UNANIMOUS

Jan. 6 Panel Votes to Hold Meadows in Contempt, Kicking Recommendation to House for Criminal Charge

“When it was time for him to follow the law, come in, and testify on those questions, he changed his mind and told us to pound sand,” the panel’s chairman said.

The House select committee probing the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection voted unanimously to hold ex-Trump aide Mark Meadows in criminal contempt on Monday night. The nine-member panel agreed to recommend that Meadows, Trump’s former chief of staff, be referred to the Department of Justice on criminal contempt of Congress after he spurned a subpoena.

Meadows had previously agreed to cooperate with the investigation, initially turning over more than 9,000 documents and records to the committee. But a day before a scheduled deposition before the panel last week, he apparently decided he wasn’t interested in answering the questions raised by his files. On Sunday night, the House panel issued a 51-page report laying out the case for holding him in contempt, including an extract from an email suggesting the National Guard was on standby to protect Trump supporters. It also released texts from Donald Trump Jr. and various Fox News stars to Meadows calling on Trump to speak up against the violence he'd inspired.

“When the records raise questions—as these most certainly do—you have to come in answer those questions,” the committee’s chair, Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS), said on Monday. “And when it was time for him to follow the law, come in, and testify on those questions, he changed his mind and told us to pound sand. He didn’t even show up.”

The contempt resolution is slated to come to the House floor for a vote on Tuesday.