| It's Thursday. Major League Baseball might be running late but we're not. Tips, comments, recipes? Call us, beep us, if you wanna reach us (I'm sorry, we're sleep deprived): earlytips@washpost.com. Thanks for waking up with us. 🚨 While you were sleeping: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky early this morning "portrayed invading Russian troops as directionless and asserted that the invasion plans of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia had been 'ruined,' even as the first major Ukrainian city fell in the war," The New York Times' Vivek Shankar reports. "'Our soldiers, our border guards, our territorial defense, even simple farmers are capturing Russian soldiers every day, and all of them are saying the same thing: They don't know why they are here,'' Mr. Zelensky said in a speech posted on his Facebook page. 'These are not warriors, they are just lost children.' Media lockdown: "Moscow is also stepping up pressure on social media sites and news organizations at home, The Washington Post's Amy Cheng reports. "It has throttled the public's access to information hubs like Twitter and Facebook and silenced reporting on the invasion by shutting down news outlets." Where things stand: Just over 1 million people have fled Ukraine since the Russian invasion began, according to data from the U.N. refugee agency — an exodus that is set to become Europe's worst humanitarian crisis this century. That figure already matches the number of refugees who were displaced from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan in 2015. The International Criminal Court has also opened an investigation into possible war crimes in Ukraine, the intergovernmental organization's prosecutor said in a statement. What we're reading about the war: | | |  | From the courts | | Jan. 6 committee alleges Trump, allies engaged in potential crimes by trying to overturn 2020 election |  Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., and Vice Chair Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., of the House panel investigating the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol insurrection, testify before the House Rules Committee on Tuesday, Dec. 14, 2021. A House vote to hold him in contempt would refer the charges to the Justice Department, which will decide whether to prosecute the former Republican congressman. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite) | | | New details: "Lawyers for the House panel investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol said in a court filing Wednesday that former president Donald Trump and key allies engaged in potential crimes during their effort to overturn the election: conspiring to defraud the United States and obstructing an official congressional proceeding — the counting of electoral votes," our team covering the Jan. 6 investigation reports. | | "The alleged criminal acts were raised by the committee in a California federal court filing challenging conservative lawyer John Eastman's refusal to turn over thousands of emails the panel has requested related to his role in trying to persuade Vice President Mike Pence to reject electors from states won by Joe Biden. Eastman has cited attorney-client privilege as a shield against turning over the documents," per Josh Dawsey, Tom Hamburger, Jackie and Roz Helderman. The argument: "The committee argued in its filing that Eastman's claim of privilege was potentially voided by the 'crime/fraud exception' to the confidentiality usually accorded attorneys and their clients, which holds that communications need not be kept confidential if an attorney is found to be assisting their client in the commission of a crime. They asked the judge deciding whether to release Eastman's emails to privately review evidence the committee has so far gathered to see if he believes it establishes that Eastman was assisting Trump in criminal acts." "The Select Committee also has a good-faith basis for concluding that the President and members of his Campaign engaged in a criminal conspiracy to defraud the United States," according to the filing. Eastman has so far turned over roughly 8,000 pages of emails to committee investigators. But he's withholding approximately 11,000 documents by citing attorney-client privilege. To help make its case, lawyers for the committee attached to their brief excerpts of depositions from several key Justice Department officials and Pence aides who have been interviewed by the committee that provided new color and details around Trump's role in Jan. 6. | | Top advisers to the former president told him that his claims of election fraud were not true: |  | | | | | The committee also released copies of emails exchanged between Eastman and Greg Jacob, an aide to Pence, as the siege unfolded. The Washington Post had previously reported the two men exchanged tense missives as the attack was underway and that Eastman continued to ask Jacob for the vice president to delay the counting of electoral votes, even after rioters were cleared from the building and Congress reconvened that evening. But the newly released emails provide fresh details of the dramatic exchange on Jan. 6: | | Former federal prosecutor Randall Eliason told Tom that the filing was "a major development" but noted that "this is only a civil proceeding concerning attorney-client privilege. To prove the actual crimes beyond a reasonable doubt, prosecutors would have to meet a much higher burden." | | Eliason said that the significance of the filing "is that the evidence being uncovered points clearly in the direction of possible criminal conduct by Trump himself in connection with the efforts to overturn the election. We can be sure that the Department of Justice is in contact with the Committee and is watching closely." A longer timeline: The committee has pushed back the timeline of the highly anticipated public hearings to April, Committee Chairman Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.) told reporters earlier this week. | - The committee has scheduled depositions with people involved in efforts to overturn the results of the election through the end of March.
- "The timeline moves based on the information we see, and as new information comes, it moves," Thompson told reporters Tuesday.
| | There's no word yet on whether the Justice Department will charge Trump's former White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, for failing to comply with a subpoena from the committee. But DOJ has been busy prosecuting defendants who are now standing trial in the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol. First up: Guy Wesley Reffitt. | - Prosecutors stressed words uttered by Reffitt, who said he "lit the match" that led members of a pro-Trump mob to push past police and drive lawmakers from the chambers, our colleagues Spencer S. Hsu and Rachel Weiner report.
- "A mob needs leaders and this man, Guy Wesley Reffitt of Wylie, Texas, drove all the way from home in Texas to D.C. to step up and fulfill that role," Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeffrey S. Nestler told a panel of jurors in a federal courthouse during opening statements in the case.
| | Another defendant, Joshua James, 34, of Arab, Ala., has become the first to admit to engaging in seditious conspiracy to keep Biden from taking office. | - James "pleaded guilty in federal court in Washington on Wednesday to helping lead a group that prosecutors say sent two tactically equipped teams into the Capitol and organized a cache of weapons in a hotel just outside the city," Tom Jackman and Rachel Weiner report.
| | Looking ahead: Today the committee is "slated to obtain documents related to a December 2020 lawsuit filed by Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) against" Pence, Politico's Kyle Cheney and Nick Wu report. "Those documents, held by the National Archives, are expected to describe Trump White House involvement in the lawsuit, in which Gohmert attempted to force Pence to reveal whether he would single-handedly try to overturn the election, as Trump was demanding." | | |  | On the Hill | | Republicans push back on unionization efforts for congressional staffers |  The U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Wednesday, March 2, 2022. Photographer: Julia Nikhinson/Bloomberg | | | Republicans cold on Hill staff unions: Republican lawmakers derided efforts to unionize the personal offices and committees of Congress Wednesday, with one committee member calling the move a "solution looking for a problem." In a hearing before the House Administration Committee, Republican lawmakers and Mark Strand, president of the Congressional Institute, expressed skepticism toward unionization. "I believe unions can and do play an important role in helping to facilitate a fair working environment in many industries across America," Rep. Rodney Davis (R-Ill.), the committee's ranking member, said in his opening remarks. "They just aren't the right answer for congressional offices." Strand, a former Hill staffer, agreed. "I believe unionizing would ultimately harm Congress and inhibit the work of elected representatives and threaten their independence." Despite the string of objections, the Congressional Workers Union, the group behind the movement, welcomed the hearing. "Today, we watched the very protections we need to have a voice at work be debated in a hearing that would not have been possible without the workers," the CWU said in a statement addressed to the Early. "Today's hearing made clear that absolutely nothing remains in the way of our right to unionize but the question of when House leadership will bring the resolution to the floor for a vote. Fulfilling your promise to protect workers' rights starts with your own. It's time to get this done." Next steps: "Lofgren did not say when the committee might vote on the resolution," Roll Call's Jim Saksa reports. "While every Democrat at Wednesday's hearing sounded positive, many others have yet to signal their support for staff unionization." | | |  | The Data | | Ukrainians rush to seek refuge in neighboring countries | - "If fighting continues, as many as 4 million — roughly 10 percent of the Ukrainian population — could be displaced in the coming weeks."
| | |  | The Media | | | |  | Viral | | | 'Covid Theater,' where the award isn't a Tony, but a DeSantis |  | | | | | | AM/PM | | Looking for more analysis in the afternoon? | | | | Weekday newsletter, PM |  | | | | | | |
