Trump DENIES claim he asked General Flynn about declaring martial law during 'raucous' Oval Office meeting where he also floated appointing 'Kraken' lawyer Sidney Powell as special counsel to investigate voter fraud

 President Donald Trump has derided a report that he held a 'raucous' Oval Office meeting where he floated Mike Flynn's calls for martial law as 'fake news'. 

'Martial law = Fake News. Just more knowingly bad reporting!,' the president tweeted early Sunday.

Multiple reports also say the meeting saw him mull appointing controversial attorney Sidney Powell as special counsel to investigate election fraud.   


Powell was booted from Trump's campaign legal team after floating wild conspiracy theories, and her threat to 'release the Kraken' with a series of election lawsuits fell flat after the suits were tossed out. She also represented Flynn, the former national security advisor, before Trump pardoned him for lying to the FBI.

During Friday's meeting at the White House, which Powell and Flynn attended, Trump went as far as discussing getting Powell a security clearance, according to two people familiar with the meeting, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. 

Flynn went even further, discussing the idea of imposing martial law and using the military to re-run the election. Trump's chief of staff, Mark Meadows, and White House counsel Pat Cipollone voiced their objections, sources said. 

President Donald Trump on Friday held a 'raucous' Oval Office meeting where he floated Mike Flynn's calls for martial law and mulled appointing controversial attorney Sidney Powell as special counsel to investigate election fraud. He called the reports that he considered martial law 'fake news'

President Donald Trump on Friday held a 'raucous' Oval Office meeting where he floated Mike Flynn's calls for martial law and mulled appointing controversial attorney Sidney Powell as special counsel to investigate election fraud. He called the reports that he considered martial law 'fake news'

Sidney Powell
Mike Flynn

Sidney Powell (left) and Mike Flynn (right) attended the meeting, where Trump is said to have mulled making Powell a special counsel 

Rudy Giuliani, the president's personal attorney, joined the Oval Office meeting by phone, and pushed Trump to seize voting machines, which the Department of Homeland Security made clear it had no authority to do. 

It is also unclear what that would accomplish, given that the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security have both looked into the issue. Paper ballots are also retained under federal law.

Flynn recently broadcast his call publicly for Trump to use the military to force an election 'rerun' in battleground states - saying such action is 'not unprecedented'. 

'Within the swing states, if he wanted to, he could take military capabilities, and he could place those in states and basically rerun an election in each of those states,' Flynn said during an interview with Newsmax on Thursday.  

'There is no way in the world we are going to be able to move forward as a nation. [Trump] could immediately, on his order, seize every single one of these [voting] machines,' he said, in apparent reference to the conspiracy theory that voting software flipped Trump votes for Biden.

The wild proposals were reportedly too much even for Giuliani, and the meeting descended into a raucous shouting match, source said.

The wild proposals at the Oval Office meeting were reportedly too much even for Rudy Giuliani, and the meeting descended into a raucous shouting match, source said

The wild proposals at the Oval Office meeting were reportedly too much even for Rudy Giuliani, and the meeting descended into a raucous shouting match, source said

That Trump is even entertaining the idea of installing Powell as special counsel underscores the increasingly desperate steps he has been weighing as he tries to reverse the results of the election and remain in power. 

Trump has increasingly entertained conspiracy theories and outlandish ways to stay in office, egged on by allies like Flynn and Giuliani. 

It is unclear whether Trump intends to move forward with the special counsel proposal. 

Under federal law, the U.S. attorney general, not the president, is responsible for appointing special counsels. 

And numerous Republicans, from outgoing Attorney General William Barr to governors and state election officials, have said again and again that there is no evidence of the kind of mass voter fraud Trump has been alleging since he lost the November 3 election to Democrat Joe Biden.  

On Saturday, Trump, Powell and Flynn all posted a campaign-style video on Twitter that called on people around the world to rally to Trump's defense.

It carried the tag-line: 'Fight for Trump. Save America, Save the World.' 

Powell was first named to Trump's 'elite strike-force' of lawyers on November 14. 

Her performance at a November 19 press conference had alarmed many of the president's allies, when she alleged that the late Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez had worked to rigged election machines, in cahoots with China and Iran, to work against Trump.

By November 23 she was, they announced, 'practicing law on her own', and she has since filed several suits which have got nowhere. 

The New York Times reported that the Oval Office meeting 'became raucous at times'.  

White House counsel, Pat Cipollone, and Mark Meadows, the chief of staff, pushed back on the ideas being proposed.

Trump also asked about Powell being given security clearances to pursue her work, two of the people briefed on the meeting said. 

Powell accused other Trump advisers of being quitters, according to the people briefed.

Trump and Giuliani have been pushing for data as evidence of widespread election fraud, despite being unable to bring any proof before a judge.

Bill Barr, the attorney general, rejected publicly the idea of widespread election fraud weeks ago. His resignation was announced this week. 

Giuliani and his team have lost 59 cases, according to a tally kept by Democrat lawyer Marc Elias, and won one - a minor victory, relating to the period of time in which you can return to change an early vote in Pennsylvania, if you change your mind.

Finding themselves unable to argue fraud before a judge, and with the cross-examination of their witnesses, they have turned to holding 'hearings' across the country, where supporters of the president claim they have seen massive fraud being carried out. 

Powell's meeting on Friday was also called to discuss the use of Dominion voting machines - a source of much contention for the Trump team, who claim that they were rigged, with the support of Venezuela's late president, Hugo Chavez, to switch votes from Trump to Biden.

During the White House meeting they discussed the possibility of an executive order to take control of voting machines to examine them, according to one of the people briefed, who spoke to the New York Times. 

Giuliani has separately pressed the Department of Homeland Security to seize possession of voting machines as part of a push to overturn the results of the election, three people familiar with the discussion said. 

Giuliani was told the department does not have the authority to do such a thing.

The Trump campaign on Saturday sent a memo to campaign officials telling them to preserve documents related to Powell and Dominion in case of legal action by the company against Powell.

Trump team lawyer Powell spins unfounded voter fraud theory
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Powell, an attorney for Michael Flynn (right), is a known QAnon conspiracy theorist. It was her representation of Flynn, who pleaded guilty in a plea deal with the Mueller inquiry to lying to the FBI, which propelled her on to the MAGA stage

Powell, an attorney for Michael Flynn (right), is a known QAnon conspiracy theorist. It was her representation of Flynn, who pleaded guilty in a plea deal with the Mueller inquiry to lying to the FBI, which propelled her on to the MAGA stage


After Powell's meeting, Trump on Saturday tweeted again that the election had been stolen from him. 

White House reporters said that Trump's meeting with Powell and Flynn had left many within the administration deeply concerned. 

Powell's efforts so far have been a comedy of errors.

Shortly after midnight on the eve of Thanksgiving she published a 104-page document detailing allegations about Georgia and a 75-page document looking at Michigan, calling for the election results to be decertified, Trump to be declared the winner and voting machines to be impounded.

In the documents she alleged the election had been 'rigged' to favor Joe Biden, and that foreign powers were involved. 

She tweeted: 'The #Kraken was just released on #Georgia', along with a link to her website.

She added: 'Exhibits to follow. Also #ReleaseTheKraken in #Michigan'.

Powell has pushed some of most extreme conspiracy theories around Biden's win. 

Powell is pictured at a rally in Alpharetta, Georgia on December 2 to talk about election fraud

Powell is pictured at a rally in Alpharetta, Georgia on December 2 to talk about election fraud 

But, despite allegations from her and other Trump defenders, no evidence has emerged of widespread voter fraud. 

The Trump legal team - which has distanced itself from Powell and her two suits - has filed almost 60 suits of its own in battleground states trying to overturn the election. The vast majority of them have been thrown out of court.

In her filings, the maverick lawyer spelled out claims she had previously made at a tumultuous press conference the week before - namely that Georgia and Michigan used election machinery designed by Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, who died in 2013, with the express wish of rigging the vote.

She alleges that China and Iran used these voting systems to influence the US election, and that 96,000 votes cast for Biden in Georgia were illegally counted.

The lawyer also claims that officials in one Georgia county forced everyone to evacuate because of a water leak, only for counters to stay unsupervised to tamper with the votes. 

But Powell's filings were riddled with typos, with both misspelling the name of the courts they were being filed in. 

In the Georgia filing, the court was named as 'United States Districct Court, Northern Distrcoict of Georgia', while the Michigan court was named as the 'Eastern Distrct of Michigan'. 

In the 104-page document detailing allegations about Georgia, the court was named as 'United States Districct Court, Northern Distrcoict of Georgia'

In the 104-page document detailing allegations about Georgia, the court was named as 'United States Districct Court, Northern Distrcoict of Georgia'

Powell also released a 75-page document looking at Michigan, but named the court as the 'Eastern Distrct of Michigan'

Powell also released a 75-page document looking at Michigan, but named the court as the 'Eastern Distrct of Michigan'

Powell's claims, and her White House visit, come after she spent years cultivating Trump's attention with regular appearances on Fox.

But her appearance on the network led to host Tucker Carlson calling her out for her lack of evidence for the new theories.

Carlson stopped short of calling Powell's claims outlandish – but he did note that she refused repeated invitations to defend them. 

'We invited Sidney Powell on the show. We would have given her the whole hour,' Carlson told his prime time audience.

'But she never sent us any evidence, despite a lot of requests, polite requests. Not a page. When we kept pressing, she got angry and told us to stop contacting her.' 

He said his show approached the subject with an open mind. 

Trump team lawyer Powell spins unfounded voter fraud theory
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'We did not dismiss any of it. We don't dismiss anything anymore,' Carlson said.

'This may be the single most open minded show on television.  We literally do UFO segments.' 

He said: 'She never demonstrated that a single actual vote was moved illegitimately by software from one candidate to another. Not one.'

Her social media accounts have been flooded with QAnon conspiracy theories and she had been on the President's radar since representing his disgraced former national security adviser Mike Flynn.

Now Powell, a 65-year-old mother of one who practices law in Dallas but is from Raleigh, North Carolina, appears to be trying to monetize her infamy.

The website for the Legal Defense Fund appears to have been set up on November 11, a day after she appeared on the Lou Dobbs show on Fox.

Originally it stated that '$500,000 must be raised in the next 24 hours' but it was updated to ask for 'millions' in donations to stop the certification of ballots.  

The Trump campaign issued a statement saying that Sidney Powell is not associated with them on November 22, 2020

The Trump campaign issued a statement saying that Sidney Powell is not associated with them on November 22, 2020 

Attorney and QAnon supporter Powell speaks at Giuliani briefing
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The mission of the organization is listed as: 'To protect and defend the lawful votes of American citizens, ensure election integrity, educate the world on what it means to be a constitutional Republic, and pursue legal action to preserve the vision of our Founders and to maintain this great Republic.'

The website adds: 'The future of our Republic is at stake. The left, the media, and a complicit Republican Establishment are attempting to steal this election through a staggering voter fraud operation. The time to fight is now.'

The website has a form for credit card payments and suggests that rather than writing checks to The Legal Defense Fund people should make them payable to 'Sidney Powell'.

The address that is given is a UPS store in West Palm Beach, Florida, which appears to be a PO Box.

According to IRS guidelines a 501(c)(4) normally applies to 'civic leagues or organizations not organized for profit but operated exclusively for the promotion of social welfare'.

Examples include a 'community association that works to improve public service' by publishing a free community newspaper.

Neighborhood watch patrols could be another option as would an organization that arranges an 'annual festival of regional customs and traditions'.

The IRS test for a 501(c)(4) organization is that it must be 'primarily engaged' in social welfare issues but the language is loose enough to allow organizations like The Legal Defense Fund to operate.

DailyMail.com previously revealed that Powell began her legal career by attending law school at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, served as a U.S. attorney in Texas, and represented executives at fallen energy giant Enron.

It was her representation of Flynn, who pleaded guilty in a plea deal with the Mueller inquiry to lying to the FBI, which propelled her on to the MAGA stage. Flynn was pardoned by Trump on the eve of Thanksgiving.

It also appears to be the origin of her use of the nickname or slogan The Kraken. 

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