Mark Meadows, who served as then-President Donald Trump’s last chief of staff, has reportedly accepted an immunity deal to testify against his former boss in the election interference case brought by special counsel Jack Smith, according to a report that has been called “largely inaccurate” by a Meadows lawyer.
ABC News, citing unnamed sources, claimed that Meadows, a former GOP congressman from North Carolina, “has spoken with special counsel Jack Smith’s team at least three times this year, including once before a federal grand jury, which came only after Smith granted Meadows immunity to testify under oath.”
“The sources said Meadows informed Smith’s team that he repeatedly told Trump in the weeks after the 2020 presidential election that the allegations of significant voting fraud coming to them were baseless, a striking break from Trump’s prolific rhetoric regarding the election,” the outlet continued.
The sources also reportedly claimed that “Meadows also told the federal investigators Trump was being ‘dishonest’ with the public when he first claimed to have won the election only hours after polls closed on Nov. 3, 2020, before final results were in.”
One source says Meadows admitted to Smith: “Obviously we didn’t win.”
The report goes on to say that Meadows has now contradicted claims he made in a post-2020 election book that accused the “liberal media” of ignoring evidence of election fraud “in plain sight.” The book argued that the election was “stolen” and “rigged” with help from “allies in the liberal media,” which ignored “actual evidence of fraud, right there in plain sight for anyone to access and analyze.”
“But, as described to ABC News, Meadows privately told Smith’s investigators that — to this day — he has yet to see any evidence of fraud that would have kept now-president Joe Biden from the White House, and he told them he agrees with a government assessment at the time that the 2020 presidential election was the most secure election in U.S. history,” the outlet reported.
However, CBS News investigative reporter Catherine Herridge posted a denial on the X platform by George Terwilliger, Mark Meadows’ lawyer.
“I told ABC that their story was largely inaccurate. People will have to judge for themselves the decision to run it anyway,” he said.
NEW: “I told ABC that their story was largely inaccurate. People will have to judge for themselves the decision to run it anyway.” George Terwilliger, Mark Meadows lawyer, to CBS News, responding to new reporting “Ex-Chief of Staff granted immunity, tells special counsel he…
— Catherine Herridge (@C__Herridge) October 24, 2023
ABC added that under the alleged immunity deal, information that Meadows gave the grand jury earlier this year could not be used against him in any federal prosecution related to the charges against Trump.
“Had Meadows not been granted immunity, prosecutors expected him to invoke his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination, sources said,” ABC reported.
Trump responded to the report on his Truth Social platform.
“Mark Meadows NEVER told me that allegations of significant fraud (about the RIGGED Election!) were baseless. He certainly didn’t say that in his book!” he wrote on Tuesday.
He added:
I don’t think Mark Meadows would lie about the Rigged and Stollen [sic] 2020 Presidential Election merely for getting IMMUNITY against Prosecution (PERSECUTION!) by Deranged Prosecutor, Jack Smith. BUT, when you really think about it, after being hounded like a dog for three years, told you’ll be going to jail for the rest of your life, your money and your family will be forever gone, and we’re not at all interested in exposing those that did the RIGGING — If you say BAD THINGS about that terrible “MONSTER,” DONALD J. TRUMP, we won’t put you in prison, you can keep your family and your wealth, and, perhaps, if you can make up some really horrible “STUFF” a out him, we may very well erect a statue of you in the middle of our decaying and now very violent Capital, Washington, D.C. Some people would make that deal, but they are weaklings and cowards, and so bad for the future our Failing Nation. I don’t think that Mark Meadows is one of them, but who really knows? MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!
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