Hi there,

Greetings from beautiful Lyons, Colorado where I just wrote all this during an absolutely bonkers rain storm that dropped over 2 inches of rain in like a half hour. That was something. Anyway, yes, I'm still on the slow road to taking my kid to college. But apparently the indictments against Donald Trump will never stop, so here we are.

We'll get to all that in a second but first, hi there. I'm Dan Sinker and I'm writing up the various indictments of Donald Trump because I make poor decisions sometimes. Haha. Also, I'm doing it for free because, once again, I make poor decisions. That said, if you would like to support this work, tips are very welcome via PayPal, Venmo, or CashApp. They mean a lot. Thanks.

OK, so about today:

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Previously: In November of 2020 Donald Trump lost his reelection campaign. He refused to accept those results and, well, things happened. Do I really have to rehash all this? We've been living in its shadow ever since. Anyway, that brings us to today....

Today, Tuesday, August 1, 2023

• For the third time this year, Donald Trump has been indicted. This time around it's on federal charges stemming from his refusal to accept the results of the 2020 presidential election and the shenanigans that he and six co-conspirators (more on them in a second) got up to trying to stop the peaceful transfer of power. The indictment handed down from a grand jury in Washington DC today includes charges on four counts: Conspiracy to Defraud the United States, Conspiracy to Obstruct an Official Proceeding, Obstruction of and Attempt to Obstruct an Official Proceeding, and Conspiracy against Rights. After revelations from the impeachment of Trump in January 2020 and the two years of the House's investigations into January 6 that ended when Republicans took control of the House this year, there's nothing particularly new about what's in the 45-page indictment, but seeing it all laid out in paintext is really something. (Source: Original Document)

• The conspiracies alleged in the charges focus on two major areas (the third "Conspiracy against Rights," is more about the overall scheme denying voters their right to have their votes count). Let's look at them:

• First is a conspiracy to block the election results by pressuring state legislators and officials to reject or overturn the results of the election in their states and by recruiting slates of false electors to "force a conflict" come time to certify those electors. All of this, the indictment alleges (and goes to great pains to document), was based on "knowingly false" information. (Source: Politico)

• The second conspiracy was around attempting to stop the final certification of electoral votes on January 6 by pressuring Mike Pence, who oversaw the proceedings as the ceremonial president of the Senate, to reject the results. When, famously, Pence refused, Trump and his conspirators pushed forward with attempting to block the proceedings in other ways and, well, you know what happened at the Capitol on January 6. (Source: CNN)

• Of course, you can't have a conspiracy alone and this indictment lists six other folks who plotted alongside Trump. While unnamed (and as-yet uncharged) the Co-Conspirators are easily identifiable based on quotes in the indictment. The Washington Post, handily, has already sorted out who five of the six are:

  • Co-Conspirator 1: Rudy Giuliani, who promised a "trial by combat" at the rally on January 6 and was "willing to pursue strategies the Defendant's 2020 re-election campaign attorneys would not."

  • Co-Conspirator 2: John Eastman, "an attorney who devised and attempted to implement a strategy to leverage the Vice President's ceremonial role overseeing the certification proceeding to obstruct the certification of the presidential election."

  • Co-Conspirator 3: Sidney Powell, "whose unfounded claims of election fraud the Defendant privately acknowledged to others sounded 'crazy.'"

  • Co-Conspirator 4: Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark, who worked with Trump to "use the Justice Department to open sham election crime investigations and influence state legislatures with knowingly false claims of election fraud."

  • Co-Conspirator 5: Kenneth Chesebro, "an attorney who assisted in devising and attempting to implement a plan to submit fraudulent slates of presidential electors to obstruct the certification proceeding."

  • Co-Conspirator 6: A political consultant, "who helped implement a plan to submit fraudulent slates of presidential electors to obstruct the certification proceeding."

  While currently uncharged, it's entirely possible more charges are coming against some of these folks. (Source: Washington Post)

• As one would expect, Trump, his presidential campaign (because don't forget, we've got that going on too), and his attorneys have already issued statements. Trump, of course, said these are "fake charges," and his attorney John Lauro promised "We now have the ability in this case to issue our own subpoenas, and we will re-litigate every single issue in the 2020 election." Kill me. (Source: NBC News)

• So what happens now? Well, this isn't anyone's first rodeo anymore, so we know the basics. In the next few days, Trump will appear in court to hear the charges against him and to plead guilty or not guilty (gee, I wonder...) and eventually—likely in the coming weeks—we'll get a trial date that will join an already-crowded calendar (remember he's already got criminal trials scheduled for March and May next year). Oh and also there's a whole Republican primary calendar and, if he wins the nomination, a national election he's running in. (Source: Vox)

What's coming next: Don't forget that there's a very possible indictment still to drop from Fulton County Georgia DA Fani Willis around Trump and his cronies attempts to overturn the election results in Georgia. It's expected in the next week or two.

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So we're three out of four indictments down now, with Georgia coming very soon. But here's the deal: if any indictment news drops the week of August 14th, you will not hear from me because that's the week we'll be moving my kid into his dorm room at college and I will be too busy crying. I mean it. More tears than the rain that just crashed over my trailer.

If you'd like to check out something else I've written recently, I had a profile of the amazing comedian and creator of the excellent show This Fool, Chris Estrada, come out in Esquire last week.

OK, back to the indictment: if this update was helpful to you, it's probably helpful to someone else, so send people to indictment.fyi/signup and they can start getting this newsletter too Thanks for spreading the word.

Finally, this whole project is done for free because I'm impulsive and don't plan ahead, but a tip via PayPal, Venmo, or CashApp is always appreciated and a great way of showing your support for this newsletter, but only if you can. Thank you so much.

I'm glad you're here,

Dan