Aaron Blake for WaPo:

Prosecutors have repeatedly described Donald Trump’s false claims of voter fraud in 2020 as effectively manufacturing a pretense for illegally overturning the election. Special counsel Jack Smith said in his indictment of the former president that fake electors were meant to “create a fake controversy” that could be used on Jan. 6, 2021.

In a new filing, Trump’s legal team appears bent on helping prosecutors make that case.

Tucked into Trump’s latest legal brief in his appeal for presidential immunity in his federal Jan. 6 case is a remarkable citation. His attorneys refer to a social media post from Trump the same day of the filing — Tuesday — which links to a report from an unnamed source running down various voter-fraud claims.

The filing cites the report to argue that there remain “vigorous disputes and questions about the actual outcome of the 2020 Presidential election.”

The report, to put it lightly, is a mess. And that Trump’s legal team would see fit to include it in a filing would not seem to augur well for his defense.

The report begins with a series of astonishing and false claims. “In actuality, there is no evidence Joe Biden won,” its first paragraph concludes. It then recounts how Trump led in key battleground states on election night and maintains that, as of that point, before millions of votes were counted, “the election was over.” But even Trump allies had acknowledged before the election that the expected late arrival of ballots from populous and heavily Democratic areas, as well as mail-in ballots, would create an illusion of an early Trump lead — a “red mirage.” There is nothing suspicious about how those states flipped as time went on…..