MSNBC’s Ari Melber recently aired an exclusive recording on Wednesday and it featured former President Donald Trump’s adviser Roger Stone planning to cheat and “to steal the [2020] race from Biden.”
“This new video obtained exclusively by The Beat will add new information to the timeline of how early Trump advisers and allies were exploring these plots, which went on infamously to run all the way through the January 6th certification process,” Melber said.
The host aired the clip, which showed Stone dictating a memo to an aide on Nov. 5, 2020 – two days after the election, but before Joe Biden was declared the winner.
“Although state officials in all 50 states must ultimately certify the results of the voting in their state… the final decision as to who the state legislatures authorize be sent to the Electoral College is a decision made solely by the legislature,” Stone said.
“Any legislative body may decide on the basis of overwhelming evidence of fraud, to send electors to the Electoral College who accurately reflect the president’s legitimate victory in their state, which was illegally denied him through fraud.”
In addition to this, Stone noted that Trump’s team lobby Republican legislatures to overturn the results in their states. Melber then introduced Danish documentary filmmaker Christopher Gulbrandsen, who captured the footage.
“Well, I think we already realized when we were recording that this was something spectacular,” Gulbrandsen said, continuing:
I picked up Roger Stone at his home on November 5th, two days after the election, and I expected him to be somewhat downtrodden over the results, and Biden had consolidated his lead by then. But as we drove to his workplace, he was completely buoyed with energy, he was on the phone restarting “Stop the Steal,” mobilizing people for the effort that we saw eventually culminating on January 6th.
So, I mean, you talk about journalism as the first draft of history, but this film and this opportunity to record this felt like, I mean, it’s history as it unfolds. So, in that sense, we had a strong feeling of witnessing something very wrong but also with a historic perspective.
Melber then asked former federal prosecutor John Flannery if he thought the footage was incriminating.
“Oh, absolutely,” Flannery replied, “and what Christian just said, which nails it down, is they knew that he’d lost the election before it was announced, and that’s why they began these initiatives then. And in the weeks and months beforehand, they had to know what was going on.”
Flannery continued, “But judging by the conduct after that, by the people who are going out doing what is prescribed in that dictated memo, we know that they’re already pulling together. And then to have the president’s son basically breaking out the elements that conform with what Stone is sending. So I think it’s powerful. I think it would be powerful for any of the cases that are pending, certainly Smith’s, certainly Georgia.”
EXCLUSIVE VIDEO: Trump adviser and ally Roger Stone is seen pushing a plot to overthrow the 2020 Election. pic.twitter.com/fWQqukV1oz
— The Beat with Ari Melber (@TheBeatWithAri) August 16, 2023
