The Jan. 6 Committee Unanimously Voted To Hold Mark Meadows In Contempt After He Stood Them Up

Mark Meadows has been in the news a lot recently. The former White House chief of staff has a new book out, which he intended as a valentine to his old boss, Donald Trump. Instead it’s revealed damning and/or unflattering things about him, like how he tested positive for COVID earlier than he revealed. (He also gorged on McD’s while in the hospital, near death from the virus he’d long underplayed.) Then he stood up the Jan. 6 committee, whom he’d already sent thousands of explosive documents. Now? He might be going to jail.

As per The New York Times, the committee met on Monday night and among the items on their to-do list was a vote on whether to hold Meadows in criminal contempt of Congress after he’d ignored their subpoena. The vote was unanimous, 9-0. The vote now moves to the House. The charge carries with it up to a year in jail.

Meadows, who was Trump’s right-hand man during his last months on the job — and during the lead-up to the now-former president’s failed attempts to overturn an election he lost by over seven million votes — had previously agreed to meet with the committee. Two days before he was due for a chat, he announced he would defy them, much as Steve Bannon did earlier. Bannon, too, was held in contempt, and he was swiftly indicted. Perhaps the two will share a jail cell.

The Jan. 6 committee also revealed some of the frantic text messages they’d acquired from Trump allies that day, which they had sent to Meadows as the Capitol building was under siege. They included Don Jr., the president’s eldest and most unhinged son, as well as numerous Fox News personalities, including Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, and Brian Kilmeade. All pleaded with Meadows to urge Trump to call off his supporters, even as they went on the air and made baseless and untrue claims that the group included leftist activists who’d infiltrated the Trumpist throngs to make them look bad.

Not long after Meadows appeared on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show. They did not discuss these bombshell texts. Meadows addressed the contempt charge and once again waved the bogus “executive privilege” defense.

(Via NYT)