title: Caltrain

text: The Southeast Rail Station Study (SERSS) was released in June 2022 and was endorsed by the San Francisco Planning Commission on July 14. SERSS recommended a new Bayview Station should be located between Oakdale and Jerrold, over alternatives at Evans or at Williams.


title: Caltrain

text: Near the proposed station, the Caltrain line is grade-separated from Oakdale (which passes over the rail line) and Quint. Prior to 2016, the rail line was carried over Quint on a steel bridge originally constructed for the Bayshore Cutoff in the early 1900s. In preparation for a new Oakdale station, the bridge over Quint was removed on April 30 and replaced by a berm completed in July 2016, which severed Quint between Oakdale and Jerrold. A new road has been proposed to reconnect Quint to Jerrold on land belonging to Union Pacific, west of the tracks.


title: Caltrain

text: The length of the Caltrain line from Gilroy to San Francisco is part of the planned route of the California High-Speed Rail line. Trains are predicted to travel at speeds up to between San Jose and San Francisco. With the adaptation of preferred alternative in July 2019 on the San Jose to Gilroy HSR section, dedicated HSR tracks are planned south of Gilroy station, while HSR would share tracks with Caltrain between San Francisco and Gilroy.


title: Caltrain

text: The Caltrain right of way between San Francisco and Tamien stations is owned and maintained by its operating agency, the Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board (PCJPB). PCJPB purchased the right of way from Southern Pacific (SP) in 1991, while SP maintained rights to inter-city passenger and freight trains. In exchange SP granted PCJPB rights to operate up to 6 trains per day between Tamien and Gilroy stations, later increased to 10 trains per day on a deal with SP's successor Union Pacific (UP) in 2005. Three round-trip freight trains operate daily over the line.


title: Caltrain

text: Law enforcement services are provided by a division of the San Mateo County Sheriff's Office, under contract with PCJPB.


title: Caltrain

text: The system has 31 stations. 28 stations are served daily, one (Broadway) is served on weekends only, one (College Park) is served during Bellarmine College Preparatory's commute times on weekdays only, and one (Stanford) is served on Stanford University's football game days only. San Francisco 4th and King Street is the northern terminus of the system, while Gilroy is the southern terminus. However, most trains originate and terminate at Tamien. The five southernmost stations—Capitol, Blossom Hill, Morgan Hill, San Martin, and Gilroy—are served only on weekdays during commute times in the peak direction, going toward San Francisco in the morning and toward Gilroy in the afternoon. Twelve stations are served by the express train service known as Baby Bullet, inaugurated in 2004. Santa Clara station is not long enough to accommodate six-car trains without minor service impacts. Seven stations (Millbrae, Burlingame, San Carlos, Menlo Park, Palo Alto, Santa Clara and San Jose Diridon) are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.


title: Caltrain

text: The Southern Pacific Railroad originally built many stations with a side platform on the west side of the tracks to serve southbound trains, plus a narrow island platform between tracks to serve northbound trains. To protect northbound passengers from being struck by southbound trains, Caltrain implemented a "hold-out rule" (GCOR 6.30): if a train is stopped for passengers, an approaching train on another track must wait outside the station. This rule caused numerous delays, especially after the Caltrain Express project added Baby Bullet trains that pass through many stations without stopping. Most stations have been rebuilt (often as part of larger projects) with side platforms or wider island platforms, thus avoiding the hold-out rule. They have included in 1995; in the late 1990s; , , and in 2000; in 2002; in 2003; in 2005; and in 2008, in 2012, and in 2021. Weekday service at and was eliminated in 2005 due to the hold-out rule, while has only limited service. Atherton station was closed altogether in December 2020.


title: Caltrain

text: The Centralized Equipment Maintenance and Operations Facility is the train maintenance yard and facility serving Caltrain, north of San Jose Diridon station in San Jose. The maintenance station began construction in 2004 and opened on September 29, 2007. It consolidates much of Caltrain's maintenance and operations into one location.


title: Caltrain

text: The Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board purchased the right of way between San Francisco and San Jose for $212 million from Southern Pacific in 1991.


title: Caltrain

text: The operating expenses for fiscal year 2011 were $95,628,000. The fare revenue was $49,026,000, making the farebox recovery ratio 51.3%. This rose to 59% in fiscal year 2012 and 64% in 2013.


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain ridership more than doubled between 2005 and 2015. Ridership growth has been linked to the expansion of businesses near Caltrain stations, a shift in attitudes against the use of cars for commuting, and the expansion Caltrain service which has included extra trains and the introduction of fast express services ("Baby Bullet" service).


title: Caltrain

text: According to the "Rail and the California Economy" study published in 2017, Caltrain Baby Bullet trains operate with a 95% on-time performance, defined as making stops within ten minutes of published schedules. In addition, Caltrain carries over 4,500 people per hour in each direction, equivalent to two freeway lanes in each direction. At current ridership levels, Caltrain directly removes of carbon dioxide emissions per day, displacing the equivalent of 10,000 vehicles per day, not counting any ancillary benefit from improved traffic flow resulting from reduced congestion.


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain operates as a proof-of-payment system. Each rider must buy a ticket prior to boarding the train that may or may not be checked during the trip. Tickets can be purchased at ticket vending machines located at all stations, as well as on the Caltrain app. Ticket windows located at San Jose Diridon and Fourth and King were closed in 2005.


title: Caltrain

text: One-way tickets expire four hours after purchase, but round-trip tickets ("day passes") are good for unlimited rides within their zone limit until the last train of the day. A joint adult Caltrain/VTA Day Pass, valid through Zone 3 and intended for service to Levi's Stadium, costs an additional $6 and covers fares on VTA buses and light rail, with the exception of VTA Express service. A Zone Upgrade may be purchased to augment a valid one-way ticket, day pass, or monthly pass at $2 per zone, valid for four hours after purchase and in one direction only. Discounted 8-ride tickets and monthly passes are available only with a Clipper card. Caltrain eliminated sales of the 8-ride ticket as of October 1, 2017; existing 8-ride tickets would be honored through the end of October. Seniors (aged 65 years and older), children (aged 17 years or younger), disabled, and Medicare card holders are eligible for a discounted fare at approximately half price (varies depending on the ticket).


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain stations are split into six zones. Zone 1 comprises all stations in San Francisco, plus South San Francisco and San Bruno stations in San Mateo County. Zone 2 comprises most stations in San Mateo County. Zone 3 comprises stations in northern Santa Clara County, plus Menlo Park station in San Mateo County. Zone 4 comprises stations in central Santa Clara County. Zones 5 and 6, which are used only during rush hour, comprise stations in southern Santa Clara County.


title: Caltrain

text: Fares for Caltrain service are based on the number of zones traveled, which is considered to be the number of zones "touched" between the origin and destination. For instance, a passenger that boards at a Zone 1 station and departs at a Zone 1 station is considered to travel within one zone. A passenger that boards at a Zone 2 station and departs at a Zone 4 station is considered to travel within three zones (Zones 2, 3, and 4). When purchasing a ticket from the station ticket machine, the machine assumes the origin zone is the same as the station's zone, and prompts the passenger to select a destination zone, but the origin zone can be changed if necessary.


title: Caltrain

text: Zone ticketing requires little infrastructure at the stations but can be expensive for passengers making a short trip that crosses a zone boundary (each zone is 13 miles long). Travel between Sunnyvale and Lawrence is a two-zone ride, since Sunnyvale is the southernmost station in Zone 3 and Lawrence is the northernmost station in Zone 4. A ride between Sunnyvale and Lawrence covers and costs $6, the same as San Francisco [Zone 1] to Redwood City [southernmost station in Zone 2], which covers a distance of .


title: Caltrain

text: In August 2009 Caltrain became the fifth public transit agency in the San Francisco Bay Area to implement the Clipper card. Monthly passes are implemented exclusively through the Clipper card; in addition, some employer-sponsored annual Go passes are implemented through the Clipper card, starting in January 2019. All passengers who use the electronic Clipper card to ride (including holders of monthly and annual Go passes) must remember to "tag on" with their card prior to boarding and "tag off" with their card after exiting the train. If they board the train without tagging on, they will be subject to the same fines as riders without a ticket. Passengers with monthly passes must tag on and off at least once before the 15th of the month to activate the pass, unless the monthly pass was added through a physical card interaction at a retailer or add value machine.


title: Caltrain

text: Without a pass, stored cash on the Clipper card may be used to purchase a one-way ticket. Clipper card users receive a $0.55 discount on the one way full fares. When tagging on, the stored cash value on the Clipper card is debited the maximum one-way fare from the originating zone, where the card was tagged on prior to boarding the train. When tagging off, the stored cash value on the Clipper card is credited according to the destination zone when leaving the train; pass holders are credited the full amount that was debited when tagging off. If passengers who use the Clipper card fail to tag off when they exit the train, they will be charged "the highest cash fare from [their] point of origin", including pass holders. Because of the initial maximum fare debit when tagging on, passengers are required to have at least $1.25 stored cash on the Clipper card to avoid exceeding the card's allowable negative value limit when boarding Caltrain.


title: Caltrain

text: For example, if a passenger tags on and boards a northbound or southbound train at San Mateo (Zone 2), their Clipper card will be debited for a five-zone one-way fare (Zone 2 to Zone 6, which is the most distant theoretical destination from the origin point, a one-way fare debit of -$12.20); if that passenger travels south and tags off at Sunnyvale (Zone 3), their Clipper card will be credited for the three zones not traveled (Zones 4, 5, and 6; +$6.75 credit overall) so the net deduction from stored cash is a two-zone one-way fare (Zone 2 to 3, -$5.45 with Clipper cash discount), unless the passenger has a pass; in that case, the passenger would receive a $12.20 credit. In the example given, failing to tag off means the initial five-zone fare debit (Zone 2 to 6, -$12.20) would remain. Because pass holders are credited only when tagging off, pass holders also would be charged the five-zone fare debit if they forget to tag off.


title: Caltrain

text: Those who use a clipper card hear one beep or see a light flash when they tag on to begin their journey and see two flashes with a double beep when they tag off to end their trip. Three beeps mean the card does not have valid fare. This ensures Caltrain is universally accessible beyond many other Clipper card acceptance mechanisms.


title: Caltrain

text: In 2018, Caltrain rolled out a mobile app allowing riders to purchase fares from Android and iOS smartphones. The Caltrain Mobile app was written by moovel North America, who have written apps with similar functionality for Santa Clara Valley Transportation Agency and San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency.


title: Caltrain

text: Before 2018, passengers who were unable to show a viable ticket were subject to fines of up to $250 plus court fees. Approximately 2,100 riders are given verbal warnings or written citations per month for fare evasion, and, while the old system was in place, an average of 15 incidents of violence against conductors occurred every month as a result of fare enforcement. This has led to trains being delayed while waiting for the police to respond. The fines for fare evasion were collected by the superior court system of the county in which the ticket is issued, and were not returned to Caltrain. The complexity of the ticketing system meant that up to 65% of issued fine tickets were later overturned in court.


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain moved to a more streamlined process of issuing citations, effective February 1, 2018. Rather than writing the citation on the spot, which takes up to fifteen minutes, the conductor will scan the photo ID, and an administrative penalty will be mailed to the address on record, bypassing the civil superior court system. In addition, the cost of the fine decreased to $75 per infraction, and Caltrain will retain the fees. However, passengers who accrue a third (or more) fare evasion citation will be subject to traditional fines and/or criminal penalties through the superior court system.


title: Caltrain

text: During the initial years as the state was assuming control (1980–1985), locomotives and rolling stock were leased from Southern Pacific. The leased "suburban" and "gallery" coaches continued to wear SP's standard dark grey. Locomotives wore SP's "Bloody Nose" paint scheme.


title: Caltrain

text: An experimental scheme was applied to SP/CDTX #3187 and three gallery cars (SP/CDTX #3700, 3701, 3702), unveiled on May 15, 1982; the locomotive had a red nose and both locomotive and cars had the body painted silver (upper half) and dark blue (lower half) blue, separated by three stripes (blue, teal, and red). The scheme was nicknamed "Rainbow", "Postal Service", or "Mailbox".


title: Caltrain

text: When new equipment was introduced in 1985, CalTrain adopted a new logo and painted the newly acquired silver EMD F40PH locomotives with teal and blue stripes, matching the colors in the Caltrans logo.


title: Caltrain

text: After the new Caltrain logo was adopted in 1997, the F40PH locomotives were repainted to gray with a black roof, and the MPI MP36 locomotives ordered for Baby Bullet service wore gray with red accents.


title: Caltrain

text: Currently, each train on the schedule is assigned a three-digit number indicating direction, sequence and stop pattern. This number is not to be confused with the locomotive number, which is the 9xx number physically stenciled on each engine. The stopping scheme (L for local or limited, B for Baby Bullet service) and first digit are displayed on the leading element of the train (either the control car, for northbound trains, or the locomotive, for southbound trains). The practice of placarding train numbers dates back to when the trains were operated by Southern Pacific. The first digit and stopping scheme is posted on the trains as:


title: Caltrain

text: Starting August 30, 2021, Caltrain changed the numbering scheme so the first digit reflects the service scheme and stopping pattern (local, limited, or Baby Bullet/express). The second two digits are incremented sequentially within the service type, and continue to reflect the direction of travel, so even numbers = southbound and odd = northbound. However, because the incrementation was within the service type, trains 101, 301, 401, 501, and 701 all run at different times and are not indicative of the sequence within a day.


title: Caltrain

text: Prior to 1985, Caltrain used equipment leased from Southern Pacific, including SP/CDTX 3187, an EMD GP9 repainted in prototype Caltrain livery and other locomotives that had been used for the Peninsula Commute service. Since 1985, Caltrain has used the following locomotives, which are almost all powered by diesel engines:


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain also leased a number of Amtrak F40PH's in 1998 and 1999 while Caltrain's F40PH-2's were being overhauled.


title: Caltrain

text: Currently, Caltrain trains consist of one locomotive and a five or six-car consist. Trains run in a puller configuration (led by the locomotive) towards San Jose and in a pusher configuration (led by the cab car) towards San Francisco, so the orientation of cars remains consistent. From north to south, Nippon Sharyo five-car gallery consists are arranged as:


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain has 93 Nippon Sharyo bi-level Gallery-type cars and 41 Bombardier BiLevel Coaches in revenue service as of 2017. Revenue train consists are made of single type of cars; the Bombardier cars are never mixed with the Nippon-Sharyo gallery cars. Of the Gallery cars, 66 are coaches and 27 are bike-accessible cab cars. Caltrans purchased the first 63 gallery cars in 1985 when it began subsidizing the commuter rail service. The other 30 were purchased by Caltrain in 2000, and the older cars were rebuilt by Nippon Sharyo around the same time. Each gallery car has one set of exit doors on each side of the car.


title: Caltrain

text: The first 17 Bombardier BiLevel Coaches were purchased as surplus from Sounder Commuter Rail in 2002, of which 10 are coaches, 5 are cab-bike cars, and 2 are cab-wheelchair cars. Caltrain purchased additional eight cars in 2008 to meet short-term passenger growth and to increase spare ratio. These Bombardier cars were initially only used on Baby Bullet express trains, but now also used on limited-stop and local trains.


title: Caltrain

text: All five-car Bombardier sets were lengthened to six-car Bombardier sets using surplus ex-Metrolink cars in May 2015. In July 2016, six-car Bombardier sets replaced some five-car gallery sets to relieve overcrowding. In November 2016, Caltrain rolled out six-car gallery sets for certain trains to further relieve overcrowding; the longer trains are intended to be temporary measures to increase capacity until more frequent service can be achieved with electrification.


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain purchased 16 used Bombardier BiLevel Coaches from Metrolink in 2014 to cope with increasing ridership by lengthening certain Bombardier sets from five to six cars. The $15 million purchase was financed by a farebox revenue fund. Since the cars had retired from Metrolink service, they required up to a year of rehabilitation before being placed in service with Caltrain. The ex-Metrolink cars were of older Series 1 and 2 that have riveted bodies, instead of the welded bodies in the Series 6 and 7 cars that Caltrain had purchased starting from 2002.


title: Caltrain

text: Four of the cars were put into service in May 2015 while other cars await their refurbishments. Ex-Metrolink cars have retained their Metrolink blue-on-white livery, but Metrolink logos have been painted over and rolling stock numbers have been repainted with JPBX numbers.


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain bought 14 remanufactured Budd Rail Diesel Car ("Boise Budd") single-level cars from Virginia Railway Express around 2000 for use on Special-Event trains. A seven-car special train took fans to the first game at Pac Bell Park on March 31, 2000. The northbound train ran at an estimated 125% of capacity and skipped stops after Hillsdale because it was already well above seated capacity. These cars were sold in 2005 after Bombardier cars were delivered and are now in service on the Grand Canyon Railway.


title: Caltrain

text: In August 2016, Caltrain awarded a $551 million contract to produce the trainsets needed for running on the electrified line – 96 Stadler KISS EMUs arranged into 16 trainsets will be delivered for testing by August 2019. Under the contract, Caltrain had the option to procure an additional 96 units in the future for an additional $385 million. In December 2018, Caltrain was reportedly carrying 65,000 passengers a day, and expected to have 240,000 daily riders in 2040. Therefore, after funding was received from the California State Transportation Agency's Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program, Caltrain's board unanimously approved the purchase of additional cars from Stadler to increase the fleet from 16 six-car sets to 19 seven-car sets.


title: Caltrain

text: New trains will be double-decked, long and equipped for both platform heights in anticipation of sharing facilities with California High-Speed Rail trains. Units can reach speeds of , though operations will likely be limited to .


title: Caltrain

text: Acceleration of the EMUs should be substantially better than current trains. The existing diesel-electric locomotives offer a starting tractive effort of for an EMD F40PH-2 and for an MPI M36PH-3C, while a six-car KISS EMU set has a starting tractive effort of .


title: Caltrain

text: The first Stadler KISS was completed by Stadler's Salt Lake City factory in July 2020. It was taken to the Transportation Technology Center in Pueblo, Colorado, for high-speed testing.


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain has several cars used for track maintenance, such as JPBX 505, a track geometry car. Some other rolling stock is infrequently used for special service, such as on the Holiday Train, an annual non-revenue train decorated with lights, carrying volunteer carolers, and making limited stops for toy donations.


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain has direct connections to three regional rail services; Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) (with service to San Francisco, SFO, Oakland, Fremont, Richmond, Dublin, Concord, and Pittsburg) at Millbrae, Amtrak's "Capitol Corridor" and "Coast Starlight" trains, as well as the "Altamont Corridor Express" at San Jose Diridon station and Santa Clara's Santa Clara and Great America stations.


title: Caltrain

text: The future BART-to-San Jose extension would also introduce connecting BART service at Diridon station and Santa Clara station.


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain is served by a number of local bus/rail systems. These systems include the San Francisco Municipal Railway (Muni), San Mateo County Transit District (SamTrans) and Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA). (Additionally, Golden Gate Transit of Marin and Sonoma Counties is within 20 minutes' walking distance, or a short Muni ride via the N or T lines, from Caltrain's northern terminus.)


title: Caltrain

text: In August 2005, as part of its Vasona light rail project, the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority established its third transfer point with Caltrain at San Jose's central train station Diridon. In addition to many bus connections, VTA light rail service has two other Caltrain transfer points at San Jose's Tamien and at Mountain View. (Also, the Cottle light rail stop in southern San Jose is a mile from Caltrain's Blossom Hill station.)


title: Caltrain

text: The San Francisco Municipal Railway (Muni) has two light rail connections, the N Judah and T Third Street lines, at separate stops near the San Francisco 4th and King station. Muni intended to establish another light rail connection to the Bayshore station at Visitacion Valley in southern San Francisco for the T Third line, but this has been delayed indefinitely due to cost and design issues. The T Third opened on April 18, 2007 without the connection to Bayshore station.


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain passengers may transfer to BART or SamTrans at the Millbrae Intermodal Station for travel to San Francisco International Airport (SFO).


title: Caltrain

text: Prior to the opening of the airport extension in 2003 a free shuttle bus operated between Millbrae and the airport. On June 24, 2018, SamTrans launched Route SFO, which provides service using buses equipped with luggage racks between the station platform at Millbrae and regular samTrans SFO terminal stops. Fares on Route SFO match samTrans local pricing.


title: Caltrain

text: There is a connection to San Jose International Airport via VTA bus No. 60 at the Santa Clara Caltrain Station.


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain is also served by AC Transit from Hayward at the Hillsdale station (Line M) and at Palo Alto station (Line U). This is in addition to the Dumbarton Express from Union City/Fremont at Palo Alto. Furthermore, Amtrak's Highway 17 Express bus from Santa Cruz and Monterey-Salinas Transit from Monterey at San Jose, as well as San Benito County Express from Hollister at Gilroy.


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain sponsors many shuttle routes serving local employers on the Peninsula and in Silicon Valley. Shuttle connections via the Stanford Marguerite Shuttle are available to Stanford University at the Palo Alto and California Avenue stations and San Jose State University at the San Jose station.


title: Caltrain

text: Caltrain was one of the first commuter rail services to add bicycle capacity to its trains, inaugurating bicycle service in 1992 by allowing four bikes on certain trains.


title: Caltrain

text: All bicycle rack-equipped cars have a yellow "Bike Car" sign posted by the door. Cyclists are required to tie their bicycle to the rack with the bungee cord provided, and must be racked so they do not protrude into the aisle. Each rack can accommodate four bicycles. Because the bikes are stacked together against the racks, most riders place a destination tag, available from a conductor, on their bicycles to optimize placement and minimize shuffling.


title: Caltrain

text: Cyclists must be at least six years old, and cyclists younger than 12 must be accompanied by an adult and capable of carrying their own bike on and off the train. Bicycles must be single-rider, with a maximum of in length, and tandem or three-wheel bikes are not allowed. Bulky attachments such as training wheels, trailers, saddlebags, and baskets are similarly not allowed. Folding bicycles are not restricted and can be carried on any car when folded; they may not be placed on seats or block aisles.


title: Caltrain

text: The variation on bicycle capacity between trainsets has generated criticisms from the bicycling community, as cyclists may be denied boarding when a train reaches its bicycle capacity. The Baby Bullets, favored by many cyclists, often use lower bike-capacity Bombardier cars and cyclists may have to wait for slower trains with higher-capacity gallery cars, or seek alternate transportation.


title: Caltrain

text: Due to equipment rotation and maintenance concerns, Caltrain said in 2009 that it could not dedicate cars with higher bike capacity on trains with high bike demand. Eventually, two bike cars were added to every train consist by 2011, and in 2016, a third bike car was added to Bombardier consists.


title: Caltrain

text: To provide an alternative to bringing bicycles on board the trains, Caltrain has installed bicycle lockers at most stations, and constructed a new bicycle station at the San Francisco station. In early 2008, Caltrain sponsored Warm Planet bicycle station opened at the 4th and Townsend terminus. A bicycle station was open at the Palo Alto station from April 1999 to October 2004, and reopened in February 2007. Nearly all stations have racks and/or lockers available to park bicycles.


title: Caltrain

text: The initial pilot program launched in 1992 allowed up to four bikes per train for off-peak service, with bicycles were carried in the cab car (northernmost car). Bicycle capacity was expanded to twelve bikes per train for all trains in 1995, followed by a doubling to 24 bikes per train for all trains in 1996.


title: Caltrain

text: Starting in 2001, gallery cars were modified for bicycle service. Gallery cars modified for bicycle service removed seats from the lower level in the north half of the car, resulting in space to carry 32 bicycles per car. By 2006, Bombardier cars were also modified for bicycle service by partially removed seats from the lower level of the car, resulting in space to carry 16 bicycles per car.


title: Caltrain

text: It was suggested that Caltrain could increase bicycle capacity by removing some seats from bicycle cars. Initially Caltrain rejected this idea because some trains are operated at seated capacity and the seat removal would take space from other passengers. However, in early 2009 Caltrain announced that it would be expanding bicycle capacity by 8 spots by removing some seats in the bike cars, bringing bike capacity to 40 bikes on gallery cars and 24 bikes on Bombardier cars. The expansion started several months later. After this, bike capacity on trains was expanded by increasing the number of bike cars in a consist, rather than further modifying cars.


title: Caltrain

text: At first, only the cab/control car (the northernmost car) of each train consist was modified for bicycle service. Prior to 2009, Bombardier consists could carry 16 bicycles, and gallery consists could carry 32 bicycles. With the removal of additional seats in 2009, capacity rose to 24 and 40 bicycles, respectively.


title: Caltrain

text: In the fall of 2009, all Bombardier consists and some gallery consists substituted a second bike car for one of the passenger trailers. The remaining gallery consists continued with a single bike car, resulting in a carrying capacity of 48 bicycles (on Bombardier consists) or 40–80 bicycles (on gallery consists with one or two bike cars). Due to demand, in 2011, the remaining gallery sets modified a passenger trailer to take bicycles, giving two bike cars to all consists, increasing capacity on all gallery consists to 80 bicycles per train. 10 gallery trailer cars, 3826-3835, had their lower-level seats removed in 2011. Although the Baby Bullet runs initially used five-car Bombardier consists, many of the Baby Bullet runs returned to five-car gallery sets due to their superior bicycle capacity, since demand for bicycle car access was high.


title: Caltrain

text: Prior to 2016, both Bombardier and gallery trains used five-car consists. With the purchase of Bombardier cars from Metrolink, Caltrain announced in January 2015 that roughly half of the additional ex-Metrolink cars will be converted to bike cars with capacity for 24 bikes, so some trains running Bombardier cars will be six-car consists, of which three will be bike cars.


title: Caltrain

text: Six-car Bombardier consists started running in May 2015, but the third car was not converted for bike service until March 2016. Five of the Bombardier cars were refurbished as bike cars and entered service in March 2016. All Bombardier consists are now six-car sets with three bike cars and three passenger cars. The third bike car is just south of the existing southern bike car. The third bike car is being placed next to the other bike car to help conductors to manage bike capacity. Official bike capacity for six-car Bombardier consists is 72 (24 bikes × 3 cars), comparable to the 80-bike capacity of five-car gallery consists (40 bikes × 2 cars).


title: Off-road vehicle

text: An off-road vehicle, sometimes referred to as an overland or adventure vehicle, is considered to be any type of vehicle which is capable of driving on and off paved or gravel surface. It is generally characterized by having large tires with deep, open treads, a flexible suspension, or even caterpillar tracks. Other vehicles that do not travel on public streets or highways are generally termed off-highway vehicles, including tractors, forklifts, cranes, backhoes, bulldozers, and golf carts.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: Off-road vehicles have an enthusiastic following because of their versatility. Several types of motorsports involve racing off-road vehicles. The most common use of these vehicles is for sightseeing in areas distant from the pavement. The use of higher clearance and higher traction vehicles enables access on trails and forest roads that have rough and low traction surfaces. Off-road vehicles can typically ford through deeper waters (i.e., rivers or floodwaters) than on-road vehicles can.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: One of the first modified off-road vehicles was the Kégresse track, a conversion undertaken first by Adolphe Kégresse, who designed the original while working for Czar Nicholas II of Russia between 1906 and 1916. The system uses a caterpillar track with a flexible belt rather than interlocking metal segments. It can be fitted to a conventional car or truck to turn it into a half-track suitable for use over rough or soft ground.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: After the Russian Revolution of 1917, Kégresse returned to his native France where the system was used on Citroën cars between 1921 and 1937 for off-road and military vehicles. The Citroën company sponsored several overland expeditions with their vehicles crossing North Africa and Central Asia.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: A huge wheeled vehicle designed from 1937 to 1939 under the direction of Thomas Poulter called Antarctic Snow Cruiser was intended to facilitate transport in the Antarctica. While having several innovative features, it generally failed to operate as hoped under the difficult conditions, and was eventually abandoned in Antarctica.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: After World War II, a huge surplus of light off-road vehicles like the Jeep and heavier lorries were available on the automobile market. The Jeeps in particular were popular with buyers who used them as utility vehicles. This was also the start of off-roading as a hobby. The wartime Jeeps soon wore out, though, and the Jeep company started to produce civilian derivatives, closely followed by similar vehicles from British Land Rover and Japanese Toyota, Datsun/Nissan, Suzuki, and Mitsubishi. These were all alike: small, compact, four-wheel-drive vehicles with at most a small hardtop to protect the occupants from the elements.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: From the 1960s and onward, more comfortable vehicles were produced. For several years, they were popular with rural buyers due to their off-road and load-lugging capabilities. The U.S. Jeep Wagoneer and the Ford Bronco, the British Range Rover, and the station wagon-bodied Japanese Toyota Land Cruiser, Nissan Patrol, and Suzuki Lj's series were all essentially just station wagon bodies on light truck frames with four-wheel-drive drivetrains. Later, during the 1990s, manufacturers started to add even more luxuries to bring those off-road vehicles on par with regular cars. This eventually evolved into what we call the SUV today. It also evolved into the newer crossover vehicle, where utility and off-road capability was sacrificed for better on-road handling and luxury.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: To be able to drive off the pavement, off-road vehicles need several characteristics: They need to have a low ground pressure, so as not to sink into soft ground, they need ground clearance to not get hung up on obstacles, and they need to keep their wheels or tracks on the ground so as not to lose traction. Wheeled vehicles accomplish this by having a suitable balance of large or additional tires combined with tall and flexible suspension. Tracked vehicles accomplish this by having wide tracks and a flexible suspension on the road wheels.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: The choice of wheels versus tracks is one of cost and suitability. A tracked drivetrain is more expensive to produce and maintain. Wheeled drivetrains are cheaper and give a higher top speed. The tracked drivetrain has greater off-road capability.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: Tires play a significant role for any off-road vehicle equipped with wheels, as they ensure optimal traction required to keep it moving. The off-road tire tread types vary depending on the terrain type. The most common types of off-road tires are A/T (stands for "All Terrain") and M/T (stands for "Mud Terrain"). While the A/T tires perform excellently on the sand, they are barely usable in the mud. There are also unique Sand Blaster and Mud bogging tires used for the most challenging terrains such as dirt, sand and even water to maintain traction at extreme angles and high speeds (off-road motorsport).


title: Off-road vehicle

text: Most off-road vehicles are fitted with especially low gearing. This allows the operator to make the most of the engine's available power while moving slowly through challenging terrain. An internal combustion engine coupled to a standard gearbox often has an output speed too high. The vehicle often has one of two things, either a very low ("granny") first gear (like the all-wheel drive Volkswagen Transporter versions) or an additional gearbox in line with the first, called a reduction drive. Some vehicles, like the Bv206 in the picture on the right, also have torque converters to further reduce the gearing.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: Many wheeled off-road vehicles provide power to all wheels to keep traction on slippery surfaces. For a typical four-wheel vehicle this is known as four-wheel drive. Vehicles designed for use both on and off-road may be designed to be switched between two-wheel drive and four-wheel drive so that the vehicle uses fewer driven wheels when driven on the road.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: SUVs are built with higher ground clearance for off-road use and thus have a higher centre of gravity, therefore increasing the risk of rollover. When an SUV turns, the vehicle's mass resists the turn and carries the weight forward, thus allowing the traction from the tires to create a lateral centripetal force as the vehicle continues through the turn. The conflict between the top weight of the SUV's desire to go straight while the friction of the tires on the road cause the bottom of the vehicle to move away and out from under the vehicle during a turn.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: SUVs are more likely to be in rollover accidents than passenger cars. According to a study conducted in the United States, SUVs have twice the fatality rate of cars and have nearly triple the fatality rate in rollover accidents.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: Of vehicles in the United States, light trucks (including SUVs) represent 36 percent of all registered vehicles. They are involved in about half of the fatal two-vehicle crashes with passenger cars, and 80 percent of these fatalities are to occupants of the passenger cars.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: In the United States, the number of ORV users since 1972 has climbed sevenfold—from five million to 36 million in 2000. Government policies that protect wilderness but also allow recreational ORV use have been the subject of some debate within the United States and other countries.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: All trail and off-trail activities impact natural vegetation and wildlife, which can lead to erosion, invasive species, habitat loss, and ultimately species loss decreasing an ecosystem's ability to maintain homeostasis. ORV's cause greater stress to the environment than foot traffic alone, and ORV operators who attempt to test their vehicles against natural obstacles can do significantly more damage than those who follow legal trails. Illegal use of off-road vehicles has been identified as a serious land management problem ranked with dumping garbage and other forms of vandalism. Many user organizations, such as Tread Lightly! and the Sierra Club, publish and encourage appropriate trail ethics.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: ORVs have also been criticized for producing more pollution in areas that might normally have none. In addition to noise pollution that can cause hearing impairment and stress in wildlife, according to the U.S. Forest Service, old-style two-stroke engines (no longer a component of new off-road vehicles, although some are still in use) "emit about 20 to 33 percent of the consumed fuel through the exhaust" and "discharge from two-stroke snowmobile engines can lead to indirect pollutant deposition into the top layer of snow and subsequently into the associated surface and ground water." In 2002, the United States Environmental Protection Agency adopted emissions standards for all-terrain vehicles that "when fully implemented in 2012... are expected to prevent the release of more than two million tons of air pollution each year—the equivalent of removing the pollution from more than 32 million cars every year."


title: Off-road vehicle

text: Common commercial off-road vehicles include four-wheel-drive pickup trucks like the Ford F-Series, Chevrolet C/K, Dodge Ram, and Toyota Tacoma. A number of military vehicles have also seen civilian use, including the Jeep CJ and the AM General Hummer. Some, like the early Land Rovers, were adapted to military use from civilian specifications. Specialized commonly available off-road vehicles include Utility terrain vehicles (UTVs), All-terrain vehicles (ATVs), dirt bikes, dune buggies, rock crawlers, and sandrails.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: There are various types of off-road motorcycles, also known as dirt bikes, specially designed for off-road events. Compared to road-going motorcycles, off-road machines are simpler and lighter, having long suspension travel, high ground clearance, and rugged construction with little bodywork and no fairings for less damage in spills. Wheels (usually 21" front, 18" rear) have knobby tires, often clamped to the rim with a rim lock.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: European militaries and utilities have used Land Rover Defenders, Haflingers, Pinzgauers, Volvo L3314, and Mercedes-Benz Unimogs for all-terrain transportation. The Portuguese UMM Alter is less common.


title: Off-road vehicle

text: The military market for off-road vehicles used to be large, but, since the fall of the Iron Curtain in the 1990s, it has dried up to some extent. The U.S. jeeps, developed during World War II, coined the word many people use for any type of light off-road vehicle. In the U.S., the Jeeps' successor from the mid 1980s was the AM General HMMWV series. The Red Army used the GAZ-61 and GAZ-64 during World War II. The Eastern Bloc used the GAZ-69 and UAZ-469 in similar roles.


title: John Eastman

text: John Charles Eastman (born 1960) is an American lawyer who is the founding director of the Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence, a public interest law firm affiliated with the conservative think tank Claremont Institute. He is a former professor and dean at the Chapman University School of Law. He ran unsuccessfully as a Republican for California's 34th congressional district in 1990, and for the office of California Attorney General in 2010. He is a former law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.


title: John Eastman

text: During the 2020 United States presidential campaign, Eastman wrote a controversial op-ed in August 2020 that falsely suggested the then-presumed Democratic nominee for U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris was not an American citizen and thus not legally eligible for the position. Eastman was a key participant in the subsequent attempts to overturn the election; during President Donald Trump's last efforts before the certification of Joe Biden's Electoral College victory, Eastman incorrectly told Vice President Mike Pence in an Oval Office meeting, on January 5, 2021, that Pence had the constitutional authority to block the certification. Pence did not accept Eastman's argument. Eastman also sent to Republican senator Mike Lee a six-point plan of action for Pence to throw out the electors from seven states to keep Trump in power, which Lee rejected. On January 6, 2021, Eastman presented a speech at the White House Trump rally that preceded the 2021 United States Capitol attack. Eastman subsequently implored Vice President Pence to violate the Electoral Count Act to delay certification of the election, via Pence's legal counsel Greg Jacob, who responded by calling Eastman a "serpent in the ear of the president of the United States". On January 13, 2021, Eastman retired from the Chapman University faculty after the controversy created by his having spoken at the Trump rally. On March 28, 2022, federal judge David O. Carter found Eastman, along with Trump, was more likely than not to have "dishonestly conspired to obstruct the joint session of Congress on Jan. 6, 2021".


title: John Eastman

text: Eastman graduated from the Dallas-area Lewisville High School and received his undergraduate degree from the University of Dallas. He then earned his Juris Doctor from the University of Chicago Law School, and a Doctor of Philosophy in Government from the Claremont Graduate School. During his time in law school, Eastman worked on the "University of Chicago Law Review".


title: John Eastman

text: In 1989, prior to attending law school, Eastman served as the director of Congressional and public affairs at the United States Commission on Civil Rights. He was also the unsuccessful 1990 Republican candidate for the United States House of Representatives in California's 34th congressional district.


title: John Eastman

text: Following law school, he clerked for Judge J. Michael Luttig at the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit and for Justice Clarence Thomas at the Supreme Court of the United States; he then was an attorney with the law firm of Kirkland & Ellis, specializing in civil and constitutional litigation. He later joined Chapman to teach constitutional law. He has also appeared on conservative pundit Hugh Hewitt's Fox News program "The Hugh Hewitt Show", commenting on law.


title: John Eastman

text: Eastman served as an attorney for the State of South Dakota, representing it in a denied petition to the U.S. Supreme Court in a constitutional challenge to federal spending.


title: John Eastman

text: Eastman has represented the North Carolina legislature and the State of Arizona in unsuccessfully petitioning the Supreme Court in cases involving same-sex marriage, abortion, and immigration.


title: John Eastman

text: He testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2014 arguing that President Barack Obama's unilateral suspension of deportation for undocumented immigrants was unconstitutional.


title: John Eastman

text: In 1990 Eastman was unopposed in the primary to become the Republican challenger of long-time 34th District incumbent Esteban Torres in California's San Gabriel Valley.


title: John Eastman

text: On February 1, 2010, Eastman resigned as dean of the Chapman University School of Law to pursue the Republican nomination for California Attorney General. On April 1, a Superior Court judge denied Eastman's choice for ballot designation as "Assistant Attorney General", fearing that use of this title, temporarily granted by South Dakota for his work on a lawsuit, would be misperceived as a California title. The judge further denied Eastman's second choice, "Taxpayer Advocate/Attorney", but accepted his third choice, "Constitutional Law Attorney". Such designations typically reflect a candidate's current employment or elected office. Eastman finished second in the three-way Republican primary with 34.2% of the vote, behind Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley, who received 47.3%. Cooley advanced to the 2010 California Attorney General election, where he was defeated by Kamala Harris.


title: John Eastman

text: Eastman is chairman of the Federalist Society's practice group on federalism and separation of powers. He is chairman of the board of the National Organization for Marriage, which opposes same-sex marriage. He is a director of the Public Interest Legal Foundation, which brings election lawsuits. He is both a member of the board and on the faculty at the Claremont Institute. He sits on the board of advisors of St. Monica Academy and the advisory board of the St. Thomas More Law Society of Orange County.


title: John Eastman

text: In August 2020, "Newsweek" published an op-ed by Eastman questioning 2020 vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris's eligibility for the office. He asserted she could not be a U.S. citizen by birth despite being born in Oakland, California, if neither of her parents was a permanent resident at the time of her birth. Eastman said that she could have subsequently obtained citizenship derived from the naturalization of her parents if one of them had become a citizen prior to her 16th birthday in 1980, which would have allowed Harris to fulfill the nine-year citizenship requirement required to become a senator.


title: John Eastman

text: All prominent legal scholars disagreed with Eastman's position, and many compared it to the birtherism theory against President Barack Obama. "Newsweek" defended the column, while acknowledging that they were "horrified that this op-ed gave rise to a wave of vile Birtherism directed at Senator Harris". They stated there was no connection between the op-ed and the birther movement. Rather, the op-ed focused on the "long-standing, somewhat arcane legal debate about the precise meaning of the phrase 'subject to the jurisdiction thereof' in the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment", also known as the jus sanguinis or jus soli debate. However, "Axios" noted that other constitutional scholars do not accept Eastman's view, labeling it "baseless". "Axios" also criticized Eastman for dismissing the eligibility concerns of 2016 presidential candidate Ted Cruz, born in Calgary, Canada, in a 2016 "National Review" op-ed, claiming they were "silly".


title: John Eastman

text: Erwin Chemerinsky, the dean of Berkeley Law School, told the BBC, "Under section 1 of the 14th Amendment, anyone born in the United States is a United States citizen. The Supreme Court has held this since the 1890s. Kamala Harris was born in the United States." Harvard Professor Laurence Tribe was similarly dismissive, telling "The New York Times" "I hadn’t wanted to comment on [Eastman’s idea] because it's such an idiotic theory. There is nothing to it." One day after publishing Eastman's op-ed, "Newsweek" published an opinion piece by legal scholar Eugene Volokh, titled "Yes, Kamala Harris is Eligible to be Vice President", in which Volokh argues that Harris is a "natural-born citizen" under the U.S. Constitution and is therefore eligible to be vice president. Lorelei Laird, in an "Above The Law" article, pointed out that Eastman was arguing that Harris was not even a U.S. citizen.


title: John Eastman

text: This op-ed was cited by the "New York Times" as helping Eastman come to the attention of Jenna Ellis, a Trump campaign adviser; subsequently, Eastman briefly met with Trump campaign advisors in a Philadelphia hotel room the weekend after the 2020 presidential election, and, according to Eastman, caught COVID-19.


title: John Eastman

text: In early December 2020, Trump contacted Eastman, asking him to challenge the results of the 2020 United States presidential election before the Supreme Court.


title: John Eastman

text: On December 9, 2020, Eastman represented Trump in a motion to intervene in "Texas v. Pennsylvania", a case filed directly in the U.S. Supreme Court by Texas attorney general Ken Paxton, in which the state of Texas sought to annul the voting processes and, by extension, the electoral college results of at least four other states. Eastman's brief included an array of unfounded claims and asserted "It is not necessary for [Trump] to prove that fraud occurred," and asserted it was enough to show that elections "materially deviated" from the intent of state lawmakers, adding, "By failing to follow the rule of law, these officials put our nation's belief in elected self-government at risk." Two days later, on December 12, the Supreme Court declined to hear the case, finding that Texas did not have standing saying Texas "has not demonstrated a judicially cognizable interest in the manner in which another state conducts its elections." On December 13, 2020, 159 Chapman University faculty members (including two from the law school) published a statement condemning Eastman for the filing.


title: John Eastman

text: On December 22, 2020, Ivan Raiklin, an attorney and associate of Michael Flynn, tweeted to Trump a two-page memo entitled "Operation Pence Card," which Trump retweeted two days later. The day of the Trump retweet, someone in the Trump administration called Eastman asking him to write a memo "asserting the vice president's power to hold up the certification" of the presidential election. Eastman circulated a two-page outline and memo to the Trump legal team several days later, followed by a more extensive memo later. Eastman called the vice president "the ultimate arbiter" of the election in his two-page memo. After receiving sharp criticism about his role in the election aftermath, in October 2021 Eastman asserted the memos did not convey his advice but rather he had written them at the request of "somebody in the legal team" whose name he could not recall. He also asserted in October that a scenario in which Pence would reject ballots was "foolish" and "crazy," further claiming he had told Pence during their Oval Office meeting that his proposal was an "open question" and "the weaker argument". In a video taken secretly and made public that same month, Eastman suggested he believed that Pence's actions served Washington politics. An audience member asked, "Why do you think Mike Pence didn't do it?" Eastman responded that "Mike Pence is an establishment guy" who fears that Trump is "destroying the inside-the-Beltway Republican Party."


title: John Eastman

text: On December 24, 2020, in an email exchange with New York appellate attorney Kenneth Chesebro and Trump campaign officials, Eastman wrote he was aware of a "heated fight" within the Supreme Court about whether to hear a case. The court had already rejected a major election challenge, "Texas v. Pennsylvania", 13 days earlier, and the participants in Eastman's email exchange were discussing whether to file papers in the hopes that four U.S. Supreme Court justices would agree to hear a Wisconsin case. Eastman wrote: "the odds are not based on the legal merits but an assessment of the justices’ spines." Chesebro responded: "the odds of action before Jan. 6 will become more favorable if the justices start to fear that there will be 'wild' chaos on Jan. 6 unless they rule by then, either way." (Chesebro apparently referred to Trump's tweet five days earlier inviting supporters to a "wild" January 6 protest.) Chesebro had emailed Rudy Giuliani 11 days earlier with a proposal for Pence to recuse himself from the January 6 certification so a senior Republican senator could count fraudulent elector slates to declare Trump the victor.


title: John Eastman

text: On January 2, 2021, Eastman joined Trump, the president's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani and others in a conference call with 300 Republican legislators from Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin to brief them on allegations of voter fraud, with the objective of the legislators attempting to decertify their states' election results. That same day, together with Giuliani and Boris Epshteyn, he appeared on Steve Bannon's podcast "The War Room" and promoted the idea that state lawmakers needed to reconsider the election results. On January 5, 2021, Eastman met with Pence in the Oval Office to argue, incorrectly, that the vice president has the constitutional authority to alter or otherwise change electoral votes. According to Eastman, he told the vice president that he might have the authority to reject electoral college votes, and he asked the vice president to delay the certification. Pence rejected Eastman's argument and instead agreed with his counsel, Greg Jacob, and conservative legal scholars and other advisors, such as John Yoo and J. Michael Luttig. Pence later released a letter stating he would not attempt to intervene in the certification process, citing Luttig by name, who later said it was "the highest honor of my life" to be involved in preserving the Constitution.


title: John Eastman

text: On January 6, Eastman spoke alongside Giuliani at the "Save America" rally that preceded the 2021 storming of the United States Capitol and asserted without evidence that balloting machines contained "secret folders" that altered voting results.


title: John Eastman

text: During the Capitol storming, when Pence was forced into hiding, Eastman exchanged e-mails with Greg Jacob, Pence's chief counsel. Jacob wrote to Eastman, "Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege." Eastman replied by blaming Pence and Jacob for refusing to block certification of Trump's loss in the election, writing, "The ‘siege’ is because YOU and your boss did not do what was necessary to allow this to be aired in a public way so that the American people can see for themselves what happened." Later in the day, when the rioters were expelled from the Capitol and Pence was again presiding over Congress, Eastman told Jacob in another e-mail that Pence should still refuse to certify the election results: “Now that the precedent has been set that the Electoral Count Act is not quite so sacrosanct as was previously claimed, I implore you to consider one more relatively minor violation and adjourn for 10 days to allow the legislatures to finish their investigations as well as to allow the full forensic audit of the massive amount of illegal activity that occurred here,” Eastman wrote.


title: John Eastman

text: According to testimony given to the January 6 Committee by former White House lawyer Eric Herschmann, Eastman emailed Giuliani several days after the storming of the Capitol, asking to be placed on the list of those to be given a presidential pardon before Trump's term in office ended. The request came a few days after a heated exchange between Herschmann and Eastman that ended with Herschmann suggesting that Eastman hire a criminal defense lawyer. Eastman emailed Giuliani, saying "I've decided that I should be on the pardon list if that is still in the works." Trump did not issue a pardon to Eastman.


title: John Eastman

text: Appearing on CNN on January 23 to argue that the Trump rally did not incite the siege of the Capitol, Eastman asserted that "a paramilitary group as well as antifa groups" had been organizing "three or four days ahead of time". Eastman asserted this had been reported by "The Washington Post" days earlier, though the article he appeared to reference did not support his assertion and did not mention antifa. The FBI had announced two weeks earlier there was no evidence of antifa involvement in the siege. Eastman referred to an "antifa and BLM guy" who had been arrested after the Capitol incursion, an apparent reference to John Earle Sullivan, a Utah man who some characterized as an "antifa leader" who had supposedly infiltrated the rally crowd to instigate the insurgency. Federal authorities had not identified the man as an antifa activist. Black Lives Matter Utah had for months disassociated itself from Sullivan on concerns he might be associated with the Proud Boys.


title: John Eastman

text: Eastman asserted his Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination on December 1, 2021, in a letter in which he refused to testify to the United States House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack. CNN reported Eastman met with the committee but invoked the Fifth Amendment 146 times.


title: John Eastman

text: In an effort to withhold 19,000 emails subpoenaed by the committee, in January 2022 an attorney for Eastman told a federal judge that they were protected by attorney-client privilege because Eastman had been representing Trump while participating in the January 2 conference call with state legislators; the January 3 Oval Office meeting with Trump and Pence; and while working as a member of the Trump team at the Willard Hotel command center. Eastman had not previously asserted privilege. The emails were stored on servers at Eastman's former employer, Chapman University, which had been subpoenaed and did not object to their release. The judge ordered the emails released to Eastman's legal team to identify which they asserted were privileged, before allowing a third party to scrutinize them. Eastman relinquished nearly 8,000 emails to the committee in February 2022 but asserted privilege for about 11,000 others.


title: John Eastman

text: As Eastman sought to withhold some emails, in March 2022 the committee continued to seek them, stating in a federal court filing that the evidence it had acquired "provides, at minimum, a good-faith basis for concluding" Trump and his campaign violated multiple laws in a criminal conspiracy to defraud the United States by attempting to prevent Congress from certifying his defeat. The filing included an excerpt of a January 6 email exchange with Pence aide Greg Jacob in which Eastman stated, "I implore you to consider one more relatively minor violation [of the Electoral Count Act] and adjourn for 10 days to allow the legislatures to finish their investigations, as well as to allow a full forensic audit of the massive amount of illegal activity that has occurred here." Douglas Letter, general counsel to the House, said about Eastman asking Pence to delay Biden's certification, "It was so minor it could have changed the entire course of our democracy. It could have meant the popularly elected president could have been thwarted from taking office. That was what Dr Eastman was urging." Eastman's assertion of privilege for 101 emails was rejected by Judge David O. Carter in March 2022, who ordered the emails to be produced to the committee. Carter wrote that Trump and Eastman likely conspired in criminal obstruction of Congress, adding, "If Dr. Eastman and President Trump’s plan had worked, it would have permanently ended the peaceful transition of power, undermining American democracy and the Constitution."


title: John Eastman

text: Seventeen months after the election, Eastman continued to press state legislatures to "de-certify" their election results. Some legal experts said his continued efforts might increase his criminal legal exposure, though if he were charged he might assert his persistent efforts showed he truly believed the election was stolen.


title: John Eastman

text: In May 2022, the University of Colorado, where Eastman was a visiting professor, released an email Eastman sent to Pennsylvania legislator Russ Diamond in December 2020. In the email, Eastman described a plan by which the Pennsylvania legislature could act to reverse Biden's victory in the state and declare Trump the winner. The plan called for legislators to express concern about absentee ballots to justify disqualifying tens of thousands of them, then using historical voting data to "discount each candidates' totals by a prorated amount" to arrive at a significant Trump lead. He wrote this new "untainted popular vote" would "help provide some cover" for the legislature to create a slate of Trump electors for certification.


title: John Eastman

text: In a late-night court filing on May 19, 2022, Eastman disclosed he had routinely communicated with Trump directly or via "six conduits" regarding legal strategy leading up to January 6, detailing "two hand-written notes from former President Trump about information that he thought might be useful for the anticipated litigation." Eastman made the disclosure to claim attorney-client privilege to prevent the January 6 committee from obtaining 600 of his emails.


title: John Eastman

text: On June 7, Carter ruled that Eastman must disclose an additional 159 sensitive documents to the committee. Ten documents related to three December 2020 meetings by a secretive group strategizing about how to overturn the election, which included what Carter characterized as a "high-profile" leader. Carter noted one email in particular that contained what he found was likely evidence of a crime and ordered it disclosed under the crime-fraud exception to the attorney-client privilege. The email content in question was a comment by an unidentified attorney that litigating a case regarding the January 6 session in Congress might "tank the January 6 strategy" and so the Trump legal team should avoid the courts. Carter concluded it showed the Trump legal team had decided to "evade judicial review to overturn a democratic election" and "forged ahead with a political campaign to disrupt the electoral count."


title: John Eastman

text: On June 15, 2022, the "Washington Post" reported that the January 6 committee had recently acquired emails between Eastman and Ginni Thomas, wife of Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas, and the "New York Times" reported that the committee had obtained the Eastman–Chesebro email exchange from December 24, 2020. Eastman and the Thomases are longtime friends.


title: John Eastman

text: Days after it became known Eastman and Thomas had communicated by email, Eastman posted on his new Substack blog one email that he captioned, "OMG, Mrs. Thomas asked me to give an update about election litigation to her group. Stop the Presses!" In the December 4, 2020 email, Thomas invited Eastman to speak four days later at a gathering of "Frontliners," which she described as a group of "grassroots state leaders." A private Facebook group named "FrontLiners for Liberty," which included over 50 people and was created in August 2020, showed Thomas as an administrator. The group's front page carried a banner stating, "the enemy of America...is the radical fascist left." After CNBC asked Thomas about the group, its public pages were either made private or deleted. The Thomas email was among those Carter ordered Eastman to release to the January 6 committee.


title: John Eastman

text: On June 22, 2022, several FBI agents approached him as he was leaving a New Mexico restaurant and, pursuant to a warrant, seized his phone. According to the warrant, the phone was to be taken to a forensic lab of the Department of Justice’s Office of Inspector General. On June 27, Eastman asked a federal judge to compel the government to return his phone and destroy its records of the phone's contents. Federal judge Robert Brack rejected Eastman's request on July 15. Federal investigators obtained a subsequent warrant to search the phone on July 12.


title: John Eastman

text: Judge Carter ruled in October 2022 that Eastman must turn over an additional 33 documents to the January 6 committee, including eight he determined were ineligible for attorney-client privilege because they related to possible criminal activity. Carter found that one Eastman email exchange showed Trump had sworn under oath that the number of alleged voting fraud cases his attorneys cited in a Georgia federal suit was accurate, though he knew it was not. One of the eight emails showed Eastman agreeing with Chesebro that bringing a legal argument to Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas would be "our only chance to get a favorable judicial opinion by Jan. 6, which might hold up the Georgia count in Congress." Chesebro continued, "We want to frame things so that Thomas could be the one to issue some sort of stay or other circuit justice opinion saying Georgia is in legitimate doubt." Thomas was the justice assigned to hear emergency arguments from cases in Georgia.


title: John Eastman

text: On October 4, 2021, a bipartisan group of attorneys, including two former federal judges and two former justices of the California Supreme Court, filed a complaint with the State Bar of California asking for an investigation of Eastman relating to "his representation of former President Donald J. Trump in efforts to discredit and overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election." In March 2022, the State Bar of California announced that since September 2021, it had been investigating claims of possible violations of law and ethics rules by Eastman. Eastman's attorney said he expected Eastman to be exonerated.


title: John Eastman

text: On January 9, 2021, the chairman of Chapman's board of trustees and two other members (including former Democratic Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez) called on the university's president and provost and the law school's dean "to promptly take action against Eastman for his role in the events of Jan. 6." Eastman responded that he was speaking two miles away from the Capitol building. Four days later, Chapman announced that Eastman had agreed to retire from the university, and the university's president, Daniele C. Struppa, said that Eastman and the university had "agreed not to engage in legal actions of any kind, including any claim of defamation that may currently exist, as both parties move forward". Eastman published a statement the next day saying that those who publicly condemned him "have created such a hostile environment for me that I no longer wish to be a member of the Chapman faculty, and am therefore retiring from my position, effective immediately." He said he would continue with his Spring 2021 position as Visiting Professor of Conservative Thought and Policy at the University of Colorado and intended to then devote full-time effort to his position as director of the Claremont Institute's Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence.


title: John Eastman

text: The University of Colorado cancelled Eastman's Spring 2021 courses due to low enrollment. The university also revoked some of Eastman's public-facing duties but permitted him to conduct scholarship.


title: John Eastman

text: On December 19, 2022, Eastman and Trump where publicly named during a televised January 6 Committee hearing as being among those who the committee wanted charged for the January 6, 2021 U.S. Capitol attack.


title: John Eastman

text: On January 7, 2021, Eastman edited this Wikipedia article to portray his post-election role in a more favorable light. His editing was reverted due to conflict-of-interest rules of Wikipedia, and on January 9 he appealed on the article's talk page, where some changes were approved but others were denied.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: The Battle of Brandywine, also known as the Battle of Brandywine Creek, was fought between the American Continental Army of General George Washington and the British Army of General Sir William Howe on September 11, 1777, as part of the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783). The forces met near Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. More troops fought at Brandywine than any other battle of the American Revolution. It was also the second longest single-day battle of the war, after the Battle of Monmouth, with continuous fighting for 11 hours.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: As Howe moved to take Philadelphia, then the American capital, the British forces routed the Continental Army and forced them to withdraw, first, to the City of Chester, Pennsylvania, and then northeast toward Philadelphia.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: Howe's army departed from Sandy Hook, New Jersey, across New York Bay from the occupied town of New York City on the southern tip of Manhattan Island, on July 23, 1777, and landed near present-day Elkton, Maryland, at the point of the "Head of Elk" by the Elk River at the northern end of the Chesapeake Bay, at the southern mouth of the Susquehanna River. Marching north, the British Army brushed aside American light forces in a few skirmishes. General Washington offered battle with his army posted behind Brandywine Creek, off the Christina River. While part of his army demonstrated in front of Chadds Ford, Howe took the bulk of his troops on a long march that crossed the Brandywine far beyond Washington's right flank. Due to poor scouting, the Americans did not detect Howe's column until it reached a position in rear of their right flank. Belatedly, three divisions were shifted to block the British flanking force at Birmingham Friends Meetinghouse and School, a Quaker meeting house.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: After a stiff fight, Howe's wing broke through the newly formed American right wing, which was deployed on several hills. At this point Lieutenant General Wilhelm von Knyphausen attacked Chadds Ford and crumpled the American left wing. As Washington's army streamed away in retreat, he brought up elements of General Nathanael Greene's division, which held off Howe's column long enough for his army to escape to the northeast. Polish General Casimir Pulaski defended Washington's rear, assisting in his escape. The defeat and subsequent maneuvers left Philadelphia vulnerable. The British captured it two weeks later on September 26, resulting in the city falling under British control for nine months, until June of 1778.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: In late August 1777, after a distressing 34-day journey from Sandy Hook on the coast of New Jersey, a Royal Navy fleet of more than 260 ships carrying some 17,000 British troops under the command of British General Sir William Howe landed at the head of the Elk River, on the northern end of the Chesapeake Bay near present-day Elkton, Maryland (then known as Head of Elk), approximately 40–50 miles (60–80 km) southwest of Philadelphia. Unloading the ships proved to be a logistical problem because the narrow river neck was shallow and muddy.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: General George Washington had placed the American forces, about 20,300-strong, between Head of Elk and Philadelphia. His forces were able to reconnoiter the British landing from Iron Hill near Newark, Delaware, about 9 miles (14 km) to the northeast. Because of the delay disembarking from the ships, Howe did not set up a typical camp but quickly moved forward with the troops. As a result, Washington was not able to accurately gauge the strength of the opposing forces.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: After a skirmish at Cooch's Bridge south of Newark, the British troops moved north and Washington abandoned a defensive encampment along the Red Clay Creek near Newport, Delaware, to deploy against the British at Chadds Ford. This site was important as it was the most direct passage across the Brandywine River on the road from Baltimore to Philadelphia. On September 9, Washington positioned detachments to guard other fords above and below Chadds Ford, hoping to force the battle there. Washington employed General John Armstrong, commanding about 1,000 Pennsylvania militia, to cover Pyle's Ford, 5.8 miles south of Chadds Ford, which was covered by Major Generals Anthony Wayne's and Nathanael Greene's divisions. Major General John Sullivan's division extended northward along the Brandywine's east banks, covering the high ground north of Chadds Ford along with Major General Adam Stephen's division and Major General Lord Stirling's divisions. Further upstream was a brigade under Colonel Moses Hazen covering Buffington's Ford and Wistar's Ford. Washington was confident that the area was secure.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: The British grouped forces at nearby Kennett Square. Howe, who had better information about the area than Washington, had no intention of mounting a full-scale frontal attack against the prepared American defenses. He instead employed a flanking maneuver, similar to that used in the Battle of Long Island. About 6,800 men under the command of Wilhelm von Knyphausen advanced to meet Washington's troops at Chadds Ford. The remainder of Howe's troops, about 9,000 men, under the command of Charles, Lord Cornwallis, marched north to Trimble's Ford across the West Branch of the Brandywine Creek, then east to Jefferis Ford across the East Branch (two fords that Washington had overlooked as a result of a poor understanding of the area and lack of credible reconnaissance), and then south to flank the American forces.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: September 11 began with a heavy fog, which provided cover for the British troops. Washington received contradictory reports about the British troop movements and continued to believe that the main force was moving to attack at Chadds Ford.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: At 5:30 a.m. the British and Hessian troops began marching east along the "Great Road" (now Route 1) from Kennett Square, advancing on the American troops positioned where the road crossed Brandywine Creek. The first shots of the battle took place about 4 miles west of Chadds Ford, at Welch's Tavern. Elements of Maxwell's continental light infantry skirmished with the British vanguard (primarily the Queen's Rangers – a battalion of loyalists). The British continued to advance and encountered a greater force of continentals behind the stone walls on the Old Kennett Meetinghouse grounds. The battle was fought at mid-morning around the meeting house while the pacifist Quakers continued to hold their midweek service. One of the Quakers later wrote, "While there was much noise and confusion without, all was quiet and peaceful within."


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: From the Meetinghouse grounds, the battle continued for three miles to the Brandywine Creek, at Chadds Ford. Eventually the British pushed the Americans back but not before suffering heavy losses.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: The main British column under General Cornwallis (and accompanied by General Howe) set out from Kennett Square at 5:00 a.m.. Local loyalist sources had provided Howe with knowledge of two unguarded fords, above the forks of the Brandywine. The 17-mile flank march took approximately 9 hours to complete. The British appeared on the Americans' right flank at around 2 p.m. and took a much-needed rest on Osbourne's Hill, a commanding position north of the Continental army. Having received intelligence from Colonel Bland's scouts, Washington ordered Sullivan to take overall command of Stirling and Stephen's divisions (in addition to his own) and quickly march north to meet the British flank attack. As they were forming their lines north of Dilworth, Howe launched his attack. Having taken overall command of the right wing of the army, Sullivan left his division to confer with the other generals. His own division he left under the command of Preudhomme de Borre, with orders to shift to the right in order to link up with Stirling and Stephen's divisions (from left to right the divisions were arranged as Sullivan, Stirling, Stephen). As the British lines advanced, the Hessian Jaegers threatened to flank the American right forcing Stephen and Stirling to shift right. Howe was slow to attack, which bought time for the Americans to position some of their men on high ground near Birmingham Meetinghouse, about a mile (1.6 km) north of Chadds Ford. By 4 p.m., the British attacked. The British Brigade of Guards caught de Borre by surprise on the American left, before de Borre had time to fully form, and immediately sent them in to disarray, causing the entire division to rout. Initially, Stephen's and Stirling's divisions held firm, aided by a battery of artillery on a knoll between their divisions. However, the British light infantry battalions, aided by the Jaegers, eventually caused Stephen's division to fall back. A bayonet charge by the British grenadier battalions, in the center, similarly forced Stirling to retreat. The Marquis de Lafayette had only just arrived, joining Stirling's division, when he received a wound while trying to rally the retreating troops.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: Around 6 p.m., Washington and Greene arrived with reinforcements to try to hold off the British, who now occupied Meeting House Hill. Washington conferred with Greene and Knox, the latter of whom was head of artillery, in the yard of the William Brinton house. The 2nd Battalion of Grenadiers was nearing their position, and was joined by a fresh reserve brigade (the 4th British Brigade). It was determined that Knox would deploy artillery to slow the British advance. Greene's reinforcements, combined with the remnants of Sullivan's, Stephen's, and Stirling's divisions, formed south of Dilworth and stopped the pursuing British for nearly an hour, letting the rest of the army retreat. When darkness fell, Greene's division finally began the march to Chester along with the rest of the army. The British army was not able to pursue due to the onset of night. The Americans were also forced to leave behind many of their cannons on Meeting House Hill because almost all of their artillery horses were killed.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: Upon hearing the attack of Cornwallis's column, Knyphausen launched an attack against the weakened American center across Chadds Ford, breaking through the divisions commanded by Wayne and William Maxwell and forcing them to retreat and leave behind most of their cannons. Armstrong's militia, never engaged in the fighting, also decided to retreat from their positions. Further north, Greene sent Brigadier General George Weedon's troops to cover the road just outside the town of Dilworth to hold off the British long enough for the rest of the Continental Army to retreat. Darkness brought the British pursuit to a standstill, which then allowed Weedon's force to retreat. The defeated Americans retreated to Chester where most of them arrived at midnight, with stragglers arriving until morning. The American retreat was well organized, largely because of the efforts of Lafayette, who, although wounded, created a rally point that allowed for a more orderly retreat before being treated for his wound.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: The official British casualty list detailed 587 casualties: 93 killed (eight officers, seven sergeants and 78 rank and file); 488 wounded (49 officers, 40 sergeants, four drummers and 395 rank and file); and six rank and file missing unaccounted for. Only 40 of the British Army's casualties were Hessians. Historian Thomas J. McGuire writes that, "American estimates of British losses run as high as 2,000, based on distant observation and sketchy, unreliable reports".


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: Most accounts of the American loss were from the British. One initial report by a British officer recorded American casualties at over 200 killed, around 750 wounded, and 400 prisoners were taken, many of them wounded. A member of General Howe's staff claimed that 400 rebels were buried on the field by the victors. Another British officer wrote that, "The Enemy had 502 dead in the field". General Howe's report to the British colonial secretary, Lord George Germain, said that the Americans, "had about 300 men killed, 600 wounded, and near 400 made prisoners".


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: No casualty return for the American army at Brandywine survives and no figures, official or otherwise, were ever released. The nearest thing to a hard figure from the American side was by Major General Nathanael Greene, who estimated that Washington's army had lost between 1,200 and 1,300 men. On September 14, about 350 wounded Americans were taken from the British camp at Dilworth to a newly established hospital at Wilmington, Delaware. This would suggest that of the "near 400" prisoners reported by Howe, only about 50 had surrendered unwounded. If General Greene's estimate of the total American loss was accurate, then they had between 1,160 and 1,260 killed, wounded or deserted during the battle. The British also captured 11 out of 14 of the American artillery pieces. Among the American wounded was the Marquis de Lafayette.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: In addition to losses in battle, 315 men were posted as deserters from Washington's camp during this stage of the campaign.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: Although Howe had defeated the American army, his lack of cavalry prevented its total destruction. Washington had committed a serious error in leaving his right flank wide open and could have brought about his army's annihilation had it not been for Sullivan, Stirling and Stephen's divisions, which bought them time. Evening was approaching and, in spite of the early start Cornwallis had made in the flanking maneuver, most of the American army was able to escape. In his report to the Continental Congress detailing the battle, Washington stated: "despite the day's misfortune, I am pleased to announce that most of my men are in good spirits and still have the courage to fight the enemy another day."


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: British and American forces maneuvered around each other for the next several days with only a few encounters such as the Battle of the Clouds on September 16 and the Battle of Paoli on the night of September 20–21. In a matter of days, the Battles of Saratoga, hundreds of miles to the north, provided a victory over a British force which Howe was supposed to join.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: In preparation for the fall of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania's Supreme Executive Council ordered that eleven bells in the city, including the State House bell (known today as the Liberty Bell) and the bells from Christ Church and St. Peter's Church, be taken down and removed from Philadelphia to prevent the British Army from taking possession of them and melting them down to cast into munitions for use in the war. The Liberty Bell was transported to Allentown, where it was hidden for nine months under floor boards at Zion United Church of Christ in the city.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: The Continental Congress then abandoned Philadelphia, moving first to Lancaster, for one day and then to York. Repairs were made at the Van Leer Furnace and military supplies were also moved to Reading.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: Eight Army National Guard units (103rd Eng Bn, A/1-104th Cav, 109th FA, 111th Inf, 113th Inf, 116th Inf, 1–175th Inf and 198th Sig Bn) and one active Regular Army Field Artillery battalion (1–5th FA) are derived from American units that participated in the Battle of Brandywine. There are thirty current U.S. Army units with lineages that go back to the colonial era.


title: Battle of Brandywine

text: Brandywine Battlefield Historic Site is a National Historical Landmark. The historic park is owned and operated by the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, on 52 acres (210,000 m), near Chadds Ford, Delaware County, part of the site of the Battle of Brandywine.


title: Sundiata Keita

text: Sundiata Keita (Mandinka, Malinke: ; 1217 – c. 1255) (also known as Manding Diara, Lion of Mali, Sogolon Djata, son of Sogolon, Nare Maghan and Sogo Sogo Simbon Salaba) was a prince and founder of the Mali Empire. He is also the great-uncle of the Malian ruler Mansa Musa, known for being the wealthiest person of all time.


title: Sundiata Keita

text: Written sources augment the Mande oral histories, with the Moroccan traveller Muhammad ibn Battúta (1304–1368) and the Tunisian historian ibn Khaldun (1332–1406) both having travelled to Mali in the century after Sundiata's death, and providing independent verification of his existence. The semi-historical but legendary "Epic of Sundiata" by the Malinké/Maninka people centers on his life. The epic poem is primarily known through oral tradition, transmitted by generations of Maninka griots ("djeli" or "jeliw"). The Manden Charter issued during his reign is listed by UNESCO as one of an intangible cultural heritage.


title: Sundiata Keita

text: The oral traditions relating to Sundiata Keita were passed down generation after generation by the local griots ("djeli" or "jeliw"), until eventually their stories were put into writing. Sundiata was the son of Naré Maghann Konaté (variation: "Maghan Konfara") and Sogolon Condé (variations: "Sogolon Kolonkan" or "Sogolon Kédjou", the daughter of the ""buffalo woman"", so-called because of her ugliness and hunchback). Sundiata was crippled from childhood and his mother (Sogolon) was the subject of ridicule among her co-wives. She was constantly teased and ridiculed openly for her son's disability. This significantly affected Sundiata and he was determined to do everything he possibly could in order to walk like his peers. Through this determination, he one day miraculously got up and walked. Among his peers, he became a leader. His paternal half-brother, Dankaran Touman, and Dankaran's mother, Sassouma Bereté, were cruel and resentful of Sundiata and his mother. Their cruelty escalated after the death of Naré Maghann (the king and father of Sundiata). To escape persecution and threats on her son's life, Sogolon took her children, Sundiata and his sisters, into exile. This exile lasted for many years and took them to different countries within the Ghana Empire and eventually to Mema, where the king of Mema granted them asylum. Sundiata was admired by the King of Mema for his courage and tenacity. As such, he was given a senior position within the kingdom. When King Soumaoro Kanté of Sosso conquered the Mandinka people, messengers were sent to go and look for Sogolon and her children, as Sundiata was destined to be a great leader according to prophecy. Upon finding him in Mema, they persuaded him to come back in order to liberate the Mandinkas and their homeland. On his return, he was accompanied by an army given to him by the King of Mema. The warlords of Mali at the time who were his age group included: Tabon Wana, Kamadia Kamara (or Kamadia Camara), Faony Condé, Siara Kuman Konaté and Tiramakhan Traore (many variations: "Trimaghan" or "Tiramaghan", the future conqueror of Kaabu). It was on the plain of Siby (var: Sibi) where they formed a pact brotherhood in order to liberate their country and people from the powerful Sosso king. At The Battle of Kirina, Sundiata and his allies defeated the Sosso king, and he became the first Emperor of the Mali Empire. He was the first of the Mandinka line of kings to adopt the royal title "Mansa" ("king" or "emperor" in the Mandinka language).


title: Sundiata Keita

text: The Mandinka epic does not give us dates, but Arab and North African writers who visited the area about a century after the epic's events documented on paper some of the information, including dates and a genealogy. Conversely, the written sources left out other pieces of information that the oral tradition includes.


title: Sundiata Keita

text: The proper English spelling of Sundiata's name is Sunjata, pronounced "soon-jah-ta", approaching the actual pronunciation in the original Mandinka. The name "Sogolon" derives from his mother and "Jata" means "lion". It is the traditional way of praising someone in some West African societies (Gambia, Senegal, Mali and Guinea in particular). The name "Sundiata" praises him through his mother which means ""the lion of Sogolon"" or ""Sogolon's lion"". The name "Jata" derives from "Jara" (lion). Jara and many of its variations such as "jata", "jala" or "jada" are merely regional variations, from Gambia, Guinea or Mali, for instance. Sundiata's name is thus a derivation of his mother's name Sogolon ("Son" or its variation "Sun") and Jata (lion).


title: Sundiata Keita

text: Some Bambaras and Mandinkas have proposed that the name "Keita" actually means "inheritor" (heir-apparent) in the Mandinka language, and that Sundiata's real surname is "Konaté" (French spelling in Mali) or "Konateh", variations: Konate, Conateh (English spelling in the Gambia where the Mandinkas make up the largest ethnic group). It is proposed that Sundiata Keita's father, Naré Maghann Konaté, took the real family name "Konaté" while his successors were "Keitas in waiting" (heirs to the throne). The name "Keita" is a clan name rather than a surname. Although in some West African societies a clan can be similar to the family name (see Joof family), such similarities do not exist between the names "Keita" and "Konaté". Both points of contention agree that Keita is not a real surname, but rather a royal name, in spite of the fact that Sundiata is referred to as Sundiata Keita in many scholarly works. At present, there is no consensus among the scholars regarding the name "Sundiata Konaté."


title: Sundiata Keita

text: Delafosse previously proposed that, Soumaoro Kanté's grandfather with the help of his army and the Sosso nobility of Kaniaga captured what was left of the sacked Ghana Empire, and by 1180, Diara Kanté (var: "Jara Kante"), Soumaoro's father gained control of Koumbi Saleh, dethroned a Muslim dynasty and continued the Diarisso Dynasty (variation: "Jariso" or "Jarisso") whose son (Soumaoro) went on to succeed him and launched an offensive against the Mandinkas. Delafosse's original work has been refuted and discarded by many scholars including Monteil, Cornevin, etc. There was no Diara Kanté in the oral sources. That was an addition by Delafosee which was contrary to the original sources.


title: Sundiata Keita

text: The consensus is, in c. 1235, Sundiata who had survived one of Soumaoro's earlier raids went to war with the help of his allies against King Soumaoro of Sosso. Although a valiant warrior, Soumaoro was defeated at The Battle of Kirina (c. 1235). Soumaoro is regarded as one of the true champions of the Traditional African religion. According to Fyle, Soumaoro was the inventor of the balafon and the "dan" (a four-string guitar used by the hunters and griots). After his victory at Kirina, Sundiata took control of the former conquered states of the Sosso and appropriated privileges among those who participated in the defeat of Soumaoro. The former allies of Soumaoro were also later defeated, in particular the king of Jolof. Serer oral tradition speaks of a Serer king of Jolof, involved in the occult (just as Soumaoro), who was later defeated by Tiramakhan Traore (one of the generals of Sundiata) after Sundiata sent his men to buy horses in Jolof. It is reported that, when Sundiata sent his men to Jolof to buy horses in a caravan loaded with gold, the king of Jolof took all the gold and horses – known among some as "the robbery of the horses". In a revenge attack, Sundiata sent his general to Jolof to assassinate the king. It is believed that, it was probably this king of Jolof (known as Mansa Jolofing or Jolofing Mansa) who sided with Soumaoro at The Battle of Kirina and possibly belongs to the Ngom Dynasty of Jolof, the predecessors of the Diaw and Ndiaye Dynasties of Jolof. At present, little is known about the Ngom Dynasty of Jolof.


title: Sundiata Keita

text: Niane has advanced the claim that, the Jolofing Mansa sided with Sumaguru [or "Soumaoro"] because ""like him, he was hostile to Islam."" He went on to state that:


title: Sundiata Keita

text: In his piece in the "General History of Africa", Volume 4, p. 133, Djibril Tamsir Niane alludes to Sundiata being a Muslim. According to Fage, there is nothing in the original epos that supports the claim. Sundiata is regarded as a great hunter and magician whose subjects predominantly adhered to traditional beliefs, as did Sundiata. However, some of Sundiata's successors were Muslim, with Mansa Musa Keita being one of the most widely known. The explorer Ibn Battuta, who visited Mali during the reign of Sundiata's great-nephew Suleyman, claimed that Mansa Musa's grandfather was named Sariq Jata and had converted to Islam. This may be a reference to Sundiata, though if so Ibn Battuta was apparently mistaken about the genealogy, as Musa's grandfather was Sundiata's brother Mande Bory. Other medieval Arabic sources claim that a ruler before Sundiata named Barmandana was the first ruler of Mali to convert to Islam.


title: Sundiata Keita

text: Some Muslim griots later added to the epic of Sundiata by claiming that Sundiata has "an ancestral origin among the companions of Muhammad in Mecca" (namely, Bilal Ibn Rabah) and speaks of himself as a successor to Dhu al-Qarnayn, a conqueror and king mentioned in the Quran, commonly regarded as a reference to Alexander the Great. Claims such as these are referred to by scholars like G. Wesley Johnson as nothing more than "Islamic legitimacy" - in African countries where Islam is now the predominant religion such as Senegal, and where Muslim griots try to link historical African figures to the prophet Muhammad either through a line of descent or by claiming that the ancestor of the historical figure belonged to Muhammad's tribe or was one of his followers (an attempt to distance them from their traditional African religious past). Although Sundiata was not a Muslim, it is clear that the original epic of Sundiata was later affected by what Ralph Austen calls "Islamicate" culture—that is, the integration of Islamic and Arab culture.


title: Sundiata Keita

text: After his victory at Kirina, Mansa Sundiata established his capital at Niani, near the present-day Malian border with Guinea. Assisted by his generals, Tiramakhan being one of the most prominent, he went on to conquer other states. The lands of the old Ghana Empire were conquered. The king of Jolof was defeated by Tiramakhan and his kingdom reduced to a vassal state. After defeating the former ally of Soumaoro, Tiramakhan ventured deep into present-day Senegal, the Gambia and Guinea Bissau and conquered them. Tiramakhan was responsible for the conquest of the Senegambia. In Kaabu (part of present-day Guinea Bissau), he defeated the last great Bainuk king (King Kikikor) and annexed his state. The great Kikikor was killed and his kingdom was renamed Kaabu. Sundiata was responsible for the conquest of Diafunu and Kita. Although the conquered states were answerable to the Mansa ("king") of Mali, Sundiata was not an absolute monarch despite what the title implies. Though he probably wielded popular authority, the Mali Empire was reportedly run like a federation with each tribe having a chief representative at the court. The first tribes were Mandinka clans of Traore, Kamara, Koroma, Konde (or "Conde"), and of course Keita. The Great Gbara Assembly was in charge of checking the Mansa's power, enforcing his edicts among their people, and selecting the successor (usually the Mansa's son, brother or sister's son). The Empire flourished from the 13th to the late 14th century but began to decline as some vassal states threw away the yoke of Mali and regained their independence. Some of these former vassals went on to form empires of their own.