“The violent siege of the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters for the purpose of disrupting the peaceful transfer of power was not an accident. President Trump has long been orchestrating strategies to circumvent the democratic process and to remain in power despite his landslide loss in the 2020 election to Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

To fully understand the failed coup on January 6th at the U.S. Capitol and why it is imperative to immediately remove Trump, you have to begin with Trump’s purge of senior personnel at the Department of Defense and Pentagon and the installation of loyalists following his election loss in November. During this period, court after court were also dispensing his dubious election challenges, even as he wildly and without evidence alleged fraud. Then, for reasons that were never made explicit, on January 3rd, ten former defense secretaries signed an op-ed stating that the U.S. military has no role to play in any election challenges. The next day at a rally, Trump pushed Vice President Pence to overturn the election results in his role certifying the Electoral College results, saying that he hoped that Pence “came through.” As he was pressuring the VP to not certify the election results on January 6th, he was also pressuring the Georgia Secretary of State to “find 11,780 votes” in a stunning, and likely criminal, phone call.

Meanwhile, Trump was joined every step of the way by his close friends and family, like Rudy Giuliani, Lin Wood, and his son Don Jr., and his fervent supporters, in planning a “last stand”  rally in Washington on the day of the ceremonial certification of the election at 1:00 pm in the U.S Capitol. As his radicalized base listened intently, Trump instructed the gathered crowd that “we are going to have to fight much harder” and then told them to march to the Capitol.  By 1:00 pm, bomb threats at the DNC and RNC had forced several buildings adjacent to the Capitol Complex to be evacuated and by 2:00 pm Trump supporters had overrun the Capitol in a dramatic and violent scene. Trump’s supporters attacked police and trashed the Capitol as Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, was calling Republican Senators to “slow it down,” meaning delaying the certification of the election. Meanwhile, amidst all this misinformation driven chaos, destruction, and violence, and despite strong opposition from Senate Leader Mitch McConnell, 6 U.S. Senators and 121 House Members voted to not certify election results in an attempt to install Trump as America’s first non-democratically elected leader since the American Revolution.

Trump has been orchestrating his ongoing occupation of the White House by any means since his loss. Far from condemning the shocking scene at the Capitol, Trump revoked the nomination of Chad Wolf to head the Department of Homeland Security because he had the temerity to tell Trump that he needed to condemn the violence at the Capitol. From Trump’s repeated efforts, it seems clear that using the military to remain in power was his Plan A, but he certainly made the most of his Plan B: to use his extremist followers to derail the will of the voters by stopping the certification. As I stated in my tweet, 13 days is simply too long to permit him to remain in power where he has access to his sycophants at the Department of Defense and the formal levers of power. America can’t wait, Trump must be removed now.”

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