Late on the night of Jan. 6, 2021, as the world reeled from the shocking images of a pro-Trump mob ransacking the U.S. Capitol, conservative activist and Trump legal adviser Cleta Mitchell focused her attention elsewhere — on a crumbling voter fraud lawsuit in Georgia that could open the door to criminal exposure.
The big picture: Axios has obtained dozens of previously undisclosed emails from the time period covering Dec. 30, 2020, to Jan. 8, 2021. They shed new light on the internal machinations, pressures and disagreements at the heart of the unprecedented legal battle to keep a defeated president in power.
Why it matters: The central question of what then-President Trump and his lawyers knew when he signed sworn court documents attesting to false evidence of voter fraud in Georgia is now under scrutiny by the Justice Department, Atlanta prosecutors and the House Jan. 6 committee.
- Two lawyers advising Trump were revealed over the past several weeks to have raised concerns about the president signing the verification, which carried the penalty of perjury. The new emails show a third, Bruce Marks, also expressed concern but was overruled.
- The emails also reveal new granularity about the role of Mitchell, who since then has collaborated with the Republican Party to build an activist base of national “election monitors” — many of whom will be out in force in Tuesday’s midterms.
Details: The legal discussions on the night of Jan. 6 about Georgia involved Trump himself and consideration of how to minimize exposure from the botched lawsuit and attestation.
- “I spoke with POTUS and he said do the best we can,” Mitchell wrote in an email timestamped 9:36 p.m. ET, to Trump campaign lawyers Justin Clark and Matthew Morgan.
- The nation’s capital was under citywide curfew. The House and Senate had just resumed debating objections to Joe Biden’s Electoral College victory.
- “We are trying to protect all concerned … just wanted to be sure you were in the loop … we will send the letter now,” Mitchell wrote.