Oct. 26 (UPI) — Mark Meadows, chief of staff under former President Donald Trump, was ordered Wednesday to testify before a grand jury in Georgia as it investigates meddling in the 2020 election by the former president and his allies.
South Carolina Circuit Judge Edward Miller ruled that Meadows must comply with the subpoena compelling him to testify.
“I am going to find that the witness is material and necessary to the investigation and that the state of Georgia is assuring not to cause undue hardship to him,” said Judge Edward Miller
Meadows’ attorney James Bannister told CNN he will appeal the order. Bannister has tried to shield Meadows from testifying, even suggesting that there is a political motivation behind the investigation. Miller dismissed the suggestion.
The investigation, led by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, stems from a phone call between Trump and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger which went public in 2021. On Jan. 2, 2021, Trump called Raffensperger, asking him to “find” votes which would overturn the presidential election result in Georgia.
Prosecutors are interested in Meadows’ testimony because of his involvement with the phone call, as well as a December 2020 White House meeting in which Meadows furthered claims of election fraud. Meadows also visited a location in Georgia where votes were being audited and sent an email to the Justice Department where he repeated allegations about fraud which were unsupported by evidence.
Trump’s efforts to overturn the election in Georgia go beyond the phone call to Raffensperger. In August, the Washington Post and Atlanta Journal Constitution reported on documents and records revealing that computer experts, at the direction of Trump-aligned attorney Sidney Powell, copied sensitive data from the Georgia election systems.
