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Former President Donald Trump on Tuesday was indicted for a third time on criminal charges related to his efforts to retain power in the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election. Trump
signaled earlier today that he had been told charges would be brought by Special Counsel Jack Smith. The charges stem from the former president’s efforts, in the weeks leading up to January
6, 2021, to block the certification of electoral votes in favor of Joe Biden, who won the election. Trump is charged 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. WATCH ON DEADLINE “Despite having lost, the Defendant was
determined to remain in power. So for more than two months following election day on November 3, 2020, the Defendant spread lies that there had been outcome-determinative fraud in the
election and that he had actually won. These claims were false, and the Defendant knew they were false. But the Defendant repeated and widely disseminated then anyway — to make his knowingly
false claims legitimate, create an intense national atmosphere of mistrust and anger, and erode public faith in the administration of the election.” You can read the full indictment here.
There are six unindicted and unnamed co-conspirators named in the document whose identities likely are easy to guess for those who have followed the case. The basis for these charges are
laid out in the document as follows: * Trump allegedly knew that he lost the election and made deliberately false claims * The co-conspirators allegedly launched a seven-state strategy to
press local and state officials to overturn the results * They allegedly tried to get the Justice Department to pressures states. * The co-conspirators allegedly pressured then Vice
President Mike Pence to try to do something they knew was unconstitutional. * Regarding Jan. 6, Trump and his unindicted co-conspirators allegedly exploited the disruption by redoubling
efforts to levy false claims of election fraud and convince Members of Congress to further delay the certification based on those claims.