April 26, 2022 | 7:20 PM

• Robby Brod
  
  

  Robby Brod is WITF’s Democracy Beat Reporter overlaying mis/disinformation and the hurt they trigger communities throughout Pennsylvania.

  Earlier than coming to Harrisburg, he labored at WHYY in Philadelphia, WVIK within the Quad Cities, and Iowa Public Radio in Iowa Metropolis. He was raised in Media, Pa. and graduated from the College of Iowa in 2017.

Amanda Andrade-Rhoades / AP Photograph

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On this file picture from August 2021, Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., takes a query from a reporter at a information convention held by the Home Freedom Caucus on Capitol Hill in Washington. The committee investigating the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol riot has requested an interview with Perry. The Republican lawmaker is the primary sitting member of Congress the panel has requested to talk with.

The Jan. 6 Choose Committee has acquired textual content messages that midstate Pennsylvania Republican U.S. Rep. Scott Perry despatched to White Home employees, confirming Perry’s direct involvement within the Trump administration’s plan to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

In a single change, on Dec. 26, 2020, Perry texted former White Home Chief of Workers Mark Meadows: “Mark, simply checking in as time continues to rely down. 11 days to 1/6 and 25 days to inauguration. We gotta get going!”

Perry inspired Meadows to speak to Jeffrey Clark, an assistant legal professional normal on the Division of Justice who was sympathetic to Trump’s voter fraud lies. The 2 deliberate to advocate for Clark’s promotion to legal professional normal. A U.S. Senate report stated Clark deliberate to say the DOJ was investigating Georgia’s election outcomes, regardless of no proof to warrant a probe.

That message was one in every of a number of Perry despatched to Meadows revealed in a submitting Friday in federal court docket by the Jan. 6 Choose Committee. The back-and-forth sheds gentle on Perry’s involvement in Trump’s plan to overturn the authorized election outcomes and stay in energy regardless of his loss. 

Trump met Clark on the White Home the next week and mentioned elevating him to legal professional normal, however didn’t transfer ahead after Justice Division officers and White Home attorneys threatened to resign.

However Perry’s texts to Meadows got here whereas that plan was nonetheless lively.

“Mark, you need to name Jeff,” he wrote about Clark. “I simply obtained off the telephone with him and he defined to me why the principal deputy received’t work particularly with the FBI. They may view it as as [sic] not having the authority to implement what must be executed.”

Meadows responded, “Let me work on the deputy place.”

Perry messaged him again two days later: “Did you name Jeff Clark?”

Clark resigned from the DOJ one week after the Jan. 6 riot.

The committee has not subpoenaed Perry for testimony, however he’s the primary sitting lawmaker to obtain a request from the committee to testify.

Perry was one in every of eight Pa. Republicans who voted in opposition to the fee.

He referred to as the investigation a part of the “failures of the novel Left” and “illegitimate,” regardless of federal courts repeatedly upholding its doc requests.

On Tuesday, CNN revealed texts that Meadows handed to the Jan. 6 committee that present Perry showing to induce Meadows to push debunked claims that Dominion voting machines had been hacked by China.

“From an Intel buddy: DNI must job NSA to instantly seize and start searching for worldwide comms associated to Dominion,” Perry wrote to Meadows 5 days after the 2020 election.

He additionally accused then-CIA Director Gina Haspel of “overlaying” for these concerned with the machines.

Amanda Andrade-Rhoades / AP Photograph

Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., discusses the infrastructure invoice making its method by means of congress throughout a information convention held by the Home Freedom Caucus on Capitol Hill in Washington, Monday, Aug. 23, 2021.

Perry, a fifth-term Republican who represents Dauphin and parts of York and Cumberland counties, started his time period earlier this yr as chairman of the Home Freedom Caucus, a gaggle of conservative Republican Home members. The group shaped in 2015 and doesn’t make its membership public. There are 43 U.S. Home representatives who’ve recognized themselves as members, lots of whom are a few of President Joe Biden’s largest detractors on Capitol Hill.

Freedom Caucus members labored to advance Trump’s agenda. 

At instances, they used disinformation to take action, reminiscent of once they referred to as mail-in ballots “fraud-prone.” That is false. Quite a few unbiased research and election safety officers discovered no widespread voter fraud anyplace within the nation, together with with mail-in voting.

In response to the New York Instances, Perry and different Home Freedom Caucus members repeatedly held calls and conferences with Trump and his high aides in December 2020 as they devised a technique to overturn the election.

The texts revealed by the Jan. 6 committee present Perry tried to strain the Justice Division into corroborating false claims about widespread voter fraud, together with “allegations that the Dominion voting machines had been corrupted.” Perry has been recognized as “significantly notable” by the Committee, who advisable additional investigation past their findings.

Hours after the U.S. Capitol was stormed by Trump supporters, Perry voted to not certify Pa.’s outcomes regardless of county, state and federal judges and public officers of each political events, and election specialists, having concluded the 2020 election was free and truthful. 

Berwood Yost, director of the Heart for Opinion Analysis and the Floyd Institute for Public Coverage at Franklin & Marshall School, stated that Perry’s claims of voter fraud don’t line up with the information.

“He was clearly one of many leaders in making an attempt to get the election outcomes overturned. An election, I might add, that he received handily,” Yost stated, including that he understands Perry’s rhetoric is a software to “work up” his supporters.

“It’s actually a harmful factor for democracy. We have to belief our processes. And it is a actual drawback by frequently calling into query the legitimacy of an election that, frankly, was excellent for Republicans throughout the board. It doesn’t make a lot sense.”

Within the court docket submitting, the committee outlined Perry’s false claims of election fraud that he communicated with the DOJ. He alleged that 205,000 extra votes had been forged than voters registered within the commonwealth. In actuality, votes in Pa. equaled the identical quantity as registered voters who voted, in line with an audit of the commonwealth’s election.

Perry falsely claimed that over 4,000 Pennsylvanians voted greater than as soon as. However solely three cases of double voting have been recognized to this point in Pennsylvania, and all three had been makes an attempt to vote twice for Trump.

He additionally claimed that Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf and Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar had been chargeable for creating “confusion, chaos, and instilling worry” in voters about being contaminated by COVID-19 by encouraging voters to vote by mail slightly than in individual. Pa. officers stated a number of instances that they promoted voting by mail to guarantee truthful voter entry in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Yost stated Perry continues to push disinformation about Pa.’s election safety, regardless of the unpopularity of the claims.

In response to polls performed final yr by F&M’s Heart for Opinion Analysis, 51% of respondents “strongly disagree” with the eight Pa. representatives in Congress who voted in opposition to certifying the commonwealth’s 2020 election outcomes. When Republicans within the state legislature had been planning an investigation into the election, which is now ongoing, 45% of respondents stated they “strongly oppose” such an investigation. And, about 9 in 10 stated one other occasion just like the Capitol assault on Jan. 6 could be “dangerous for our democracy.”

“After we ask questions on an important issues dealing with the state, election integrity reveals up very hardly ever. Individuals care concerning the economic system. They care about the truth that the federal government is so divided and politicians aren’t getting issues executed,” he stated. “I’m involved about the truth that we’ve had a number of recounts on this state, there isn’t a proof of this, that a number of challenges have shot this down.”

Pa.’s 2020 major and normal election had been decided a number of instances to be correct, authorized, and safe by numerous election safety authorities each from and out of doors the commonwealth.

Perry didn’t return a request for remark.

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