Former President Donald Trump’s attorney defended Mr. Trump’s phone call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in January 2021, saying his client wanted “the truth” when asking the state’s top election official to find votes.
During an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday, attorney John Lauro dismissed allegations that the former president had done anything wrong in his call to Mr. Raffensperger, which was
part of the evidence for Mr. Trump’s second impeachment and subsequent exoneration.
“President Trump had every right to ask the Secretary of State: ‘I believe that this election was conducted improperly. There are deficiencies here. I want to see if there are more than 10,000 votes, or whatever the number was, that were counted illegally.’ Once again, that’s core political speech,” Mr. Lauro said.
Mr. Trump lost Georgia and its 16 electoral votes in the 2020 election. In an hourlong
recorded call on Jan. 2, 2021, Mr. Trump asked Mr. Raffensperger “to find 11,780 votes,” referring to a figure that is one more than the margin he lost by. A transcript of the call was released by media outlets.
Mr. Trump asserted that he
won Georgia and asked the state election officials to probe election irregularities during the call. However, Mr. Raffensperger
countered the former president’s claims, saying that his concerns were either inaccurate or had been proven untrue.
Mr. Lauro also rejected the idea that Mr. Trump had threatened Mr. Raffensperger.
“That wasn’t a threat at all. What he was asking for is for Raffensperger to get to the truth,” Mr. Lauro said. “He believed that there were an excess of 10,000 votes that were counted illegally. And what he was asking for is the Secretary of State to act appropriately and find these votes that were counted illegally.”
He added: “That was an aspirational ask. He is entitled to petition even state government.”
On Aug. 1, the former president was
indicted by a grand jury in Washington convened by special counsel Jack Smith. The indictment accuses Mr. Trump of conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct the certification of votes on Jan. 6, 2021, and conspiracy against citizens’ right to vote.
Separately, Trump is facing
40 felony charges over his alleged mishandling of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort following Mr. Smith’s investigation.
Mr. Lauro claimed the Biden administration is leading a politically-motivated prosecution against his client.
“President [Joe] Biden has put in motion a political prosecution in the middle of an election season,” Mr. Lauro said. “The Justice Department, the Biden Justice Department, is going after a former president for acts that he carried out in fulfillment of his oath as president of the United States.”
Also on Sunday, Mr. Lauro told CNN’s “State of the Union” that Mr. Trump’s legal team will
oppose a protective order requested by Mr. Smith that would restrict the information that the former president and his allies can share about the Jan. 6 case.
