Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in
In recent weeks, Donald Trump’s tax returns have been published and the House select committee investigating January 6 released its report
Find your bookmarks in your Independent Premium section, under my profile
What we know about Donald Trump’s tax returns
Donald Trump’s aides raged to each other about their future prospects while Rudy Giuliani and other Trump allies persisted in their efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in the immediate hours after the January 6 attack on the Capitol.
Those were the revelations we learned as the committee released its final report this weekend, including a massive new trove of documents and transcripts of witness testimony gathered over the course of its investigation.
Among the released documents include text messages from Mr Trump’s White House staffers as well as members of Congress.
Separately, the House Ways and Means committee last week published Mr Trump’s tax returns from 2016-2020 following a years-long legal battle.
Former Donald Trump aide Alyssa Farah Griffin said her one-time colleague, the then-White House Press Secretary and current Fox News personality Kayleigh McEnany, was a “liar” who peddled election lies because she knew it would enrich her career post-Trump.
During her time in the White House Ms Farah Griffin served as Mr Trump’s communications director, and her experiences interacting with Ms McEnany reportedly left her with the impression that the former press secretary was more interested in self enrichment than serving the public.
Read more from Graig Graziosi:
‘She got her Fox News gig,’ Ms Griffin said of Ms McEnany
Ginni Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court judge Clarence Thomas, admitted that she was not aware of any specific evidence of voter fraud in the 2020 election at the time she personally lobbied senior White House officials to overturn the results.
In an interview with the House committee investigating the attack on the US Capitol, a transcript of which was released on Friday, Ms Thomas said that she “wasn’t very deep” in her knowledge of specific voter fraud allegations at the time of her lobbying effort, but instead “was basing what I believed off of people I trusted and news that I trusted.”
She’s not the only one who has made this admission: Donald Trump’s top legal adviser in the days following the election, Rudy Giuliani, also admitted as much in a phone call with a state lawmaker.
Read more:
Wife of Supreme Court judge admits she ‘wasn’t very deep’ in her knowledge of specific voter fraud claims in interview with Jan 6 committee
Adam Kinzinger, one of two Republicans on a House select committee investigating the attack on the US Capitol, blamed GOP leader Kevin McCarthy for giving Donald Trump a political lifeline after the insurrection, opening the door for “crazy elements” in the soon-to-be Republican-controlled House of Representatives.
“He is the reason Donald Trump is still a factor,” Mr Kinzinger told CNN on 1 January.
Watch his interview below:
“Donald Trump is alive today politically because of Kevin McCarthy,” the congressman said on CNN this weekend
Nine House Republicans sent a letter criticising House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s bid to become House speaker despite his overtures to Trump loyalists in the party.
The letter came two days before the new Congress begins. Republicans won the majority in the House of Representatives in November, but only by a narrow margin. Republicans will only have 222 seats, which is only four more than the required 218 votes Mr McCarthy has needed.
Their continued rebellion could mean that Mr McCarthy becomes the first speaker candidate to lose on the first ballot in 100 years.
Read more:
Comes as McCarthy makes key concession to House conservatives
Kevin McCarthy is facing the political fight of his career, with a cadre of Trump-backed House members seeking to block him from becoming speaker this week.
The election of the House speaker takes place before the chamber has settled on the rules for the next Congress, the 118th. This means that the vote will occur without regular procedures in place.
Read more about the process and this year’s political battle in The Independent:
No leader has lost the first ballot to become speaker in a century
Emails from Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner obtained by the House select committee investigating January 6 reveal that the former president wanted to trademark “rigged election” days after the 2020 presidential election.
It’s a phrase that Mr Trump used nearly 100 times in 2020 and 2021. Apparently, the former president saw his 2020 defeat as not just a personal outrage, but a branding opportunity as well.
Read more:
Jared Kushner wanted it done ‘ASAP’
A pair of Trump White House aides asked if the Secret Service could construct a bulletproof glass box for then-president Donald Trump to stand in after accompanying supporters to the Capitol on January 6, transcripts of an interview with his ex-deputy chief of staff have shown.
The transcript of the House January 6 select committee’s deposition with ex-White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations Tony Ornato revealed that the White House advance staffers, Bobby Peede and Max Miller, asked if the Secret Service could accompany the riotous mob he had called to Washington as they protested Congress’s certification of his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden outside the US Capitol.
The Independent’s Andrew Feinberg has more:
Revelation came in transcript of January 6 select committee’s deposition with Tony Ornato
Jared Kushner, Donald Trump’s son-in-law, personally ordered the Biden administration to be excluded from Covid-19 planning in the wake of the 2020 election, a Jan 6 committee witness has claimed.
His role was revealed in new transcripts from the House select committee investigating January 6, released as part of the panel’s final report.
Read more:
Assertion contained in interview transcript of former Trump official Alyssa Farah Griffin
Donald Trump donated nothing to the Department of Health and Human Services during the height of the pandemic, despite claiming publicly to have done so, his tax returns revealed on Friday.
The release of his returns came as the result of the end of a years-long legal battle between the now-former president and the House Ways and Means Committee, which released its final report this week after recently obtaining the returns when the Supreme Court declined to intervene in the case.
The picture painted by the documents is crystal clear: Donald Trump claimed zero charitable donations throughout 2020, meaning that his tax burden was not reduced at all (at least in that regard). He would still go on to pay $0 in income tax for the year in total.
Read more in The Independent:
Despite his spokeswoman’s claim, returns show he donated nothing to charity in 2020
Tweets by model Karlie Kloss about the January 6 Capitol riot enraged an aide to Ivanka Trump as well as Counselor to President Trump Hope Hicks, newly released texts have revealed.
Ms Kloss is married to Jared Kushner’s brother, Josh Kushner.
Texts released by the House Select Committee investigating the insurrection also show that Ivanka Trump’s Chief of Staff Julie Radford and Ms Hicks were concerned about the impact of the riot on their reputations.
Read more in The Independent:
‘Does she get how royally f***ed they all are now?’ Hicks writes
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images
Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? Start your Independent Premium subscription today.
Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in
Log in
New to The Independent?
Or if you would prefer:
Want an ad-free experience?
Hi {{indy.fullName}}
