CNN: Judge orders Meadows, other top Trump aides must testify to Jan. 6 grand jury

A federal judge has ordered several former Donald Trump aides, including Mark Meadows, to testify before a grand jury as part of the criminal investigation into efforts to overturn the 2020 election, rejecting the former president’s claims of executive privilege, multiple sources confirmed to CNN. #CNN #News

Transcript

We have some breaking news just in to CNN. A federal judge has ordered former Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows and a number of other former top aides to testify in the special counsel’s January 6th investigation. The judge rejected Trump’s claims of executive privilege. Let’s get right to CNN’s Evan Perez.

Evan, tell us what this means, because this may open the door to so much more information in this case. It really does, Brianna. The just the Justice Department has been winning these these cases where they’re asking a judge to compel some of these these former Trump aides to answer questions

To as part of this investigation into the attempts by the former president to overturn the 2020 election results. And, you know, they keep winning these because, you know, the judges are finding that because of the of the importance of this investigation. The former president’s claim that this is protected by executive privilege

Just does not stand in this case. We’re talking about Mark Meadows, who is of course, a former chief of staff, is a very, very important witness. He was there through all of this and in some cases played a key role in trying to pressure people to try to help support the former president’s

False claims of vote fraud. You see there a list of some of the other aides John Ratcliffe, Robert O’Brien, Stephen Miller, Dan Scavino. All of these folks had in some cases gone in and refused to answer certain questions because the former president was making this claim of executive privilege.

The judge in this case Beryl Howell, who was a former chief judge in the Washington, D.C. federal court, she has ruled that they must comply with the Justice Department’s request to answer these questions now. What happens next is we expect that the Trump team is going to appeal.

They’ve been appealing all of these and they keep losing. So the it doesn’t, of course, prevent them from from trying. And so we expect that they’re going to appeal the Meadows ruling, as well as some of the others. And then we’ll see when the Justice Department can get those before an appeals court

And perhaps even to the Supreme Court Brianna. Evan, what is this going to mean when it comes to the former vice president, Mike Pence? Well, that’s a separate case. And obviously, one of his cases a lot more complicated because the former president is claiming not only executive privilege.

But Mike Pence is also claiming that he is protected under the Constitution speech or debate clause. And so he is saying that when he was acting in those days around January 6th, he was acting as a member of the Senate because of his role there as the president of the Senate.

The Justice Department is is is claiming or is arguing that Mike Pence is his role. There was ceremonial and so they’re pushing back on that. We anticipate that that ruling is sometime in the offing soon, Brianna. But, you know, these are important witnesses that the Justice Department believes are key to this investigation,

Trying to get these people to provide evidence about what the former president’s state of mind was, what he knew, what he was being told as he was pushing for these states to overturn their election results and keep him in power. Even though he had lost the election. What is the next step here?

Because when you look at this, I mean, it’s a number of aides and officials from the Trump administration, a number of them, varying degrees, are not going to want to be sharing information and are going to do everything they can to not do that. So what recourse do they have? Right.

Well, that’s the thing. I mean, I think Mark Meadows has certainly been one of the more loyal of the former president’s aides. He’s tried his best to try to keep the counsel that he gave to the former president. And he’s also, I think, because of his very overt role,

Perhaps in in a position where he also may have his own exposure here as part of the Justice Department investigation. So you’re right, as some of these some of these witnesses, for instance, have already gone in and didn’t know that they were supposed to claim executive privilege. So the former president

Made this claim in some cases after some of these people already went in to answer some questions. So the issue here, though, Brianna, what you’re getting a picture of is the Justice Department, the special counsel in this case, Jack Smith, is really got his foot on the accelerator. He is trying to get

These witnesses in there, trying to move as quickly as they can because I think you and I both know that there’s a political calendar that’s in the works here. You know, you have the former president already he has declared that he’s a candidate. You have other candidates coming in.

So the political season is upon us. And the Justice Department wants to bring a case. They need to try to start moving that very, very soon Brianna. Without the cooperation. Right, without the testimony of some of those folks, some of the faces that we’re seeing here, there are blind spots in this investigation.

So what kinds of questions will some of these folks, including Mark Meadows, be able to answer? What kind of information will they be able to reveal that previously the special counsel didn’t have access to? Well, you know, one of the things that I think a lot of us

Who have been watching this investigation very closely believe it’s happening here is the importance of these witnesses, is for the special counsel to establish what the former president knew, what were his closest, most trusted people telling him. You had people who were like Robert O’Brien, for instance, who was his national security adviser,

And who was telling him that there was absolutely no evidence that there was foreign involvement in rigging vote machine voting machines, for instance, which is something that Trump was being told by what I think some of the witnesses have called team crazy people like Rudy Giuliani and some of the other people

Who are trying to tell him that, oh, maybe there was some kind of interference. Right, in the voting machine. So the importance of these witnesses is to forge for the special counsel, if they decide to bring a case, is to be able to establish that Trump,

Even if he can claim right now that that he believed that vote fraud was real, he was getting the different advice from his most closely appointed aides, people who were who would have no right if there was any sign, any evidence of foreign interference in the voting machine and the vote count

And he was being told by Robert O’Brien, by some of these other people that there was absolutely no evidence, and yet he was persisting in trying to pressure people in Georgia and in other states to try to find a way for him to remain in power. That’s part of what the

The importance of these witnesses are is what happens. What happens even if some of these folks have exposure and they are asked questions, I mean, are they are they useful? Do they use their. Do they plead the Fifth? What do they know? Yes, some of them do. In the case of Mark Meadows,

We now know from the grand jury report in Georgia, we know that he pleaded the fifth in in the investigation there by the special grand jury. And that tells you a lot, right? Because Mark Meadows was key he was helping to set up some of these calls. He was making phone calls himself

To try to pressure people to find what the former president said in that now infamous recorded call to Brad Raffensperger, where he said he wanted to find 11,780 votes. Right. To try to remain to try to say that he won the state of Georgia, which he did not. And so there are witnesses

Who do have their own legal exposure. And if you’re the prosecutors, you have the right in this in the right then and there to offer them at least limited immunity to try to get their testimony. It’s not clear whether that is exactly what’s going to happen. All this stuff is, of course, happening

In a closed court where we don’t have the benefit of being able to see, Brianna, what is happening. But that is certainly on the table we’ve seen it happen with some of the other witnesses who have gone in and had declined to answer questions where the Justice Department asked them

Or gave them immunity so that they could answer some questions.

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