President Donald Trump’s eldest daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, hosted a fancy dinner party for members of the Trump administration and invited guests just hours after a deadly siege at the U.S. Capitol resulted in the death of a police officer, while more would die in the coming weeks. The bizarre revelation is one of many in ABC News correspondent Jonathan Karl’s book, Betrayal, which details the final days of the 45th president’s time in office and his escapades as a former president holding court at Mar-a-Lago.

According to Mr. Karl, the event hosted by Mr. Kushner and Ms. Trump occurred on January 7, just a little more than 24 hours after one of the most shocking scenes in U.S. political history, and amid a staggering wave of furious resignations throughout the administration, including that of longtime aide Stephanie Grisham. But the topic was never once broached at the dinner...Instead, the party focused on ideas about the formation of a free-market-espousing think tank with the goal of appealing to Democrats and pulling their opponents away from an embrace of left-leaning economic policies that has overtaken the party’s base in recent years.

Johnny McEntee, Trump’s director of presidential personnel, listing 14 reasons for ousting Esper. That document was dated Oct. 19, 2020. Three weeks later Esper was fired by a Trump tweet.

The very premise of McEntee’s memo was both sinister and ludicrous — a 30-year-old of no professional or intellectual distinction, whose path to power was carrying Trump’s bags, was making the case for getting rid of a senior Cabinet officer for insufficient loyalty to the president. This revealing and chilling document deserves to be read not as a historical curiosity but as a terrible portent of what could be in store if Trump wins another term. He appears determined to turn the military into his personal goon squad.

One of McEntee’s first complaints was that Esper had “approved the promotion of Lt. Col. [Alexander] Vindman, the start [sic] witness in the sham impeachment inquiry, who told Congress that the President’s call with Ukraine ‘undermined U.S. national security.’” No one has challenged the veracity of Vindman’s testimony, which was delivered under oath. Yet Trump, acting through McEntee, seemed intent on carrying out what Vindman described in a Post op-ed as “a campaign of bullying, intimidation and retaliation” for daring to tell the truth.

The next item in the indictment of Esper: “Publicly opposed the President’s direction to utilize American force to put down riots just outside the White House.” This was a reference to Esper’s brave decision in June 2020 to resist Trump’s desires to deploy active-duty troops to suppress Black Lives Matter protests.

Esper acted after he and Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, had been lured by Trump into a bizarre photo op in Lafayette Square, which been cleared by force of peaceful protesters. Milley subsequently apologized and reminded military personnel that they are pledged to defend the Constitution, including “the right to freedom of speech and peaceful assembly.” This was presumably what sparked another of McEntee’s grievances against Esper: “Has failed to exercise oversight of the Joint Staff.”

McEntee further indicted Esper for acting to remove a symbol of racism and sedition — the Confederate flag — from military installations. He was upset, moreover, that the defense secretary had ruled out attacks “on cultural sites in Iran if the conflict escalated, despite the President wanting to keep that option open.” Attacking cultural sites would have been a war crime — but, according to McEntee, Esper should have been willing to commit a war crime at Trump’s direction.

McEntee also criticized Esper for spending too much time focused on competition with Russia. Left unstated was that Trump seems to hero-worship Russian President Vladimir Putin, who helped him win the 2016 election. Esper’s other transgressions of Trumpism included insufficient support for Trump’s capricious and discriminatory “transgender ban”; contradicting “the President in SEAL Eddie Gallagher’s case” (Trump reversed Gallagher’s demotion despite accusations he had committed war crimes); and dissenting from “the President’s decision to withdraw troops from Germany.” (McEntee gave a new Pentagon appointee working for Esper’s replacement, Christopher Miller, an isolationist to-do list that consisted of withdrawing troops from Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Germany.)

The most damning and telling grievance against Esper was near the bottom of this pathetic document: “When he assumed his role, he vowed to be apolitical.” Normally being apolitical is a sine qua non for leading the armed forces. That’s why President Biden chose retired Gen. Lloyd Austin as defense secretary and President Barack Obama decided to keep Republican Robert M. Gates in the post. But Trump tried to destroy the professional, apolitical ethos of the armed forces — and if given the opportunity, he will almost certainly do so again.

"It started with Trump and now continues with Trumpism," Goldman said. "There is a swath of the country that no longer believes in free and fair elections."

One of the lawyers who helped Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn his 2020 election defeat has reportedly landed a seat on federal Election Assistance Commission’s board of advisers. Attorney Cleta Mitchell was on the infamous January conference call between Trump and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger when the president demanded that Raffensperger “find 11,780 votes” to reverse his defeat. After the recording of her backing Trump on that call was released, Mitchell resigned her position as a partner at her law firm. However, according to Jessica Huseman, the editorial director of Votebeat, Mitchell has now been named to the board of advisors for the Election Assistance Commission—a federal agency that supports election officials to make sure their elections are secure and accurate. In an ambiguous statement that didn’t name Mitchell, the EAC said it “does not make or approve appointments to the 35-member Board of Advisors... Board members are directly appointed by a wide variety of organizations.”

"[Gosar] took the video down and he made a statement that he doesn't support violence to anybody. Nobody should have violence [against them]," the California Republican told CNN. "I called him when I heard about the video, and he made a statement that he doesn't support violence, and he took the video down."