Rudy Giuliani lands in Atlanta to surrender to authorities
A plane carrying Rudy Giuliani has landed at Atlanta’s Dekalb-Peachtree airport.
The former New York mayor and lawyer for Donald Trump is expected to surrender to face charges in the sprawling Georgia elections racketeering case later today.
Key events
Rudy Giuliani is expected to meet with his attorneys at a local law office in Atlanta before a meeting with the Ful county district attorney’s office to discuss terms of a bond agreement, CNN reported.
Giuliani’s attorneys were seen entering a local law office after touching down in Atlanta, the report said.
The former New York mayor and Trump attorney, who landed in Georgia earlier this morning, is expected to surrender to authorities once a bond agreement is reached.
Giuliani faces 13 charges in the Georgia election subversion case, including racketeering, three counts of soliciting lawmakers to violate their oaths of office, three counts of making false statements and six conspiracy counts dealing with the recruitment of fake electors.
House could launch Biden impeachment inquiry next month, says Kevin McCarthy
House speaker Kevin McCarthy said lawmakers could formally launch an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden next month when they return from summer recess.
During an interview with Fox Business on Tuesday night, McCarthy said the Republican-led House will move forward with an impeachment inquiry if the Bidens do not “provide us the documents we’re asking”.
“If they provide us the documents, there wouldn’t be a need for an impeachment inquiry,” McCarthy said.
But if they withhold the documents and fight like they have now to not provide to the American public what they deserve to know, we will move forward with impeachment inquiry when we come back into session.
In July, McCarthy floated an impeachment inquiry into Biden over unproven claims of financial misconduct and his latest comments are the clearest signal yet that an inquiry could come soon in the House.
Republicans in Congress have ramped up investigations of Biden and his son Hunter Biden, particularly the younger Biden’s business dealings.
North Dakota governor and GOP presidential candidate Doug Burgum plans to appear on the debate stage tonight despite injuring his leg during a basketball game, CBS’ Robert Costa reports.
Burgum, 67, was taken to a Milwaukee emergency room on Tuesday night and it was unclear if he would be able to stand for the two-hour debate.
Burgum campaign source tells me the governor is planning to go to the “walk thru” this afternoon at the debate site despite his injury and ER visit… and has made clear to RNC he plans to be on stage tonight
— Robert Costa (@costareports) August 23, 2023
A Super Pac backing Florida governor Ron DeSantis was briefly suspended from X, formerly known as Twitter, hours before the first Republican presidential primary debate, according to reports.
Visitors to the “Never Back Down” Twitter account on Wednesday morning were greeted with a message stating “Account suspended. Twitter suspends accounts that violate the Twitter Rules”. The account was later restored.
My colleague David Smith is in Milwaukee today to cover the preparations for tonight’s Republican primary debate.
Former Coffee county elections supervisor Misty Hampton reaches $10,000 bail agreement
Misty Hampton, the former elections supervisor for Coffee county, has reached a $10,000 bond agreement with prosecutors in Fulton count, according to court documents.
Hampton’s bail conditions include not communicating with witnesses and co-defendants, reporting to pretrial services by phone every month and not obstructing justice by intimidating witnesses.
Hampton was present when a Donald Trump-aligned group sought to illegally access voting machines in search of fraud and directed much of the group’s search.
Here’s a copy of the bond agreement, shared by Lawfare’s Anna Bower:
Misty Hampton, former Coffee County elections supervisor who was involved in unauthorized copying of voting systems, has bond set at $10,000. pic.twitter.com/XwLFfwykks
— Anna Bower (@AnnaBower) August 23, 2023
Larry Elder, the rightwing radio host who is running for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, has threatened to file a complaint against the Republican national committee (RNC) if it does not reverse its decision to exclude him from participating in tonight’s debate.
The RNC announced on Tuesday that eight candidates had qualified for the Milwaukee debate, but that three candidates had fallen short: Miami mayor Francis S Suarez, businessman Perry Johnson, and Elder. All three had claimed to have met the donor and polling threshold.
In order to qualify for the first debate stage, the RNC required candidates to draw at least 40,000 individual donors and register at least 1% support in three national polls or in two national and two early state polls. Candidates were also required to sign a pledge to back the eventual winner of the GOP primary.
Posting to X, formerly known as Twitter, Elder said he intends to file an FEC complaint for violation of debate rules and illegal campaign contributions if the RNC does not reverse their decision by 2pm Central time.
If the RNC does not reverse their decision by 2pm CT and acknowledge that I met all criteria for entry into the presidential debate, I intend to file an FEC complaint for violation of debate rules and illegal campaign contributions.
FEC rules governing debates are clear that… pic.twitter.com/aKbFPOjy1k
— Larry Elder (@larryelder) August 23, 2023
Prosecutors described the interaction with the witness who retracted “false prior testimony” in the criminal case against Donald Trump over the hoarding of classified documents in a filing that seeks a hearing in Florida about potential conflicts of interest involving the defense lawyer, Stanley Woodward, who also represents Trump valet Walt Nauta.
The filing states:
The target letter to Trump Employee 4 crystallized a conflict of interest arising from Mr Woodward’s concurrent representation of Trump Employee 4 and Nauta.
They added:
Advising Trump Employee 4 to correct his sworn testimony would result in testimony incriminating Mr Woodward’s other client, Nauta; but permitting Trump Employee 4’s false testimony to stand uncorrected would leave Trump Employee 4 exposed to criminal charges for perjury.
Special Counsel prosecutors explain this is the conflict of interested for lawyer Stanley Woodward, adding that Taveras flipped after switching lawyers and taking the Federal Public Defender. https://t.co/3PpBjChUMJ
— Hugo Lowell (@hugolowell) August 22, 2023
David Smith
The Republican party faces an electability test on Wednesday when candidates including election deniers, climate deniers and anti-abortion extremists take the debate stage in a city that rebukes them and a state they cannot afford to lose.
The first presidential primary debate will be held in Milwaukee, a racially diverse Democratic stronghold in Wisconsin, a battleground that could decide who wins the White House in 2024.
Even without Donald Trump, who is skipping the primetime televised event, the juxtaposition between Republicans who have embraced his far-right agenda and their sceptical host city offers a preview of the party’s struggle to broaden its appeal.
“This is a debate of bad ideas,” said Mandela Barnes, born and raised in Milwaukee and a former lieutenant governor of Wisconsin.
It’s going to be a bunch of Maga extremists showing up in this city because Wisconsin is a critical state every election year. But regardless of how they perform, the reality is they are choosing a losing strategy of extremism and showing how out of touch they are with the people of this country and specifically people here in the city of Milwaukee.
Read the full report by the Guardian’s Washington DC bureau chief, David Smith, here.
Mar-a-Lago witness ‘retracted false testimony’ to implicate Trump
A witness in the criminal case against Donald Trump over his alleged mishandling of classified documents retracted “prior false testimony” after switching lawyers last month and implicated the former president in new information, according to the justice department.
The witness, a Trump employee identified elsewhere as Mar-a-Lago director of information technology, Yuscil Taveras, initially testified to a grand jury in Washington DC that he was unaware of any effort to erase surveillance video at the Florida property.
Prosecutors said in a court filing on Tuesday that the witness after getting the new attorney “immediately … retracted his prior false testimony” and provided the justice department with information that helped form the basis of the revised indictment against Trump, his valet Walt Nauta, and a third defendant, Carlos De Oliveira.
Rudy Giuliani is expected to have traveled to Georgia with the former New York police commissioner Bernie Kerik, who is an unindicted co-conspirator in the Georgia election subversion case.
Kerik has been assisting Giuliani to find a lawyer to represent him, CNN reported.
Kerik, who is not a lawyer, has agreed to assist Giuliani at no cost through the first phase of the Georgia prosecution — including bond negotiations with the Fulton County district attorney’s office and then surrendering to local authorities, the sources said.
Giuliani faces proliferating legal difficulties and expenses arising from work including searching for dirt on Donald Trump’s political enemies, which stoked Trump’s first impeachment, and challenging election results in states lost to Joe Biden.
The former New York mayor was forced to put his Manhattan flat on the market earlier this month to cover his soaring legal bills.