Trump suggests Mark Meadows may be among the ‘WEAKLINGS and COWARDS’ making deals but ‘who really knows?’ and denies ex-chief of staff told him election fraud allegations were baseless
Former President Donald Trump said anyone who struck an immunity deal with Special Counsel Jack Smith was a “weak and a coward,” hours after his former chief of staff Mark Meadows reportedly reached just such a deal.
In a pair of social media posts, Trump also said Meadows never told him his claims about election fraud allegations were untrue.
However, it previously emerged that the former White House chief of staff repeatedly spoke to prosecutors and told them the ex-president was “dishonest” when he said the election was stolen.
“I don’t think Mark Meadows would lie about the rigged and stolen 2020 presidential election just because he was given immunity from prosecution (PRESECTION!) by crazy prosecutor Jack Smith,” Trump wrote on social media, using his quirky mix of capital letters.
He went on to say that the offer must be tempting “after being hunted like a dog for three years and told you’re going to jail for the rest of your life, your money and your family are gone forever…”
White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows steps off Air Force One with President Donald Trump in 2020. On Tuesday, a report suggested he had struck a deal with prosecutors
Trump responded to the news by saying that “weak ones and cowards” would make that deal
But testify and lie and the reward is a statue in the nation’s capital, Trump continued.
“Some people would make that deal, but they are weaklings and cowards, and so bad for the future of our failing country. I don’t think Mark Meadows is one of them, but who really knows?’
He responded to a bomb ABC news report that Meadows had struck a deal to cooperate with the federal election investigation.
“Obviously we didn’t win,” Meadows told investigators.
Trump is too special an exception to that line.
“Mark Meadows NEVER told me that allegations of significant fraud (over the WRONG Election!) were unfounded,” he said in a second Truth Social post.
“He certainly didn’t say that in his book!”
Meadows was Trump’s last chief of staff in the White House.
An attorney for Meadows did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Trump also said Meadows had never previously raised doubts about the 2020 election fraud
U.S. President Donald Trump walks with Chief of Staff Mark Meadows after returning to the White House from an event at the WWII Memorial in Washington, DC, on May 8, 2020
Mark Meadows in Congress earlier this month
Cassidy Hutchinson, a former top aide to Meadows, testifies before the Jan. 6 committee last year
In August, Smith charged Trump with four felonies for attempting to interfere with the vote counting and block the recognition of Joe Biden as the winner of the 2020 US presidential election.
Trump has denied guilt in the charges.
Thousands of Trump supporters stormed the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 in a failed attempt to overturn his defeat.
Since then, Trump has continued to make the false claim that his loss was the result of fraud.
According to ABC News, Meadows has spoken to Smith’s team at least three times this year.
That included once before a federal grand jury.
He only did that after he had been was given immunity to testify under oath, sources told ABC News.
Rioters storm the Capitol in Washington on January 6, 2021
Inside the Capitol on January 6, 2021
The case is one of four criminal charges Trump, 77, is facing in his bid to retake the White House.
He is the frontrunner for the Republican nomination in 2024.
Trump has previously described Meadows as a “special friend” and “great chief of staff, as good as it gets.”
Prosecutors are said to have asked him about his conversations with Trump in the final months of his presidency, leading up to January 6.
Meadows reportedly told prosecutors that Trump was “dishonest” when he claimed to have won hours after polls closed on election night.
Former US President Donald Trump sits among his lawyers as he faces charges in court in Washington that he orchestrated a plot to overturn his 2020 election loss
Special Prosecutor Jack Smith has granted Mark Meadows immunity
He reportedly told prosecutors that he never saw evidence of fraud that would have changed Biden’s victory.
In mid-December, weeks after the election, he told Trump that no such evidence had been provided, ABC News reported.
Prosecutors reportedly asked Meadows whether Trump had ever admitted to him that he thought he had lost the election.
Meadows reportedly told them he had never heard Trump say that.