Mark Meadows Wants SCOTUS to Intervene in Georgia Election Interference Indictment
The lawyers for Mark Meadows, the chief of staff for former President Donald Trump, petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday to move his Georgia election interference case to a federal court, citing the Court’s recent controversial ruling on presidential immunity.
Meadows was one of 19 defendants —including Trump — charged in August of 2023 for their efforts in trying to overturn the results of the 2020 election in Georgia. Meadows was charged with two of the 41 counts in the indictment, which included violating the state’s Racketeer and Corrupt Organizations Act and solicitation of oath by a public officer.
“Trump and the other Defendants charged in this Indictment refused to accept that Trump lost, and they knowingly and willfully joined a conspiracy to unlawfully change the outcome of the election in favor of Trump,” the indictment reads. “That conspiracy contained a common plan and purpose to commit two or more acts of racketeering activity in Fulton County, Georgia, elsewhere in the State of Georgia, and in other states.”
In his request asking the Supreme Court to intervene in his case, Meadows’ lawyers argued that the Court’s latest ruling on whether or not a president is immune to criminal prosecution for official acts committed while in office should also apply to “former officers” of the White House. “That decision makes clear that federal immunity fully protects former officers, often requires difficult and fact-intensive judgment calls at the margins, and provides not just a substantive immunity but a use immunity that protects against the use of official acts to try to hold a current or former federal officer liable for unofficial acts,” reads the petition for writ of certiorari.
It’s not the first time Meadows has tried to get his case moved to federal court. In December of 2023, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Meadows’ request to move his case out of Georgia into a federal court. In their rejection to Meadows’ request, the Appeals Court ruled that “whatever the chief of staff’s role with respect to state election administration, that role does not include altering valid election results in favor of a particular candidate. So there is no ‘causal connection’ between Meadows’ ‘official authority’ and his alleged participation in the conspiracy.”
Georgia isn’t the only state where Meadows has been indicted for his role in Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election results. He faces similar charges in Arizona.