- Pakistan 'vigilantes' behind rise in online blasphemy cases
- Nearly 90, but opera legend Kabaivanska is still calling tune
- Smith experiment as Test opener over, Green out of India series
- With inflation down, ECB eyes faster tempo of rate cuts
- Is life possible on a Jupiter moon? NASA goes to investigate
- Dodgers crush Mets 9-0 in MLB playoff series opener
- South Korea military says 'fully ready' as drone tensions soar
- Cummins back, Marsh and Head out of Pakistan ODI series
- Shanghai stocks swing after stimulus briefing as most of Asia rises
- New Zealand's Latham promises 'no fear' as he takes charge for India Tests
- Kyrgios vows to 'shut up' doubters with December comeback
- Public hearings start into death of Brit by Russian nerve agent
- Ex-Stasi officer faces verdict over 1974 Berlin border killing
- Role of government, poverty research tipped for economics Nobel
- 'Stolen satire' feeds US election misinformation
- Rookie McCarty captures first PGA Tour title in Black Desert Championship
- Australia all-rounder Green ruled out of India Test series
- Seeing double in Nigeria's 'twins capital of the world'
- UK FM to attend EU foreign affairs talks for first time in 2 years
- Carter, Billups among 13 new Basketball Hall of Fame inductees
- Ravens rip Commanders as Lions lose NFL sacks leader in win
- Hezbollah drone strike kills four, wounds dozens at Israeli base
- China says launches military drills around Taiwan
- Stewart leads Liberty past Lynx to level WNBA Finals
- England return to winning ways in Nations League, Austria thrash Norway
- UN chief says attacks on UNIFIL 'may constitute a war crime'
- Ravens outlast Commanders while Bucs batter Saints in NFL
- Dozens hurt in Israel as Hezbollah claims drone strike
- England deserve 'world class' coach: Carsley
- Burkina Faso win to become first qualifiers for 2025 AFCON
- AC Milan's Pulisic among five out for USA match in Mexico
- France's Amandine Henry retires from international football
- Centre-left set to win pro-Ukraine Lithuania's vote
- India's World Cup hopes in Pakistan hands after Australia defeat
- Zelensky says NKorea sending troops to Russian army
- England beat Finland to get back on track
- King and Lewis propel West Indies to T20 triumph over Sri Lanka
- Pre-Halloween 'Terrifier' lands atop North America box office
- 'I still plan to compete and play next season,' says Djokovic
- Harris, Trump seek advantage in knife-edge election battle
- Chepngetich shatters women's marathon world record in Chicago
- Kamindu and Asalanka power Sri Lanka to 179 against West Indies
- Chepngetich shatters women's marathon world record as Korir wins in Chicago
- Spain send injured Yamal home 'to prioritise player's health'
- In milestone, SpaceX 'catches' megarocket booster after test flight
- Iraq walks fine line with pro-Iran factions to avoid war
- Race four abandoned after New Zealand breeze into 3-0 lead in America's Cup
- West Indies win toss, put Sri Lanka in to bat in first T20
- Sudan rescuers say air strike killed 23 in Khartoum market
- Netanyahu tells UN to move Lebanon peacekeepers out of 'harm's way'
Trump became 'detached from reality,' says ex-justice chief
Former US president Donald Trump lost touch with reality as he deluged aides with wild voter fraud conspiracy theories in the wake of his election defeat to Joe Biden, his top law enforcement official said in videotaped testimony revealed Monday.
Appearing in a pre-recorded deposition at a congressional hearing into the 2021 assault on the US Capitol, former attorney general Bill Barr described his then boss as having no interest in the facts that debunked his groundless narrative.
"I was demoralized because I thought, boy... he's become detached from reality if he really believes this stuff," Barr told the House committee investigating the January 6 insurrection by supporters of Trump.
"When I went into this and would tell him how crazy some of these allegations were, there was never an indication of interest in the actual facts," said Barr, who likened addressing Trump's avalanche of false allegations with playing the game "whack-a-mole."
The panel is holding six hearings throughout June to outline its case that the riot at the seat of US democracy in Washington was the culmination of a seven-step conspiracy by Trump and his inner circle to overturn his defeat to Biden.
Trump ignored repeated warnings from top aides against falsely claiming the November 2020 election was stolen, according to testimony unveiled by the panel.
"We will tell the story of how Donald Trump lost the election -- and knew he lost the election -- and as a result of his loss, decided to wage an attack on our democracy," the committee's Democratic chairman Bennie Thompson said in his opening remarks.
The second of six planned hearings was shown videotaped accounts from the former president's advisors, including Barr and campaign manager Bill Stepien, saying they repeatedly counseled him not to declare victory on election night because he hadn't won -- but that Trump went ahead anyway.
"He thought I was wrong, he told me so, and that they were going to go in a different direction," Stepien said.
- 'Far flung conspiracies' -
Thompson's deputy on the panel, Republican lawmaker Liz Cheney, said Trump chose to listen to the advice of "apparently inebriated" former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani "to just claim he won, and insist that the vote counting stop -- to falsely claim everything was fraudulent."
Trump started pushing what came to be known as his "Big Lie" around 2:30 am on November 4, 2020, prematurely declaring victory on the night of an election he ultimately lost to Biden by seven million votes.
Barr said in his testimony that Trump claimed major fraud "right out of the box on election night... before there was actually any potential of looking at evidence."
Giuliani and associates including the lawyer Sidney Powell would go on to push debunked theories of massive voter fraud that put them at odds with the White House lawyers Stepien referred to as "Team Normal."
Cheney highlighted "far-flung conspiracies" -- dismissed as "nonsense" by Barr -- of fraud involving voting machines "with a deceased Venezuelan Communist allegedly pulling the strings."
- 'Big rip-off' -
The committee says the initial claim of fraud grew quickly into a conspiracy to cling to power by Trump and his inner circle -- and a fundraising campaign that raised $250 million between election night and the Capitol insurrection.
The committee's senior investigative counsel Amanda Wick said much of the cash was funneled into a political action committee that made donations to pro-Trump organizations.
"As early as April 2020, Mr Trump claimed that the only way he could lose an election would be as a result of fraud," Democratic panel member Zoe Lofgren said.
"The big lie was also a big rip-off," she said, promising to show how the Trump campaign raised hundreds of millions of dollars from supporters who were falsely led to believe their donations would be used for the legal fight over fraud claims.
All but one of the 62 lawsuits filed by the Trump campaign were dismissed -- the vast majority by Republican-appointed judges -- while the one that was upheld didn't affect the outcome.
Eleven lawyers were referred for disciplinary proceedings due to "bad faith" legal efforts to overturn the election.
Powell filed four federal lawsuits in staunchly Democratic cities that were all rejected as frivolous and, in Detroit, a judge ordered that she face sanctions for a "historic and profound abuse of the judicial process."
The panel ended the hearing by returning to the Capitol riot, showing footage of mob participants explaining how Trump's voter fraud claims had motivated their actions.
"I know exactly what's going on right now. Fake election," one said.
M.A.Colin--AMWN