Michigan state legislature closes offices due to 'credible threats of violence'

Law enforcement recommended the Michigan legislature close its offices.

President Donald Trump is slated to hand over control of the White House to President-elect Joe Biden in 39 days.


0

Trump called Pennsylvania Republican House Speaker last week

Trump reached out to Pennsylvania State Speaker of the House Brian Cutler last week asking about the legislature possibly overturning the election as part of his ongoing and apparent pressure campaign to have GOP-controlled legislatures flip results in his favor in battleground states he lost.

Mike Straub, a spokesman for Cutler, confirmed to ABC News reporting in The New York Times that Trump asked what options were available to the legislature on the phone call.

“Cutler made it very clear what power the legislature has and does not have," Straub told ABC News, adding he is "not aware of the President explicitly asking to turnover [sic] the election results."

Straub separately told ABC News that he was not present for the conversations between Cutler and the president, but he was briefed.

"The president wanted to know what options were available to the legislature to address those concerns... Speaker Cutler was very clear in explaining what power the legislature has and does not have within our state Constitution," Straub said. "One remedy the Trump campaign is seeking in a court case involves the legislature seating electors -- Speaker Cutler explained the legislature does not have that authority."

Cutler separately signed onto a resolution last week imploring Pennsylvania Republicans in Congress to officially contest the election results in January. While this has happened in the past, including over the election of George W. Bush, it is highly unlikely to overturn the election results.

The Supreme Court may decide Tuesday to take up a challenge by Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Mike Kelly over the constitutionality of mail-in voting, but legal experts have told ABC News that is a long shot. With Tuesday being the constitutionally mandated "safe-harbor" deadline for electors, all legal challenges are meant to be resolved by the end of the day, thus ensuring the correct electors will cast their votes in statehouses on Dec. 14.

-ABC News' Alex Hosenball


Former Trump admin official sues Trump campaign lawyer for defamation

Former Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Director Chris Krebs has sued Trump campaign lawyer Joe diGenova and Newsmax over comments the Trump campaign lawyer made on the TV network calling for Krebs to be "taken out at dawn and shot."

Krebs’ lawyers say that the Trump campaign and “diGenova, spread, stoked, and instigated unfounded allegations of system-wide voter fraud, abuse, and interference—without proffering any evidence deemed credible by any state or federal court—in a naked and politically motivated effort to undermine public confidence in the election,” according to a complaint filed in Montgomery County, Maryland, court.

Trump fired Krebs last month after he repeatedly rebuked unfounded claims made by Trump and his campaign about widespread voter fraud, which the complaint also hits on.

The lawsuit says Krebs has received death threats through email and on Twitter by, in some cases, “angry Newsmax viewers," with people calling Krebs a traitor who should be hung. These threats were so serious, according to the lawsuit, that Krebs’ 10-year-old child asked, “Daddy’s going to get executed?”

“Seeing the pain and fear in those closest to him has only elevated his own pain and fear,” the lawsuit says. Because of this, Krebs has had to leave his house, retain private security and reported threats to law enforcement.

Krebs is seeking Newsmax to remove the clip as well as monetary damages, with the suit saying that diGenova and the network have a “symbiotic relationship.”

-ABC News' Luke Barr


Jenna Ellis says she's positive for COVID-19: Sources

Trump campaign legal adviser Jenna Ellis has informed associates she’s tested positive for coronavirus only days after attending a Christmas party at the White House, igniting panic in the West Wing, multiple sources tell ABC News.

Ellis attended a senior staff Christmas party at the White House on Friday, where she was photographed not wearing a mask.

The news comes just days after it was revealed that Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani has been hospitalized after testing positive for COVID-19. Ellis has spent the last month traveling the country with Giuliani working to overturn the 2020 election results in states including Pennsylvania, Michigan and Arizona on behalf of the president. Both have attended hearings without wearing a mask.

-ABC News' Katherine Faulders, John Santucci and Will Steakin


Clyburn says majority of Biden inauguration will be virtual 

Democratic Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, whose primary endorsement in South Carolina helped put Biden on a path to victory and who was tapped this week to chair Biden’s presidential inaugural committee, began to paint a clearer picture Tuesday of what the public can expect on Jan. 20, saying a majority of the inauguration will be virtual.

"I think the president will be sworn in in a a traditional way, but 75%, 80% of this inauguration will probably be virtual," Clyburn told CNN Tuesday morning, comparing the look to this summer’s Democratic National Convention.

"This inauguration will be an example of what a President Joe Biden would like to see the people of America do," Clyburn added, noting the worsening coronavirus pandemic. "We are not going to violate anything... We are going to discourage anything that could be a spreader."

Providing an alternative, Clyburn said he's hopeful there could be a celebration on the National Mall July 4, adding, "Hopefully things will be under control then."

As Biden is expected to name retired Army Gen. Lloyd Austin to lead the Pentagon at some point this week, Clyburn also offered praise for the "historic" choice of and encouraged Biden to consider more Black candidates he's suggested -- including Rep. Marcia Fudge, D-Ohio, and Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms -- for other senior-level Cabinet positions. The pressure comes ahead of Biden's meeting with civil rights leaders Tuesday afternoon as they advocate for more people of color to be nominated to top spots.

"There are plenty of bodies to be found if you ask the right person," Clyburn said.


Georgia secretary of state to recertify Biden's win Monday

Up against Tuesday's "safe harbor" deadline, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said that he will recertify that Biden won Georgia's election sometime Monday following the state's third recount of the presidential vote there which has Biden ahead by nearly 12,000 votes.

"It's been a long 34 days since the election on Nov. 3. We have now counted legally cast ballots, three times, and the results remain unchanged," Raffensperger told reporters.

As he did in his WSJ op-ed this morning, the secretary equated how former gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams acted after her 2018 loss and Trump's behavior in 2020.

"Whether it's the president of the United States or a failed gubernatorial candidate ... disinformation regarding election administration should be condemned and rejected," he said. "All this talk of a stolen election, whether it's Stacey Abrams, or the president of the United States is hurting our state."

Raffensperger also said that "the focus on Nov. 3 is drawing energy away from" the state's goals of job growth, efficient COVID-19 vaccine distribution and "getting back to normal."

"I know there are people that are convinced the election was fraught with problems, but the evidence -- the actual evidence, the facts -- tell us a different story," he said.

Gabriel Sterling, the voting system implementation manager in Raffensperger's office, came to the podium afterward to fact check some of the misinformation that the president has helped spread. In one example, he directly called out the president's legal team for how they've tried to "mislead" people about a video from counting occurring in State Farm Arena in Fulton County that Trump played at his rally in Valdosta on Saturday night.

"What's really frustrating is the president's attorneys had this same videotape. They saw the exact same things the rest of us could see, and they chose to mislead state senators and the public about what was on that video," he said, debunking the notion that there were "magic ballots" that showed up in the state's largest county.

"They knew it was untrue and they continue to do things like this," Sterling said. "We continue to see people who are put in positions of responsibility, sending out this disinformation and undermining the electoral system," he added later.Minutes after Raffensperger told reporters he would receritfy the vote Monday, Trump continued his attacks on election officials in the state on Twitter, targeting GOP Gov. Brian Kemp for signature verification saying he'd have an "easy win" were it conducted -- but signature verification was already done twice for absentee ballots in the state, and the vote was recounted three times affirming Biden's win.

-ABC News' Quinn Scanlan