Trump led ‘desperate criminal scheme’ to stay in power, prosecutors reveal new evidence

Donald Trump launched a "private criminal effort" to subvert the 2020 US elections, which he lost to US President Joe Biden, alleged prosecutors in a court filing unsealed on Wednesday (Oct 2). Thismay be the last ditch effort to detail their case against the Republican presidential candidate before he faces off Democratic nominee, US Vice-President Kamala Harris in the Nov 5 Elections.

A 'private criminal effort'

In the 165-page motion, Special Counsel Jack Smith argues that the historic case against Donald Trump must move forward, and the ex-president should not be shielded by presidential immunity.

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The filing which was unsealed by District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan, who is hearing the case, said Trump should not escape prosecution because "at its core, the defendant's scheme was a private criminal effort."

Smith, in the filing, said: "The defendant asserts that he is immune from prosecution for his criminal scheme to overturn the 2020 presidential election because, he claims, it entailed official conduct."

"Not so," he stated, adding, "Although the defendant was the incumbent president during the charged conspiracies, his scheme was fundamentally a private one."

The special counsel alleges that to stay in office, Trump "resorted to crimes."

Colluding with "private co-conspirators" Trump launched "a series of increasingly desperate plans to overturn the legitimate election results in seven states that he had lost," statesthe filing which also brings to light new evidence.

Allegedly, Trump lied to state officials, manufactured fraudulent electoral votes and tried to get the-then Vice President Mike Pence to obstruct congressional certification of Biden's victory.

But, "when all else had failed," the Republican directed an "angry crowd" of his supporters to the US capitol, hoping to disrupt Biden's certification.

The damning filing claims that when a concerned White House staffer told Trump about Pence being taken to a secure location during the Jan 6 rioting, the president said: "So what?"

Another staffer, who is ready to testify at trial, also heard Trump tell a member of his family, "it doesn't matter if you won or lost the election. You still have to fight like hell."

The filing also claims thatTrump fired his attorneys after the 2020 election and replaced them with Rudy Giuliani because he would willingly "spread knowingly false claims of election fraud".

Trump cries wolf

After the filing was unsealed, Trump, in a post on Truth Social, claimed, "Democrats are Weaponising the Justice Department against me because they know I am WINNING."

"This is egregious PROSECUTORIAL MISCONDUCT, and should not have been released right before the Election," he said.

(With inputs from agencies)