White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows speaks to reporters following a television interview, outside the White House in Washington, U.S. October 21, 2020.
Alexander Drago | Reuters
A South Carolina judge on Wednesday ordered former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows to comply with a Georgia grand jury subpoena demanding his testimony in a probe into potential criminal meddling within the 2020 presidential election.
The order got here a day after a lawyer for the previous South Carolina congressman Meadows said the subpoena issued by the Fulton County grand jury needs to be blocked for multiple reasons. Meadows’ attorney reportedly said he’ll appeal the choice.
The grand jury is investigating efforts by former President Donald Trump and his allies to get Georgia election officials to effectively reverse the victory in that state by President Joe Biden.
Georgia authorities needed to ask a judge in South Carolina to compel Meadows to comply with the subpoena because he shouldn’t be a resident of Georgia.
Meadows listened in on a phone call Trump made to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in early January 2021, during which the then-president urged Raffensperger to “find” him enough votes to win the state.
The decision got here days before a joint session of Congress was as a consequence of certify the outcomes of Biden’s win within the Electoral College, which hinged on his popular vote victories in swing states that included Georgia.
A spokesman for Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, whose prosecutors are presenting evidence to the grand jury, declined to comment on Wednesday’s order, which was issued in South Carolina’s Court of Common Pleas.
Meadows’ lawyer James Bannister didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment.
Bannister in a court filing argued that the subpoena needs to be blocked since it had been issued under a Georgia civil law, and never a criminal law. Bannister said that South Carolina’s law related to securing the attendance of witnesses for one more state in a criminal proceeding wouldn’t apply to the one issued for Meadows.
The lawyer also argued Meadows shouldn’t be a “material witness” under South Carolina law because he has asserted the claim of executive privilege in arguing he shouldn’t be compelled to testify to the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot by Trump supporters.
The Georgia grand jury has subpoenaed various other Trump allies and lawyers for the previous president, amongst them Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.
Graham asked a federal judge to quash his subpoena, arguing that he’s exempt from being compelled to testify within the case due to U.S. Structure’s speech and debate clause, which protects members of Congress from legal risk from their comments related to legislative business.
Graham has claimed that his own call to Raffensperger after Election Day 2020 was a part of a legislative inquiry.
However the federal judge in Graham’s case refused to dam the subpoena, while saying that he couldn’t be asked about portions of the decision that could possibly be related to such a legislative inquiry.
Graham last week lost a bid to delay the subpoena on the eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, which said he had not shown he was more likely to win an appeal of that ruling. The appeals court also said, “There is important dispute about whether his phone calls with Georgia election officials were legislative investigations in any respect.”
On Monday, U.S. Supreme Justice Clarence Thomas temporarily blocked the subpoena for Graham pending further filings within the Supreme Court.
