Trump’s Jan. 6 Coup Attempt Could Be Back In The Headlines Just In Time For The Election

WASHINGTON — Donald Trump’s coup attempt that ended with the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol may be on the cusp of making new headlines, just weeks ahead of the November election.

That decision is now in the hands of U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who will determine when and how much to make public of a detailed accounting of special counsel Jack Smith’s evidence backing up the four felony charges against Trump. That could include material never before seen, such as grand jury testimony from then-Vice President Mike Pence and Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows.

Whether and how much any of those details will matter to voters in the campaign’s final weeks, though, is an open question.

“Very, very unlikely,” said Republican pollster Neil Newhouse. “Jan. 6 is already baked into this election cake.”

Fellow Republican David Kochel, a consultant and veteran of numerous campaigns, said he also doubts that any new information or details about testimony will change many minds.

“If you care about Jan. 6, you’re already for Harris,” he said about Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee. “I guess anything helps. And when Trump is covered wall to wall, it’s usually unhelpful to him.”

That appears to be the view of Trump’s defense lawyers, who have been openly arguing that it would be unfair to allow the public to see evidence of his actions undermining the last presidential election in the days before the coming one.

“President Trump is the leading candidate in the presidential election, which is just weeks away. The [special counsel’s] office cannot be permitted to issue a massive and misleading public statement,” Trump lawyers Todd Blanche and John Lauro wrote in a Monday filing.

The filing fails to mention that Trump will have the ability to order his attorney general to dismiss all federal cases against him, should he win the Nov. 5 election and return to office in January.

In an hour’s worth of rambling remarks to reporters on Thursday afternoon, Trump did not address the Jan. 6 prosecution.

In the past, Trump has repeatedly attacked Smith, calling him “deranged,” as he continues to push the lie that the 2020 election was “stolen” from him — the same lie that led his mob to attack the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. More than 140 police officers were wounded that day. One died hours later, and four others died by suicide in the coming months.

Amanda Carpenter, a former Republican aide in the Senate who is now with the nonprofit United to Protect Democracy, said that if the details of that day come front and center again, it could turn undecided voters against Trump.

“What happened on January 6 will only be a factor if voters have the searing memories of the Capitol being breached and officers being assaulted in mind when they are making their decisions about who will lead the country in 2025,” she said.

Smith’s filing was in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s July ruling that Trump could not be prosecuted for “official” acts he took as president. The ruling specifically mentioned Trump’s attempts to coerce Department of Justice officials into falsely claiming there had been widespread election fraud. The six conservative justices ruled that presidents can order their own employees to do anything they want, even if it means breaking the law.

They also found that Trump’s attempts to pressure Pence into declaring Trump the winner of the election at the congressional certification ceremony could be considered an unofficial or private act, done to benefit Trump as a political candidate, but that Smith had the burden of proving that. If courts made such a determination, it would allow Smith to go forward with his charges and use Pence’s testimony against Trump.

Trump’s lawyers have until Oct. 17 to file a response to Smith’s Thursday filing, and then Smith has until Oct. 29 to respond to that.

Chutkan would likely wait for all of those filings before ruling on whether Smith is correct — that the special counsel’s “superseding” indictment he filed Aug. 27, by deleting all references to the coercion of DOJ officials, now only addresses unofficial or political acts, not official ones. It is unclear when, if at all, the detailed information regarding evidence Smith has on Trump would become public.

But even if all those details remain secret through Election Day, the mere fact that the case is back in the news could help Harris, said Rick Wilson, a former GOP consultant and now a vocal Trump critic.

“It will re-center Jan. 6 in the dialogue, make Trump promise to pardon the attackers and so on,” he said. “Net negative for Trump.”