Mark Meadows, former chief of staff to former President Donald Trump, asked a judge on Wednesday to move his charges from his alleged involvement in Arizona’s fake elector case from the state to the federal level.
While he is not being charged as a fake elector in Arizona, prosecutors said Meadows worked with other Trump campaign members to submit names of fake electors from Arizona and other states to Congress in the Trump campaign’s push to keep Trump in office despite losing the 2020 election. In Arizona, 18 Republicans were charged for their alleged involvement in going along with a scheme to overturn the results of the election in the state, including the 11 Republicans who submitted a document falsely claiming Trump had won Arizona, known as the “fake electors.”
Meadows, however, is arguing his actions were taken when he was a federal official working as Trump’s chief of staff. His legal team cited immunity under the supremacy clause of the Constitution, which says federal law ranks higher than state law. The hearing for Meadows’s request is set for Thursday.
“Nothing Mr. Meadows is alleged in the indictment to have done is criminal per se. Rather, it consists of allegations that he received (and occasionally responded to) messages from people who were trying to get ideas in front of President Trump or seeking to inform Mr. Meadows about the strategy and status of various legal efforts by the President’s campaign,” Meadows’s lawyers wrote in a federal court filing.
“This is precisely the kind of state interference in a federal official’s duties that the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution prohibits, and that the removal statute shields from adjudication in a state court,” his lawyers continued.
Trump tried to move his own election subversion charges in Georgia to federal court also, but he was unsuccessful. Meadows is facing similar charges in Georgia as he is in Arizona.
Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, a Democrat, has urged the judge to keep the case in Arizona. A Maricopa County judge recently set a trial date for January 2026, nearly five years after the alleged crimes occurred.
In August, former Trump campaign attorney Jenna Ellis signed a cooperation agreement with prosecutors in exchange for her charges being dismissed. She is expected to testify against other defendants in the criminal case as part of her deal. Republican activist Loraine Pellegrino pleaded guilty to her false document misdemeanor charge and was sentenced to probation, marking the first person to be convicted in Arizona’s case.
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The remaining defendants, including Meadows, have pleaded not guilty. Criminal charges related to the fake electors scheme have also been filed in Michigan, Nevada, Georgia, and Wisconsin.
In 2020, President Joe Biden won Arizona by 10,457 votes, which was the first time the state had elected a Democrat to the executive branch since 1996.