Meadows ordered to testify in Georgia
ATLANTA — A judge on Wednesday ordered former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows to testify before a special grand jury that’s investigating whether President Donald Trump and his allies illegally tried to sway Georgia’s results in the 2020 election.
Meadows, a former GOP congressman, is a key figure in the investigation. He traveled to Georgia, sat in on Trump’s phone calls with state officials and coordinated and communicated with outside influencers who were either encouraging or discouraging the pressure campaign.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis opened the investigation last year into actions taken by Trump and others to overturn his loss to Democrat Joe Biden in the state. Meadows is just one of several associates and advisers of the Republican former president whose testimony Willis has sought.
Because Meadows doesn’t live in Georgia, Willis, a Democrat, had to use a process that involved getting a judge where he lives in South Carolina to order him to appear.
Meadows attorney Jim Bannister said his client was “weighing all options,” including appeals.
“Nothing final until we see the order,” he said.
After the election, Meadows was widely seen in the White House as a chief instigator of Trump’s fixation on the election, passing along debunked conspiracies about fraud that other officials were forced to swat down.
On the legal front, in a court filing this week, Meadows’ lawyer Bannister argued that executive privilege and other rights shield his client from testifying.
Bannister asserted in a filing that Meadows has been instructed by Trump “to preserve certain privileges and immunities attaching to his former office as White House Chief of Staff.” And Willis’ petition calls for him “to divulge the contents of executive privileged communications with the president,” Bannister wrote.
Meadows previously invoked that privilege in a fight against subpoenas from the U.S. House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.