Top Trump aides pushed back on Sidney Powell during a chaotic West Wing meetin
20 December 2020
There were "raised voice levels and animated conversation" during a chaotic Friday night meeting with President Trump in the Oval Office, a source familiar with the meeting tells Axios.
Driving the news: As the N.Y. Timesfirst reported yesterday, the meeting included — at various times — Rudy Giuliani, Gen. Michael Flynn and conspiracy-minded election lawyer Sidney Powell.
- Chief of staff Mark Meadows and counsel Pat Cipollone pushed back strenuously on some of the more far-out ideas, including impounding voting machines and making Powell special counsel for election fraud.
"It's basically Sidney versus everybody," the source said. "That is why voices were raised. There is literally not one motherf—r in the president’s entire orbit — his staunchest group of supporters and allies — who doesn't think that Sidney Powell should be on that first rocket to Mars."
- "These are the hardcore defenders. This is the one thing that has united people."
Between the lines: The obvious exception, of course, is the president of the United States.
Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times
Section2Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.
Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.
The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.
- The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.
What the transcripts say:
- Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
- The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
- Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."
Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.