Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY), who serves as vice chair of the Jan. 6 Committee, on Tuesday revealed yet more details about former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows’ communications as he worked with former President Trump to subvert the election results before and during the deadly Capitol insurrection.
Appearing before the House Rules committee shortly before its vote to advance a resolution to hold Meadows in contempt to the full House, Cheney read aloud more texts, sent from unnamed GOP lawmakers to Meadows while the Capitol was invaded by Trump supporters on Jan. 6.
“‘It is really bad up here on the hill,'” Cheney read.
“‘The President needs to stop this ASAP,'” she added.
“‘Fix this now,'” said another.
After noting that the committee has also received texts from Trump officials and members of the media sent to Meadows during the Capitol insurrection, Cheney explained that Meadows has knowledge helpful to the committee about Trump’s efforts to persuade state officials to alter their official election results, pointing to the former Trump official’s participation in a phone call between Trump and Georgia secretary of state Brad Raffensperger.
Meadows “was on the phone when President Trump asked the secretary of state to ‘find 11,780 votes’ to change the election results in Georgia,” Cheney said.
According to Cheney, Meadows appeared to have been “texting at least one other participant on the call” at the time, citing Meadows’ texts that he has turned over to the committee.
“Again, Mr. Meadows has no conceivable privilege basis to refuse to testify on that topic and doing so puts him in contempt of Congress,” Cheney said.
Cheney then said that Meadows’ texts revealed that the former Trump official had communicated “multiple times” with a current member of Congress who was working with Jeffrey Clark, the DOJ official who Trump mulled making attorney general as part of his scheme to subvert the election.
Although the committee hasn’t named the GOP lawmakers who texted Meadows, chair Bennie Thompson (D-MS) told reporters after the House Rules meeting that he expects the panel to do so in the future.
“At some point they will be [named], but it’s a little premature to do it right now,” Thompson said, according to NPR.
Cheney’s remarks were issued a day after the panel voted to recommend that Meadows be charged with criminal contempt of Congress. On Monday night, Cheney read aloud revealing texts between Meadows, Trump’s loyal soldiers at Fox News and Donald Trump Jr. during the Capitol insurrection — all of whom pleaded for Meadows to urge Trump to put a stop to the attack on Jan. 6.
Watch Cheney’s remarks below:
