The House of Representatives reprimand leads the ultra-conservative ex-MP on the verge of becoming the first White House chief of staff to be prosecuted after stepping down as H.R Haldeman in the Watergate scandal nearly 50 years.
U.S. lawmakers voted Tuesday to recommend criminal contempt charges against former Donald Trump aide Mark Meadows for refusing to testify before the Congressional panel investigating the Jan.6 assault on Capitol Hill. the first White House chief of staff to be prosecuted after leaving office by H.R Haldeman in the Watergate scandal almost 50 years ago.
The select committee said in a statement ahead of the vote that it was roughly following party lines, with just two Republicans joining each Democrat in despising Meadows. to the Capitol uprising, as well as the help it received from Meadows and others.
Meadows, who served in the House for seven years earlier and joined Trump’s team in 2020, challenged a subpoena that required him to testify, highlighting a request for “executive privilege” from the former president republican. This defense, which is theoretically accessible only to outgoing presidents seeking to keep sensitive conversations with their collaborators private, has already been rejected by a federal appeals court.
The nine-member select committee, which voted on Monday to move the contempt case forward, said it was seeking responses to text messages and other communications that Meadows has previously admitted not being privileged. Investigators say Meadows gave him the right to refuse to testify in any case, as he promotes a new brief that includes detailed accounts of January 6 and his conversations with Trump.
