Jan 6 cops slam Trump pardon plan as Congress looks to certify election: Live

Donald Trump is facing criticism for premiering a documentary over the weekend at Mar-a-Lago about an allied lawyer who helped him strategize about how to overturn the 2020 election results.

The film, The Eastman Dilemma: Lawfare of Justice, profiles lawyer John Eastman, who helped Donald Trump formulate an unprecedented, illegal plan to use Congress and the vice-president to overturn the certification of the 2020 election results.

A former Capitol police officer says he has been “devastated” by Donald Trump’s vow to pardon January 6 rioters, four years on from the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

In an op-ed published in The New York Times, Aquilino Gonell, a former sergeant in the Capitol Police, said a pardon “outrageous mistake,” that could put him and other law enforcement officers in danger.

“I remain haunted by that day. Now Mr. Trump’s promised actions could erase the justice we’ve risked everything for,” he said. “Releasing those who assaulted us from blame would be a desecration of justice. If Mr. Trump wants to heal our divided nation, he’ll let their convictions stand.”

But Johnson’s speech afterward did not set the tone, nor did the speech of House Republican Conference Chairwoman Lisa McClain.

Rather, it came when House Democratic Caucus Chairman Pete Aguilar nominated Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries and called Democrats the “governing majority.”

Former Trump adviser Steve Bannon called on the incoming Trump administration to rescind the medal, the nation’s highest civilian honor.

“Send a team to track down Soros and take the medal back,” Bannon said on his War Room podcast. “It is a disgrace that a demonic individual like that—who has been going out of his way to try to destroy this country, to mock this constitutional republic, which he hates and has dedicated his life to destroying—that we would be presenting him, awarding him, the highest civilian honor that you can give.”

“There has never been a President who was so evilly and illegally treated as I,” Trump wrote. “Corrupt Democrat judges and prosecutors have gone against a political opponent of a President, ME, at levels of injustice never seen before.”

Republican Senator Jim Banks revealed he believes Speaker Mike Johnson wouldn’t have won his leadership role without President-elect Donald Trump’s support.

“Donald Trump weighed in in support of Mike Johnson. I don’t think Mike Johnson would be Speaker of the House this morning if Donald Trump wouldn’t have weighed in last week, spent political capital helping him get elected on one vote,” Banks told CNN on Sunday.

“And to me, that’s a positive sign that House Republicans are unified behind Donald Trump, the Trump agenda,” he added.

New York Representative Mike Lawler, a Republican, suggested Donald Trump won the 2024 presidential election in part due to his hush-money conviction.

“Well, the great irony in all of this is that I don’t think anyone did more to help elect Donald Trump president of the United States than Alvin Bragg and Tish James,” Lawler told Fox News, referring to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who prosecuted the hush-money case.

In May, Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in connection with a scheme to silence adult film stat Stormy Daniels, whose story about having sex with Trump threatened to derail his 2016 presidential campaign.

The judge overseeing the case ordered Trump to appear for sentencing on January 10. However, he has indicated the sentence will be an unconditional discharge. This means Trump will face no jail time, probation or fines.

A deal that would see Elon Musk’s SpaceX take over secure communications for the Italian government is reportedly back on track and nearing final approval after Italy’s prime minister met with Donald Trump this weekend.

House speaker emerita Nancy Pelosi discussed the ongoing threat of political violence and the dangers posed by Donald Trump’s 2020 misinformation campaign in an interview Sunday on Face the Nation.

The former top Democrat in the lower chamber said that her husband, Paul Pelosi, still faces medical issues resulting from a violent attack he suffered in 2022, when an intruder in their home attacked him with a hammer.

The suspect, David DePape, was convicted of the violent attack and found to have been consumed by far-right conspiracy theories promoted by various figures aligned with MAGA Republicanism, including the 2020 stolen election conspiracies promoted by Trump himself.