(Headline USA) Former White House staffers Jared Kushner and Hope Hicks testified before a grand jury investigating former President Donald Trump over his allegations of 2020 election fraud this week, as partisan federal investigators aim for another indictment.
During a grand-jury interrogation, special counsel Jack Smith’s prosecutors reportedly asked Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and his former senior adviser, whether the president privately acknowledged that he lost the 2020 election to Joe Biden, according to the New York Times.
Kushner maintained that Trump legitimately believed the election had been stolen from him and that he did not fabricate a narrative to try and stay in office.
Trump has blasted Smith—who also spearheaded his indictment for alleged mishandling of classified information—as a “deranged” and biased “lunatic” who “looks like a crackhead.”
The line of questioning from federal investigators suggests prosecutors are trying establish intent in order to make the case that Trump, while serving as the duly elected president, sought to lead a treasonous insurrection in defiance of the U.S. Constitution.
“Words are incredibly powerful in white-collar cases because in a lot of them you’re not going to hear from a defendant, as they are seldom going to take the stand,” said former federal prosecutor Daniel Zelenko in response to the Times’s inquiry about how establishing Trump’s mindset might strengthen its case.
“So, having those words put in front of a jury gives them more importance and makes them more consequential,” Zelenko added
However, multiple staffers have rebuffed this accusation throughout the investigation.
Even Mark Milley, the recently retired chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who publicly made known his anti-Trump views, admitted before a House committee that Trump repeatedly talked about how he believed the election had been stolen.
“It wasn’t there in the first session, but then all of a sudden it starts appearing,” Milley said.
Trump has dismissed the accusations against him as the result of political bias, arguing the Biden administration has weaponized the justice system to suppress his 2024 presidential campaign.
In a court filing this month, Trump’s legal team asked the courts to delay its trial regarding his indictment for the alleged mishandling of classified information until after the election, so as to prevent further election interference on Biden’s part.
“The government’s request to begin a trial of this magnitude within six months of indictment is unreasonable, telling, and would result in a miscarriage of justice,” Chris Kise, one of Trump’s lawyers, argued in a filing. “[It] will create extraordinary challenges in the jury selection process and limit the defendants’ ability to secure a fair and impartial adjudication.”
