Coup Mechanics

Our book, Divided We Stand, looks at the 2020 election and the January 6 insurrection.  Some Republican leaders -- and a measurable number of rank-and-file voters -- are open to violent rebellion, coups, and secession.  DOJ has charged the head of the Oath Keepers with seditious conspiracy. And we are learning more about the role of fake electors.

Charlie Sykes on the attempted coup:

 Here is a useful thread that put this all in context: (I’ve unrolled it.)

Asha Rangappa @AshaRangappa_

THREAD. Since there’s so much [waves hands everywhere] crazy coming up all of a sudden, let me break down the theory of how the overturning of the election was supposed to go down:

January 15th 2022

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STEP 1: John Eastman concocts a “legal blueprint” whereby VP Pence elides the requirements of the Electoral Vote Act based on 7 states submitting dual slates of electors, allowing Pence to either count the alternate slate or not count those states at all https://cdn.cnn.com/cnn/2021/images/09/20/eastman.memo.pdf…

STEP 2: GOP operatives/officials in those 7 states in fact create a false slate of electors and submit them as official, so they can be used in the scenario above

STEP 3: DOJ, meanwhile, submits letters to each state, indicating (falsely) that they have reason to believe that there has been election fraud. This creates perception that results are actually in question, bolstering VP’s ability to discount their votes.

[She later tweeted: “Jeffrey Clark’s letter references the alternate slate of electors “which have already been submitted”… his DOJ scheme was part and parcel of the same Eastman/forged slate scheme (also creating appearance the the “alternate slate” is OK as a matter of law)”]

STEP 4: The Big Lie is repeated in rallies and social media, saturating information space to rile up base and give momentum to “Stop the Steal” movement

STEP 5: Plan for all of these angry and agitated individuals to come to D.C. on January 6, the day that Eastman’s plan will be put into effect. The protesters are sent to march on the Capitol, to further put pressure on VP Pence and lawmakers, as stated in Oath Keeper indictment.

STEP 6: Since mob attack is intended to keep up pressure on Pence/lawmakers, they must be able to remain in Capitol as long as possible.

So: 6a) Purge top DOD and replace with loyalists; and 6b) delay LE/National Guard response as long as possible.

STEP 7: ??? I’m not sure what was supposed to happen at this point. Presumably, Pence would somehow declare Trump the winner, or if not, the Capitol would remain occupied until they found a way to make him do it. Seems like they planned to continue the siege.

The point is that there are a lot of moving parts and evidence surfacing in a lot of different areas but they are all connected to one overarching goal: Keep Trump in power by subverting the counting of the electoral votes and preventing the transfer of power to Biden /END

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Exit take: Let’s go back to George Conway’s question: How does this not constitute a criminal offense? And why on earth would the DOJ not launch an investigation into the fake/forged election certificates?

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