Two House Democrats want the FBI to open a new criminal investigation into President Donald Trump following a leaked phone call between him and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.
The call, which surfaced on Sunday, includes audio of Trump pleading and threatening the Georgia official to “find” enough votes to overturn Biden’s victory.
"As members of Congress and former prosecutors, we believe Donald Trump engaged in solicitation of, or conspiracy to commit, a number of election crimes," California Representative Ted Lieu and New York Representative Kathleen Rice wrote in a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray on Monday. "We ask you to open an immediate criminal investigation into the president."
The Washington Postfirst acquired a recording Trump’s call, where he concurrently criticized charmed, begged, and threatened Raffensperger if he didn’t help him overturn the election results.
"So look. All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have," Trump said. "Because we won the state."
According to USA Today, Trump’s actions could make him criminally liable and garnered criticism from both Republicans and Democrats. Senator Dick Dubin previously suggested the call “merits nothing less than a criminal investigation."
“There’s nothing wrong with saying, you know, um, that you’ve recalculated,” Trump told Raffensperger during their call.
On Saturday, Trump hosted a conference call with 50 lawmakers to coordinate their plan to reject the Electoral College’s certification of the presidential election results during the congressional session on Jan. 6. Over the weekend nearly a dozen senators also announced their plans to dismiss the Electoral College votes from multiple states.
“Mr. President, the challenge that you have is, the data you have is wrong,” Raffensperger told Trump, rebuking his request.
Trump later criticized Raffensperger on Twitter, to which he replied: “Respectfully, President Trump: What you’re saying is not true.”
The request from House Democrats precedes Tuesday’s Senate runoff elections that will decide which party is able to secure the Senate during the first two years of Biden’s term.
