The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ordered oral arguments on Monday for White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows’ bid to remove the racketeering case against him from Fulton County to a federal court. On Tuesday, the court requested additional arguments from District Attorney Fani Willis and Meadows’ lawyers to be submitted early next month.
Meadows argues that he should not be tried in Fulton County because he was a federal official working for former President Donald Trump at the time Willis alleges he engaged in criminal activities. A lower court agreed with Willis, who argued that Meadows’ efforts to contest the 2020 election results in Georgia went outside his job duties as Trump’s Chief of Staff.
Prosecutors and Meadows’ defense attorneys are expected to present no more than 15 minutes of arguments on December 15, and the 11th Circuit will name the panel of judges who will hear the arguments by November 28.
The court ordered both parties must explain the significance of United States v. Pate, a recent case that saw a Florida man sentenced under a federal law designed to punish those who falsely file retaliatory liens against “any officer or employee of the United States.” The man’s victims were determined to be former government officials, which made the conviction invalid and prompted the court to vacate the conviction and remand the man for additional sentencing.
Meadows’ lawyers will likely seek to prove his circumstances are materially different from United States v. Pate, while Willis will likely assert the case proves her case against Meadows should not be removed.
Willis indicted Meadows for allegedly demanding Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) and other public and elected officials to “violate their oaths of office by unlawfully changing the outcome of the” election to favor Trump, in some cases to prevent the former president from “yelling” at him. Meadows pleaded not guilty.
The original attempt by Meadows to have his case removed from Fulton County was denied by a federal judge, but he was granted an expedited appeal by the 11th Circuit to complete the appeal by the end of September.
Meadows’ lawyers have accused Willis of committing legal “errors” in her “unnecessarily complicated” attempts to keep the case in Fulton County, which they claim rise to the level of “serious constitutional concerns,” while Willis asserted Meadows was engaged in “federal meddling in matters of state authority” when helping Trump contest the 2020 election.
With the case against Meadows potentially leaving Fulton County, a start date for the trial against Trump and most of his co-defendants remains unclear. A trial for two pro-Trump attorneys indicted by Willis, Kenneth Chesebro and Sidney Powell, is scheduled to begin on October 23. The joint case against Chesebro and Powell was severed from the greater racketeering indictment after they invoked their right to a speedy trial.
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Tom Pappert is the lead reporter for The Georgia Star News and a reporter for the Arizona Sun Times. Follow Tom on X/Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Mark Meadows” by Gage Skidmore. CC BY-SA 2.0.
