Fact Check: The Four BIG Federal Criminal Charges Against Trump.

1. The lie: Fraud changed the outcome of the 2020 election, that Trump “had actually won,” and that the election was “stolen.” (Pages 1 and 40-41 of the indictment)

You’ve heard Trump’s claim of a stolen election over and over, even though — as the indictment lays out — Trump had been told by numerous senior officials in his administration and allies outside the federal government that there was no evidence of fraud.

2. The lie: Fake pro-Trump Electoral College electors in seven states were legitimate electors.

The indictment alleges that Trump and unnamed co-conspirators  “organized” the fake slates of electors and then “caused” the slates to be transmitted to Vice President Mike Pence and other government officials to try to get them counted on January 6, the day Congress met to count the electoral votes.

3. The lie: The Justice Department had identified significant concerns that may have affected the outcome of the election.

Attorney General William Barr and other top Justice Department officials testified that they warned Trump that his claims of major fraud had proved to be untrue. But the indictment alleges that Trump still sought to have the Justice Department “make knowingly false claims of election fraud to officials in the targeted states through a formal letter under the Acting Attorney General’s signature. The former President did this to try and give him the backing of the Federal government and  “improperly influence the targeted states to replace legitimate Biden electors with the Defendant’s.”

4. The lie: Pence had the power to reject Biden’s electoral votes. 

Even though VP Pence had repeatedly and correctly told Trump that he did not have the ‘constitutional or legal right’ to send electoral votes back to the states as Trump insisted, Trump persisted in saying so, most dangerously in tweets on Jan 6 which lead some rioters to create a noose with Pence’s name on it and put the VP’s life in danger.