FBI agents were dispatched to run down and eventually disprove bizarre fraud claims — including a suitcase and a truck laden with ballots — in the wake of the 2020 election, but Donald Trump didn’t want to hear it, some of the former president’s top advisers told a U.S. House committee.
Everyone from then-Attorney General William Barr to presidential son-in-law Jared Kushner said in videotaped testimony to the panel that they advised Trump against pursuing claims the election was stolen. Yet he pressed on, raising about $250 million from supporters in fundraising appeals that Democratic Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a committee member, said were then diverted to other purposes in a "big ripoff.”
Showing Trump never had credible evidence the 2020 election outcome was tainted is crucial to the committee’s case that the Jan. 6 insurrection was a consequence of an illegitimate attempt by the former president to hold onto power. It also rebuts a grievance that many Republican political figures continue to embrace.