Meadows responds to Schiff’s subpoena threat of criminal prosecution
Meadows: We already went through impeachment and now we’re holding hearings? The American people understand that it’s politics as usual.
Former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows is providing records to the Jan. 6 committee and is expected to testify.
Meadows’ cooperation comes after former White House official Stephen Bannon was indicted on contempt of Congress charges for failing to cooperate with the committee.
January 6th Committee Chairman Bennie G. Thompson announced Tuesday that Meadows has been “engaging” with the committee through his attorney.
“He has produced records to the committee and will soon appear for an initial deposition,” Thompson, D-Miss., said in a statement Tuesday. “The Select Committee expects all witnesses, including Mr. Meadows, to provide all information requested and that the Select Committee is lawfully entitled to receive.”
White House chief of staff Mark Meadows speaks with reporters at the White House on Sept. 17, 2020.
(AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
“The committee will continue to assess his degree of compliance with our subpoena after the deposition,” Thompson added.
Rep. Bennie Thompson, chairman of the House Select Committee on the Jan. 6 attack, speaks with reporters outside the Capitol on Sept. 24, 2021. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)
Meadows’ attorney, George Terwilliger, in a statement Tuesday said they “appreciate” the committee’s “openness” to receiving responses to non-privileged topics.
“As we have from the beginning, we continue to work with the Select Committee and its staff to see if we can reach an accommodation that does not require Mr. Meadows to waive Executive Privilege or to forfeit the long-standing position that senior White House aides cannot be compelled to testify before Congress,” Terwilliger said in a statement. “We appreciate the Select Committee’s openness to receiving voluntary responses on non-privileged topics.”
Thompson’s announcement comes after the committee set a deadline for Meadows to comply with a subpoena earlier this month. Terwilliger had said the former chief of staff would not comply with the subpoena, in an effort to protect former President Trump’s executive privilege. The committee said that if Meadows did not appear by the deadline, it would consider him in contempt of Congress.
“Our correspondence over the last few weeks shows a sharp legal dispute with the committee. The issues concern whether Mr. Meadows can be compelled to testify and whether, even if he could , that he could be forced to answer questions that involve privileged communications,” Terwilliger said in a statement earlier this month.
“Legal disputes are appropriately resolved by courts,” he continued. “It would be irresponsible for Mr. Meadows to prematurely resolve that dispute by voluntarily waiving privileges that are at the heart of those legal issues.”
Terwilliger added: “No matter how important the subject matter of the committee’s work, decades of litigation over Executive Privilege shows how critically important it is for a president to have access to advice and counsel without fear that political opponents in Congress will later be able to pull away the shield of confidentiality that protects candor in those communications.”
Allies of Trump have decried the committee’s investigation as a political witch hunt, noting that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., refused to seat the choices of Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., on the committee. Democrats only allowed two Republicans highly critical of the former president on the committee.
Fox News’ Cameron Cawthorne, Tyler Olson and Lillian LeCroy contributed to this report.
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