If you’ve been keeping up with the various investigations and revelations surrounding January 6 and the plot to overturn the 2020 election, you know that one person—among many!—who hasn’t come out looking good is former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows. The fourth and final individual to serve as Donald Trump’s right hand at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Meadows, according to his assistant, had prior knowledge that the rioters who attacked the Capitol were armed, brushed off the mob’s chants to have then vice president Mike Pence hanged, and later sought a pardon from Trump for his actions on the day of the insurrection. He also repeatedly urged the Justice Department to investigate ridiculous voter-fraud conspiracy theories—like the one about Italian satellites giving Trump votes to Joe Biden—and exchanged a number of messages with Clarence Thomas’s wife, Ginni Thomas, about keeping the former president in the White House. In other words, Meadows was intimately involved in the effort to subvert democracy—and according to recently revealed text messages, he was even more involved than previously thought.
On Monday, Talking Points Memo published a trove of text messages that the former chief of staff turned over to the January 6 committee before suing the panel and asking a federal judge to block a subpoena for his phone records. Perhaps not surprisingly—given the lengths to which Meadows went to not cooperate with the people investigating the events before, during, and after January 6—these texts do not make him look good, as they suggest that he basically spent all of his waking hours between the 2020 election and Biden’s inauguration chatting with people about how to stop Biden from becoming president. In total, Meadows texted with, or received texts from, at least 34 Republican members of Congress regarding how to keep Trump in the Oval Office despite the inconvenient fact that he had not won the presidential election.
Representative Scott Perry, for instance, told Meadows about assembling a “cyber team” to seize voting machines throughout the country and place them under “lock and key.” He was all in on the crackpot idea re: Italian satellites and also suggested that Gina Haspel, who’d been appointed to run the CIA by Trump, was “running around on the Hill covering for the Brits who helped quarterback this entire operation.” While Meadows does not appear to have responded to the majority of Perry’s messages, he did push the DOJ to investigate the Italian satellite conspiracy theory and personally asked Perry if one of his contacts would be “willing to sign an affidavit,” which likely detailed claims of election fraud.
Elsewhere, Meadows exchanged messages with Representative Mo Brooks, who texted the chief of staff in December of 2020 about plans to hold a “White House meeting regarding formulation of our January 6 strategies.” In a message to Fox News host Brian Kilmeade, Meadows later confirmed the meeting had occurred. (“The President and I met with about 15 members of Congress to discuss the evidence of voter fraud in various states as well as discuss the strategy for making the case to the American people,” Meadows wrote to Kilmeade.) The meeting was attended by, among others, GOP reps. Paul Gosar, Jody Hice, Jim Jordan, Andy Biggs, Perry, and Representative-elect Marjorie Taylor Greene. Speaking of Greene, thanks to previous reporting from CNN, we know that she texted Meadows on December 31, 2020, to say, “We have to get organized for the 6th”; she also asked to “meet with Rudy Giuliani again.” Jordan reached out the night before the attack on the Capitol and presented a plan for Pence to block the certification of Biden’s win “in accordance with guidance from founding father Alexander Hamilton and judicial precedence.”
Probably most disturbing, though, is the message that came from Representative Ralph Norman 11 days after the insurrection and just three days before Biden’s inauguration, in which he wrote: “Mark, in seeing what’s happening so quickly, and reading about the Dominion law suits attempting to stop any meaningful investigation we are at a point of no return in saving our Republic !! Our LAST HOPE is invoking Marshall Law!! PLEASE URGE TO PRESIDENT TO DO SO!!”
Norman, like Greene, of course meant to refer to “martial law” despite writing “Marshall,” because they’re both f–king idiots. Also like Greene, Norman is a current member of Congress, as are Perry, Jordan, and a whole bunch of other people who frantically texted with Meadows about stealing a second term for Trump. And come January, their party will control half of Congress. Not great for the ye olde democracy!
Bess Levin
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