Former President Trump has been indicted as part of special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, which culminated in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.
The former president, who is the leading Republican candidate in the 2024 presidential field, faces four counts. The indictment details a campaign of “dishonesty, fraud and conceit” to obstruct a “bedrock function” of a democracy.
News of the indictment comes after Trump said he received a target letter informing him that he is the subject in the probe, a move often followed by the filing of charges.
A federal grand jury in Washington, D.C., has been hearing evidence in the case when it typically meets Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Follow along our live updates below:
Members of the Jan. 6 select committee suggested on Tuesday that the indictment of former President Trump on charges connected to his efforts to remain in power following the 2020 election built on their investigation into the Capitol riot.
In statements and remarks reacting to the news, members of the Jan. 6 committee cited work from their probe, which spanned roughly a year and a half and included a series of high-profile hearings where the panel presented their findings.
“I’ve just had a chance to skim the indictment, I want to read it in detail, but it sure looks like the facts recited follow what the Jan. 6 committee was able to unveil to the public,” Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), a member of the select committee, told CNN in an interview. “As you know, we thought those actions were criminal in nature and apparently, upon our referral, the Department of Justice did as well.”
House Republican Conference Chair Elise Stefanik came to Trump’s defense Tuesday, lambasting the indictment as a corrupt attempt by the Justice Department to “interfere” in the 2024 presidential election.
“President Trump had every right under the First Amendment to correctly raise concerns about election integrity in 2020,” she said in a statement.
An attorney for former President Donald Trump slammed the historic indictment against his client, calling it “unprecedented.”
During an appearance on Fox News, Trump attorney John Lauro said the indictment affects “every American who now realizes that the First Amendment is under assault.”
He added, “The reality is that if a president can be indicted for free speech, then anybody can be indicted.”
In an interview on Fox News in the wake of former President Trump’s third indictment, House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.) said he feels like the charges Trump is now facing mirror his committee’s own observations about President Biden.
“I feel like someone broke into our notes on the Oversight Committee and plagiarized them, only they put them down for Donald Trump instead of Joe Biden,” the Kentucky congressman told Laura Ingraham.
— Tara Suter
Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) accused the Department of Justice (DOJ) of using the latest indictment against former President Trump — which stems from his efforts to remain in power following the 2020 election — to “distract” from recent information GOP-led committees have gathered about President Biden and his son Hunter Biden.
In a post on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, McCarthy listed several points Republicans have been hammering in their investigations into the Biden family’s business dealings.
“And just yesterday a new poll showed President Trump is without a doubt Biden’s leading political opponent,” McCarthy continued. “Everyone in America could see what was going to come next: DOJ’s attempt to distract from the news and attack the frontrunner for the Republican nomination, President Trump.”
While pointing the finger at the DOJ and Biden, McCarthy did not engage with any specific allegations in the Trump indictment, a tactic that has become typical for the Speaker in recent weeks when speaking to the press about charges against Trump.
— Mychael Schnell and Emily Brooks
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jefferies (D-N.Y.) on Tuesday said the third indictment of former President Trump is the “most serious and most consequential thus far” and “will stand as a stark reminder to generations of Americans that no one, including a president of the United States, is above the law.”
“The insurrection on January 6, 2021 was one of the saddest and most infamous days in American history, personally orchestrated by Donald Trump and fueled by his insidious Big Lie in an attempt to undermine the 2020 election,” the Democratic leaders said in their joint statement on Tuesday.
“In a deadly effort to overturn the will of the American people and block the peaceful transition of power, our nation’s Capitol—the very symbol and home of American patriotism and democracy—fell under attack to thousands of vicious and violent rioters.”
— Olafimihan Oshin
Florida governor and 2024 Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis took aim at D.C. jurors following the historic third indictment against former President Trump, calling the capital city a “swamp.”
DeSantis slammed the outcome of the indictment in a tweet posted shortly after the news broke.
“While I’ve seen reports, I have not read the indictment,” DeSantis tweeted. “I do, though, believe we need to enact reforms so that Americans have the right to remove cases from Washington, DC to their home districts.”
He added, “Washington, DC is a ‘swamp’ and it is unfair to have to stand trial before a jury that is reflective of the swamp mentality.”
– Sarah Polus
Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) are renewing their calls to defund the office of special counsel Jack Smith, who on Tuesday indicted former President Trump on charges stemming from his efforts to remain in power following the 2020 election.
Gaetz, a staunch Trump supporter, introduced a bill last month to prohibit federal funding for Smith’s office, an effort he renewed calls for on Tuesday as news broke of Trump’s indictment.
“DEFUND JACK SMITH’S WITCH HUNT AGAINST PRESIDENT TRUMP!” Gaetz wrote on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.
Greene echoed that call Tuesday, writing on X just before the indictment was handed down, “I will not fund Jack Smith’s special counsel.” She also said she would utilize the Holman rule “to defund his office.”
The Holman rule allows lawmakers to propose amendments to appropriations bills that cut the salaries of specific federal workers down to $1, effectively defunding them.
— Mychael Schnell
New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu — no fan of Donald Trump — told CNN that the Justice Department’s indictment of the former president “reaffirms there’s no way this guy can win in November of ’24.”
The remark, made to CNN, echoes Sununu’s comments made recently on a conservative radio show that Trump will lose and “I don’t think he’s going quietly.”
Former Vice President Mike Pence — who is mentioned extensively in Tuesday’s indictment — called the charges against Trump a reminder that he is unfit to serve another term as president.
“Today’s indictment serves as an important reminder: anyone who puts himself over the Constitution should never be President of the United States,” Pence said in a statement.
“I will have more to say about the government’s case after reviewing the indictment,” Pence continued. “The former president is entitled to the presumption of innocence but with this indictment, his candidacy means more talk about January 6th and more distractions.”
Pence launched his own 2024 campaign in June by arguing that Trump’s efforts to put himself over the Constitution should be disqualifying.
Trump’s efforts to pressure Pence to overturn the 2020 election results are detailed at length in the indictment.
“Our country is more important than one man. Our constitution is more important than any one man’s career,” Pence said in his statement Tuesday. “On January 6th, Former President Trump demanded that I choose between him and the Constitution. I chose the Constitution and I always will.”
– Brett Samuels
President Biden and first lady Jill Biden went to see the summer box office hit movie Oppenheimer as the indictment news unfolded.
The Bidens are on vacation in Rehoboth and prior to going to the movies, they had dinner at a nearby restaurant, Matt’s Fish Camp Lewes. Just as the Bidens arrived at dinner, the Trump indictment dropped.
They then arrived at the theater around 6:30 p.m. to see the movie, starring Cillian Murphy as the famed real-life Manhattan Project physicist.
– Alex Gangitano, reporting from Delaware
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said the charges alleged in the latest Trump indictment are ‘very serious’.
She added that it must play out through the legal process both ‘peacefully’ and ‘without any outside interference’.
“Like every criminal defendant, the former President is innocent until proven guilty. Our Founders made clear that, in the United States of America, no one is above the law – not even the former President of the United States,” the statement added.
“As this case proceeds through the courts, justice must be done according to the facts and the law.”
Pelosi was the speaker of the House during the 2020 presidential election and as the events of Jan. 6, 2021 unfolded, that culminated in the attack on the Capitol.
– Sarakshi Rai
Attorney General Merrick Garland defended Smith, saying the special prosecutor who brought the case against Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election “followed the law.”
Garland, who rarely addresses federal investigations involving the former president, told reporters that any questions on the matter could be answered in court filings and in the courtroom.
The indictment of Trump by a federal grand jury investigating Jan. 6 details a campaign of “dishonesty, fraud and conceit” to obstruct a “bedrock function” of a democracy — the counting of votes — generating charges for conspiracy to defraud the U.S.
“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,” the indictment states.
Read details of the indictment here.
Special Counsel Jack Smith previewed an indictment against Donald Trump, saying the former president’s efforts to remain in power after losing the 2020 election were “fueled by lies.”
“The attack on our nation’s Capitol on Jan. 6 2021, was an unprecedented assault on the seat of American democracy. As described in the indictment, it was fueled by lies – lies by the defendant targeted at obstructing a bedrock function of the US government: the nation’s process of collecting, counting and certifying the results of the presidential election,” Smith said.
— Rebecca Beitsch