Trump to attend immunity hearing, seeks to dismiss Georgia case: Live

Donald Trump is set to attend a hearing on Tuesday morning at Washington DC’s Court of Appeals weighing the presidential immunity plea that he hopes will see his January 6 election interference case dismissed.

“Of course I was entitled, as President of the United States and Commander in Chief, to Immunity,” Mr Trump told his followers on Truth Social, trailing the appearance.

“I wasn’t campaigning, the Election was long over. I was looking for voter fraud.”

Trump’s legal team will again try to convince a federal appeals court that the former president should be immune from criminal prosecution for his attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, a defence that was already shot down by the judge overseeing the election conspiracy case against him.

Tuesday’s session will see a three-judge panel in DC hear arguments from the former president’s attorneys who want that decision reversed.

His defence was already shot down by the judge overseeing the election conspiracy case against him. On Tuesday, a three-judge panel in Washington DC will hear arguments from the former president’s attorneys who want that decision reversed.

Mr Trump and his attorneys have argued that his alleged criminal actions on trial were part of his “official acts” as president.

The federal investigation into the efforts of Mr Trump and his allies to subvert the outcome of the election are detailed in a 45-page indictment outlining three alleged criminal conspiracies and the obstruction of Joe Biden’s victory, culminating in a mob’s violent breach of the US Capitol in a last-ditch riot to stop it.

A grand jury voted to indict Mr Trump last August after months of evidence and witness testimony under an investigation helmed by special counsel Jack Smith. A trial date is tentatively set for 4 March.

Mr Trump’s appeals and mounting court battles in the middle of the 2024 presidential race have threatened to steer that timeline off course.

The representative was reportedly involved in an exchange with Jayson Boebert at the Miner’s Claim restaurant in Silt, Colorado, on Saturday night and police have since confirmed to The Independent that officers are looking into the incident and examining security footage from the venue’s dining room.

The Daily Beast quoted an aide to the conservative as saying that Mr Boebert had called the police claiming to be a “victim of domestic violence” – a claim his former wife has refuted.

The Maga faithful Senators have backed him. Others, not so much…

Read the full story by The Independent’s Eric Garcia here:

In the newly unsealed documents, Ms Ransome testified that her unnamed friend “was one of the many girls that had sexual relations with Donald Trump” – including at Epstein’s New York townhouse.

“She confided in me about her casual ‘friendship’ with Donald. Mr Trump definitely seemed to have a thing for her and she told me how he kept going on about how he liked her ‘pert nipples’,” she testified.

She then described in graphic detail how Mr Trump allegedly caused pain to the victim’s nipples – and claimed she saw the resulting injury firsthand.

“I also know she had sexual relations with Trump at Jeffery’s NY mansion on regular occasions as I once met Jen for coffee, just before she was going to meet Trump and Epstein together at his mansion,” she said.

A home owned by the judge overseeing the federal election subversion case against former president Donald Trump was targeted by a fake emergency call Sunday night, the latest in a spate of similar false swatting reports at the homes of public officials in recent days.

Police responded around 10 p.m. to a report of a shooting at a Washington, D.C., home linked in public records to U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan. But officers quickly found out that no shooting happened, the Metropolitan Police Department said Monday.

Chutkan has received numerous threats since she was assigned Trump’s case last year. In August, a Texas woman was arrested after calling the courthouse and threatening to kill Chutkan and other officials. Investigators traced her phone number and she later admitted to making the threatening call, according to court documents.

Sunday’s incident comes after a spike in swatting directed at high-profile public officials over the holidays. Those whose homes have been targeted include Republican U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat who removed Trump from the state’s presidential primary ballot under the Constitution’s insurrection clause.

State capitols and courthouses in several states were also targeted by bomb threats last week, prompting lockdowns and evacuations. No explosives were found and the FBI called the threats a hoax.

Attorney General Merrick Garland on Friday called the spike in threats “deeply disturbing” in remarks ahead of a private meeting with top Justice Department leaders to address violent crime.

“These threats of violence are unacceptable. They threaten the fabric of our democracy,” he said.

Swatting refers to prank calls made to emergency services designed to draw a police response, especially from a SWAT team.

Roughly 45 members of the party’s 107-strong governing committee met in a closed session on Saturday to eject Kristina Karamo as chair, according to local media reports.

But Ms Karamo has insisted that their vote was “illegitimate” and had “no legal standing” under the party’s bylaws, declaring: “I am still chair of the Michigan Republican Party.”

io Dodds has the full story: