In an abrupt reversal, an lawyer for former White Home chief of workers Mark Meadows mentioned his consumer won’t cooperate with a Home committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol rebellion, citing a breakdown in negotiations with the panel.
Lawyer George Terwilliger mentioned in a letter Tuesday {that a} deposition could be “untenable” as a result of the Jan. 6 panel “has no intention of respecting boundaries” regarding questions that former President Donald Trump has claimed are off-limits due to government privilege. Terwilliger additionally mentioned that he discovered over the weekend that the committee had issued a subpoena to a third-party communications supplier that he mentioned would come with “intensely private” info.
Terwilliger mentioned in a press release final week that he was persevering with to work with the committee and its workers on a possible lodging that may not require Meadows to waive the manager privileges claimed by Trump or “forfeit the long-standing place that senior White Home aides can’t be compelled to testify” earlier than Congress.
“We recognize the Choose Committee’s openness to receiving voluntary responses on non-privileged matters,” he mentioned then.
A spokesperson for the panel didn’t have speedy touch upon Terwilliger’s letter. The committee’s chairman, Mississippi Rep. Bennie Thompson, mentioned final week that Meadows had been partaking with the panel via his lawyer, producing data and agreeing to seem for an preliminary deposition.
Thompson mentioned the committee would “proceed to evaluate his diploma of compliance with our subpoena after the deposition.” He has mentioned that any witnesses who do not comply can be held in contempt of Congress.
In halting cooperation, Terwilliger additionally cited feedback from Thompson that he mentioned unfairly solid aspersions on witnesses who invoke their Fifth Modification proper in opposition to self-incrimination. A separate witness, former Justice Division official Jeffrey Clark, has mentioned he’ll invoke these Fifth Modification rights.
“On account of cautious and deliberate consideration of those components, we now should decline the chance to seem voluntarily for a deposition,” Terwilliger wrote within the letter.
The reversal comes as Meadows has been receiving consideration for a brand new guide, launched Tuesday, which revealed that Trump acquired a optimistic COVID-19 check earlier than a presidential debate and was far sicker than the White Home revealed on the time.
Trump — who instructed his supporters to “struggle like hell” earlier than lots of of his supporters broke into the Capitol and stopped the presidential electoral rely — has tried to hinder a lot of the committee’s work, together with in an ongoing court docket case, by arguing that Congress can’t acquire details about his personal White Home conversations.