After loss in US polls, Trump ordered top military leader to seize voting machines: Report
India Today
After his defeat in the 2020 US Election, an order by former President Donald Trump asked the Pentagon to seize voting machines, a report said.
A draft executive order written by Donald Trump's White House in the weeks after his defeat in the 2020 election directed the nation's top military leader to seize voting machines, a report said Friday.
The explosive document, released by the National Archives and obtained by Politico, highlights the extreme measures Trump may have been willing to take to cling to power against the will of voters who picked Joe Biden to be their next president.
Dated December 16 2020, the order sought to appoint a special counsel to bring charges on any fraud allegations that arose from the seizures. But it was never signed.
It is among 750-plus records turned over to the House of Representatives select committee investigating the 2021 Capitol assault after the Supreme Court rejected Trump's appeal to block their release.
"Effective immediately, the Secretary of Defense shall seize, collect, retain and analyze all machines, equipment, electronically stored information, and material records required for retention," says the three-page draft.
The document reprises many of the debunked conspiracy theories about hacked voting machines that were pushed by figures in Trump's orbit now being targeted by congressional investigators, including right-wing attorney Sidney Powell.
She falsely told reporters the election had been targeted by "communist money through Venezuela, Cuba, and likely China."
