Mark Meadows PowerPoint Plan to Overturn Election Results Revealed
Former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows handed over a PowerPoint presentation to the House committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol that details how the Trump administration planned to overturn the 2020 election results, including by declaring a national emergency.
The 38-page presentation, entitled "Election Fraud, Foreign Interference & Options for 6 Jan," is dated one day before the Capitol riot. It's believed to have been submitted by Meadows after he was subpoenaed by the panel in connection with the insurrection.
The slides contained a series of recommendations for Donald Trump and his administration to follow ahead of the certification of the electoral votes ceremony to declare Joe Biden the winner.
These include informing senators and congressmen of apparent "foreign interference" in the election, namely by China, before declaring a National Security Emergency. The government was then to announce that electronic voting in all states for the 2020 Election would be invalid.
The PowerPoint file details a number of dismissed claims of voter fraud, including that electronic voting machines were "shifting votes from Trump to Biden," as well as disputed allegations of widespread occurrences of double voters, deceased voters and fake ballots/ballot stuffing in states such as Michigan, Arizona and Pennsylvania.
There were also apparent plans to make then Vice President Mike Pence, in his purely ceremonial and constitutional role as presiding officer of the Senate on January 6, reject the electoral votes from states "where fraud occurred," therefore forcing the vote to be decided by the remaining electoral votes.
The plan then called for Pence to delay the election decision in order to allow "for a vetting and subsequent counting" of all the legal paper ballots.
In a slide entitled "Restoring confidence: 'Clear the air—count and compare'" the next stage of the alleged plan to stop Biden becoming president was to do a "full check to weed out counterfeit paper ballots" and then a count of the remaining "legal ones" across the country.
U.S. Marshals and Troops
"It must be done in full public view (via web broadcast) where each person has the chance to do the count themselves if they so desire. No more hiding behind barriers, distances, secrecy, and gag orders," the slide states.
The presentation also shows the extent of the planned recount, including deploying U.S. Marshals to immediately secure all the ballots and "provide a protective perimeter around the locations" in all 50 states.
National Guard troops were then to be brought in to recount the tens of millions of votes across the country.
"As the counting occurs each ballot will be imaged and the images placed on the Internet so any US citizen can view them and count the ballots themselves. The process will be completely transparent," the presentation said.
The existence of the PowerPoint presentation appeared to have been first referenced in a letter from the House committee investigating the January 6 riot to Meadows' lawyer, saying that they had "no choice" but to move forward contempt charges against Trump's former chief of staff after he refused to appear for a second scheduled deposition on Wednesday.
The letter confirmed that Meadows had previously been cooperating with the investigation and provided documents as requested. Meadows' lawyers are also reported to have withheld several hundred additional documents and more than 1,000 text messages from the committee while citing executive privilege, a defense that has been thrown out by District Judge Tanya S. Chutkan.
"Despite your very broad claims of privilege, Mr. Meadows has also produced documents that you apparently agree are relevant and not protected by any privilege at all," the letter to attorney George Terwilliger adds.
"Those documents include: a November 7, 2020, email discussing the appointment of alternate slates of electors as part of a 'direct and collateral attack' after the election; a January 5, 2021, email regarding a 38-page PowerPoint briefing titled 'Election Fraud, Foreign Interference & Options for 6 JAN' that was to be provided 'on the hill.'"
The letter from the panel chairman rep. Bennie Thompson adds that "there is no legitimate legal basis" for Meadows to refuse to cooperate with the Select Committee and answer questions about the documents he produced.
In a joint statement on Wednesday, Thompson and Vice Chair Liz Cheney said that they will be recommending that the House cites Meadows for contempt of Congress and refers him to the Department of Justice for prosecution.
Fellow key Trump ally Steven Bannon was indicted in November on two counts of contempt of Congress for defying subpoenas and refusing to answer questions from the House committee investigating the January 6 attack.
Terwilliger has been contacted for comment.
