Former US president Donald Trump said he dismissed the views of his own lawyers in continuing to challenge his 2020 defeat because he did not respect them, saying in an interview aired on Sunday that he had made up his own mind that the election had been “rigged” — a false claim that he continues to make.
Trump, the front-runner for the Republican nomination to take on Democratic US President Joe Biden in next year’s election, is now facing four concurrent criminal prosecutions, including two involving his attempts to overturn his 2020 loss to Biden.
“It was my decision,” Trump told NBC’s Meet the Press program, that the election was “rigged” against him, adding that he relied heavily upon his own “instincts” in coming to that conclusion.
Photo: Reuters
Trump has continued to make false claims that the election was stolen from him through widespread voting fraud.
Asked why he dismissed the views of lawyers in the White House and his campaign that he had lost the election, Trump said: “Because I didn’t respect them.”
Trump singled out former US attorney general William Barr, who told him that he had lost the election, as one of the lawyers whose advice he did not follow.
“I listened to some people,” Trump said. “Guys like Bill Barr, who was a stiff, but he wasn’t there at the time. But he didn’t do his job, because he was afraid.”
Trump has pleaded not guilty in all four criminal cases, including a federal prosecution in Washington and a Georgia state indictment that involve to his attempts to recruit a slate of phony electors for congressional certification of the 2020 election results.
His comments on Sunday could undermine one of his possible legal defenses — that he relied on the advice of his lawyers in continuing to challenge his defeat.
US courts threw out dozens of legal challenges from Trump’s campaign and allies following the November 2020 election.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un sent Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) greetings with what appeared to be restrained rhetoric that comes as Pyongyang moves closer to Russia and depends less on its long-time Asian ally. Kim wished “the Chinese people greater success in building a modern socialist country,” in a reply message to Xi for his congratulations on North Korea’s birthday, the state-run Korean Central News Agency reported yesterday. The 190-word dispatch had little of the florid language that had been a staple of their correspondence, which has declined significantly this year, an analysis by Seoul-based specialist service NK Pro showed. It said
On an island of windswept tundra in the Bering Sea, hundreds of miles from mainland Alaska, a resident sitting outside their home saw — well, did they see it? They were pretty sure they saw it — a rat. The purported sighting would not have gotten attention in many places around the world, but it caused a stir on Saint Paul Island, which is part of the Pribilof Islands, a birding haven sometimes called the “Galapagos of the north” for its diversity of life. That is because rats that stow away on vessels can quickly populate and overrun remote islands, devastating bird
‘CLOSER TO THE END’: The Ukrainian leader said in an interview that only from a ‘strong position’ can Ukraine push Russian President Vladimir Putin ‘to stop the war’ Decisive actions by the US now could hasten the end of the Russian war against Ukraine next year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday after telling ABC News that his nation was “closer to the end of the war.” “Now, at the end of the year, we have a real opportunity to strengthen cooperation between Ukraine and the United States,” Zelenskiy said in a post on Telegram after meeting with a bipartisan delegation from the US Congress. “Decisive action now could hasten the just end of Russian aggression against Ukraine next year,” he wrote. Zelenskiy is in the US for the UN
A 64-year-old US woman took her own life inside a controversial suicide capsule at a Swiss woodland retreat, with Swiss police on Tuesday saying several people had been arrested. The space-age looking Sarco capsule, which fills with nitrogen and causes death by hypoxia, was used on Monday outside a village near the German border. The portable human-sized pod, self-operated by a button inside, has raised a host of legal and ethical questions in Switzerland. Active euthanasia is banned in the country, but assisted dying has been legal for decades. On the same day it was used, Swiss Department of Home