Mark Meadows, the former chief of staff under former President Donald Trump, was reportedly granted immunity and told special counsel Jack Smith that he had told Trump at the time that election fraud claims were without merit.
ABC News reported the development Tuesday based on sources familiar with the investigation.
Meadows has said in a book published after Trump left the Oval Office that the election was stolen and that Trump actually won the presidential contest.
Those claims are contradicted by what he told the special counsel, according to the ABC News report.
Meadows is said to have met with the special counsel team three times to discuss his time as Trump’s final chief of staff. The former congressman reportedly told them that he said to Trump numerous times in the weeks after the election that claims of voter fraud were baseless.
He also reportedly told the special counsel team that Trump was being “dishonest” when he publicly claimed there was election fraud hours after the results were reported.
“Obviously, we didn’t win,” Meadows reportedly said to investigators.
Meadows previously turned over about 6,000 documents relating to the election to the congressional committee investigating the rioting at the Capitol on Jan. 6. Some of those texts showed Fox News hosts calling on Meadows to tell Trump to tell protesters to go home.
“Mark, the president needs to tell people in the capitol to go home,” read a text from Laura Ingraham to Meadows. “This is hurting all of us. He is destroying his legacy.”
An attorney for Meadows declined to comment to ABC News about the report.
A spokesperson for the Trump presidential campaign released a statement about the report.
“Wrongful, unethical leaks throughout these Biden witch-hunts only underscore how detrimental these empty cases are to our Democracy and System of Justice and how vital it is for President Trump’s First Amendment rights to not be infringed upon by un-Constitutional gag orders. Transparency and free speech are the only way to combat murky gossip,” the statement read.
“President Trump will not be deterred by Crooked Joe Biden’s election interference and will continue to focus on winning back the White House and Making America Great Again,” the statement concluded.
Also on Tuesday, Trump’s former attorney, Jenna Ellis, pleaded guilty to one felony count of aiding and abetting false statements and writings and promised to testify against the other codefendants in the case.
In addition to investigating Trump’s role in efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, special counsel Jack Smith is investigating accusations that the former president improperly handled classified White House documents.
Here’s more about Meadows’ reported immunity:
Mark Meadows Given Immunity To Testify About Trump And 2020 Election, Report Sayswww.youtube.com
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