Jeffrey Clark’s 'election subversion' plot included 'brazen' things even Bill Barr wouldn’t do: conservative

Following the 2020 presidential election, there were right-wing Republicans who refused to go along with then-President Donald Trump’s attempted coup — Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, Sen. Mick Romney of Utah — and right-wing Republicans who wholeheartedly encouraged it. One of the latter was Jeffrey Clark, a pro-Trump attorney serving in the U.S. Department of Justice. Never Trump conservative Amanda Carpenter, in an article published by the Bulwark on December 7, lays out some reasons why Clark is so important to the investigation being conducted by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s committee on the January 6 insurrection.

As much of a Trump loyalist as former U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr was, he had no appetite for Trump’s coup attempt — and he infuriated Trump supporters when he acknowledged that now-President Joe Biden legitimately won the election. Former Acting U.S. Attorney General Jeffrey A. Rosen, who Trump appointed in December 2020 following Barr’s post-election resignation, wouldn’t support the coup attempt either. But Clark, Carpenter emphasizes, was willing to do the dirty work that even Barr wanted no part of.

“Before the 2020 election,” Carpenter explains, “(Clark) was just another run-of-the-mill Republican lawyer with a cushy appointment in the federal government. Post-election, he became a star in Trump’s eye as he proved that he was willing to do all the election subversion that his colleagues in the Justice Department refused to take part in…. Think of Clark as the guy who was prepared to do everything former Attorney General Bill Barr — who stated there ‘was no widespread election fraud’ and then promptly announced his resignation and left his post on December 23 — wouldn’t. Stuff like using Department of Justice resources to declare the election ‘corrupt,’ launch investigations into bananas internet-conspiracy theories about Italygate and Dominion Voting Systems, and file federal lawsuits to those ends.”

Clark, Carpenter notes, “risks joining” former White House Chief Strategist “Steve Bannon as the second person charged with criminal contempt for refusing to cooperate with the January 6 committee.” Clark’s attorney told the committee, “We will not be answering any questions or producing any documents.”

READ: A writer who predicted Trump's first coup attempt warns of an obscure legal doctrine he may exploit next time

Carpenter also points out that when Clark outlined, in a letter, a plan for overthrowing the 2020 presidential election results, Rosen refused to go along with it.

“When then-Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen rejected the idea on January 2,” Carpenter writes, “Clark told him Trump had offered to make him attorney general, but he would decline if Rosen would agree to sign the letter. Rosen refused. On January 3, Clark told Rosen he was going to accept Trump’s offer to replace Rosen as acting attorney general. But, Rosen quickly organized with others and threatened to resign if Trump did so. Clark’s plan fell apart. But still, it was quite the plan.”

Carpenter continues, “Keep in mind that Clark was proposing these steps after Trump’s campaign had lost dozens of cases in court over alleged election fraud and the states had all certified their election results, which makes his actions all the more brazen. And, that’s the point. There was a plan to delegitimize the election and interfere with the peaceful transfer of power with many people involved. Not just the big, famous people, like Steve Bannon and the Kraken Lady. But also, little people. People you’ve never heard of before. Like Jeffrey Clark.”