Trump Plans to Defend Himself Against Election Charges by Throwing His Lawyers Under the Bus: Report

Donald Trump was officially charged by the Department of Justice on Tuesday for his attempt to overturn the 2020 election. On Thursday, he is expected to be arraigned in a DC court, at which time he will no doubt plead not guilty to the four counts against him: conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding, and conspiracy against rights. As for the actual legal-defense strategy he’s going to go with in an effort to stay out of prison? According to a report from Rolling Stone, it’s a regular Donald Trump special: blame the whole thing on everyone else.

Specifically, Trump’s current lawyers are planning to defend his actions by pinning them on the lawyers “who aided his attempt to overturn the 2020 election,” as reported by the outlet, which spoke to two sources familiar with the situation. Obviously, they’re not just going to yell “It was Rudy’s idea!”—but, really, when it comes down to it, that’s the essence of what they’re going to say.

Per Rolling Stone:

…if the case goes to trial, [Trump’s] current legal team is preparing an “advice of counsel” argument, attempting to pull blame away from the former president for any possible illegal activity. Plans for such a defense have been percolating since last year, the two sources say.

In the aftermath of Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory, Trump had an armada of lawyers—some officially representing him, and some simply aligned with him—spreading unhinged conspiracy theories and pushing states to reverse the results: Rudy Giuliani. Sidney Powell. John Eastman. The list goes on and on. The attorneys were acting on Trump’s behalf. But in this legal strategy, Team Trump would argue it was the lawyers leading Trump, rather than the other way around. “It is an argument the [former] president likes, and the team is on board with it,” one Trump adviser bluntly says, then somewhat ominously adding: “John [Eastman] and Rudy [Giuliani] gave a lot of counsel…Other people can decide how sound it was.”

As Rolling Stone notes, one potential problem with such a strategy is that Giuliani and Eastman “were merely doing what then president Trump wanted them to do, or had told them to do: to try to find a way to keep Trump in power despite his loss to Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential contest.” (Neither a spokesman for Trump nor Trump’s attorneys responded to Rolling Stone’s requests for comment.)

The ex-president, of course, is no stranger to blaming his actions on other people; earlier this year, he pinned the Stormy Daniels hush money payment that he’d ultimately be charged over on former attorney Michael Cohen, writing on Truth Social: “I had every reason to believe [Cohen] had a license to practice law, was competent, & was able to appropriately provide solid legal services. He came from a good law firm, represented other clients over the years, & there was NO reason not to rely on him, and I did.” Last week he similarly claimed, with regard to the s–t he pulled following the 2020 election, that he “did nothing wrong” and was “advised by many lawyers.”

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