealed that Chief of Staff Mark Meadows had spoken with Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser about additional guardsmen.
Anthony Ornato, who was the White House deputy chief of staff during the breach, testified to the Jan. 6 committee that he overheard Mark Meadows, who was then chief of staff, on the phone with Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser.
According to the transcript, Mr. Meadows wanted to ensure Ms. Bowser “had everything she needed,” and he “wanted to know if she [needed] any more guardsmen,” Mr. Ornato testified, according to the transcript.
“And I remember the number 10,000 coming up of, ‘The president wants to make sure that you have enough,’” he said.
But the committee said in its final report that it “found no evidence” supporting the idea that President Trump ordered 10,000 National Guard troops to be ready for Jan. 6.
After the report was released, Ms. Cheney wrote that people should read the committee’s report, which included the 2022 Miller interview in which he denied that President Trump ordered the troops.
Fani Willis Issues Warning to Trump After Surviving Disqualification
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis stated that her case against former President Donald Trump for alleged election interference will continue, unaffected by the proceedings regarding her relationship with her now-former top prosecutor.In the case, President Trump and more than a dozen other co-defendants face charges in relation to alleged attempts to illegally overturn the 2020 election in Fulton County. The 45th president has pleaded not guilty, saying that he is being wrongfully prosecuted in an attempt to harm his 2024 presidential chances.
Ms. Willis spoke just days after the same judge, Judge Scott McAfee, allowed attorneys for the former president and other co-defendants to appeal his ruling for a review. The judge ordered that either the district attorney or her former special prosecutor, Nathan Wade, needs to stop working on the case. Mr. Wade later resigned.
Defense lawyers had alleged that Ms. Willis engaged in a romantic relationship with Mr. Wade, which the two confirmed in a February court hearing, and that they financially benefited from the arrangement. The two denied the latter allegation.
Judge McAfee ruled there wasn’t enough evidence to back claims that Ms. Willis financially benefited in the case but described her relationship as a “tremendous lapse in judgment.” Some analysts have said that Ms. Willis and Mr. Wade perjured themselves during statements they made in court last month. The judge did not respond to those claims.
Ms. Willis maintained that she did not engage in anything illegal.
“I guess my greatest crime is that I had a relationship with a man, but that’s not something I find embarrassing in any way,” she said in an interview with CNN.
The case is separate from the 2020 election interference case brought by special counsel Jack Smith in Washington’s federal court. That case is currently on hold while the U.S. Supreme Court weighs President Trump’s claims of presidential immunity, with oral arguments scheduled for next month.
Trump Says He'll Post $175 Million in Fraud Case After New Court Order
The Appellate Division, First Judicial Department, of the New York State Supreme Court has granted a stay of enforcement on the $464 million judgment against former President Donald Trump on conditions. This allows the Trump Organization to prevent the seizure of its assets by the New York attorney general.The decision was made after defense attorneys argued that it was impossible to obtain a $464 million bond. The court’s conditions for reducing the bond include President Trump posting $175 million within 10 days. The judgment permanently bars former Trump Organization Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg and former Comptroller Jeffrey McConney from serving in financial control of any New York business entity; permanently bars President Trump, Mr. Weisselberg, and Mr. McConney from serving as an officer or director of any New York corporation for three years; bars President Trump from applying for loans from New York financial institutions for three years; and bars Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump from serving as an officer or director in New York for two years..
There was no stay requested for the continuance of an independent monitor overseeing financial matters in the Trump Organization or the installation of a compliance officer, and that will continue.
President Trump was attending a hearing regarding the trial date in a separate case at the time, and during the break told reporters that he would be posting the $175 million “quickly.”
He also released a statement shortly after the appellate ruling, criticizing Justice Arthur Engoron and saying that the new order showed how “ridiculous” his original order was.
He stated that this case was a confrontation between a judge and those that rule above him.
“This is the 5th time in this case that he has been overturned, a record. His credibility, and that of Letitia James, has been shattered,” President Trump said in his statement.
President Trump maintained that he did nothing wrong. He held a press conference where he decried the legal action against him as “election interference.” He argued that the government was trying to “knock out someone’s political opponent” and that these trials would not be happening if he wasn’t running for office. President Trump vowed to continue fighting the case all the way to the Supreme Court if necessary.
The case revolves around the Trump Organization’s statements of financial condition. These statements are not official financial documents, but rather marketing pieces wherein the Trump Organization summarized values of major assets, totaling to a net worth figure for President Trump that the court found to be routinely inflated.
The statements were used to introduce the company in several deals, including securing major loans for development projects. The defense has argued that these deals were done with sophisticated financial entities who read the disclaimer on the statements asking parties to do their own analyses, and did so.
During the trial, defendants sought to argue that no fraud had occurred, over the judge’s reminders not to reopen litigation to matters that he had already decided. Toward the latter half of the trial, the defense opted to continue to do so in order to preserve a record for appeal.
RFK Jr. Issues Dire Warning
Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and other prominent figures have raised concerns about central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), warning that they could lead to authoritarian government control.Mr. Kennedy highlighted the Canadian truckers’ protests as an example of the dangers CBDCs pose to freedom. The government used facial recognition technology to identify the participants and froze their bank accounts, crippling their ability to buy essential goods and services. A trucker told Mr. Kennedy that he would be going to jail for no longer being able to pay his alimony.
Mr. Kennedy argued that transactional freedom is as important as freedom of speech, as government control over finances can lead to oppression.
He also mentioned the Chinese communist regime as an example, where facial recognition systems and a social credit score are used to control citizens and restrict access to basic necessities.
“You can’t buy gas, you can’t buy an airplane ticket, you can’t buy anything else. So, you’re basically under home confinement. Like the truckers in Canada, they were never charged with a crime. They were certainly never convicted,” he said.
“It was just they were doing something the government didn’t like. The government was able to destroy their lives, and that is a very dangerous power to give government.”
Former President Donald Trump and Brexit leader Nigel Farage have echoed Mr. Kennedy’s concerns, emphasizing that CBDCs give the government too much control over people’s money. International figures, such as General Manager of the Bank for International Settlements Agustin Carstens and IMF Deputy Managing Director Bo Li, acknowledged that CBDCs would enable greater government control over finances. A paper from the Bank of Canada even suggested that CBDCs could harm bank deposits and undermine financial stability.
In response, Republican senators, led by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), have introduced a proposal to ban CBDCs in the United States to protect individual privacy and freedom.
Republicans Sound Alarm on DOJ’s ‘Red Flag’ Initiative
Republicans have voiced concerns following the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) announcement of a training center to assist with the implementation of state red flag laws, which aim to prevent certain individuals from accessing firearms.Attorney General Merrick Garland stated that the center would provide resources to keep guns away from those who pose a threat. The website will offer assistance and training to various professionals and organizations.
Red flag laws, or Extreme Risk Protection Orders, allow officials to confiscate guns from an individual under a judge’s order if the individual is “at risk of harming themselves or others,” according to Mr. Garland’s statement.
The DOJ’s center is part of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, which was implemented after a mass shooting in Texas. Several Republican lawmakers, including Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), and Kat Cammack (R-Fla.), sounded the alarm after the DOJ’s announcement over the weekend. None of these lawmakers voted for the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act in 2022. Only 14 GOP lawmakers voted in favor of the bill at the time; 10 of them have left Congress or were not reelected.
Twenty-one states have red flag laws on the books, according to a statement from the White House issued on March 23.
The DOJ announcement comes after an appeals court upheld New York state’s red flag law, saying that the measure does not violate the Second Amendment.
“This regulation is consistent with the nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation in keeping dangerous individuals from carrying guns and, therefore, is presumptively lawful,” the court’s opinion reads.
However, a lawyer for the plaintiff, Corey Monroe, told reporters last week that the law doesn’t have adequate protections.
He said, “We strongly believe that New York’s red flag law continues to lack sufficient and constitutionally required procedural protections for people who might find themselves on the receiving end of such an order.”
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That’s our final story on today’s News Brief, but before we sign off, we do want to take just a moment to celebrate you, if today is the day you were born. Your fellow birthday celebrants include:
Legendary entertainer Diana Ross is 80.
Singer Steven Tyler of Aerosmith is 76.
Actor Martin Short who is related to Jimmy Glick is 74.
And country singer Kenny Chesney who was once upon a time married to movie star Renée Zellweger. He celebrates is 56th birthday, today!
Almost forgot… one last note. If you enjoy The Epoch Times News Brief, please let us know by sending us an email. We’re at [email protected], that’s [email protected]. We always welcome your comments and thoughts and if you have any story ideas that you’d like to have featured on this program, please let us know. Again, we’re at [email protected]
Thanks for tuning in and for all of us here at the Epoch Times News Brief, I’m Bill Thomas and have a great day!
