Hit for the former president. Sources told abc news, his former Chief Of Staff, we have talked about a lot over the last two years, mark meadows has been granted immunity from the Special Counsel jack smith, in exchange for his testimony before a federal grand jury. Abc report, quote, the source said meadows informed smiths team that he repeatedly told trump in the weeks after the 2020 president ial election that the allegations of significant voting fraud coming to them were baseless. Nbc news has not independently confirmed this report. Here is what the former lead investigator for the January 6th Committee had to say about all of this. If its true, it is the most significant evidential if element in the entire investigation, and there is really no one who was closer to the former president in the days between the election and his reluctant release of the white house than mark meadows. Meadows lawyer says, he, quote, told abc their story was largely an accurate that there were also huge developments in the former president s other cases today, both criminal and civil. My colleague Laura Jarrett has all put details on those. For weeks, attorney jenna ellis furiously defended then president donald trump, as he falsely claimed the 2020 election was rigged. Today, she sobbed as she told a judge she was wrong. If i need what i know now, i would have to climb to represent donald trump and these postcolonial adjusts. In a georgia courtroom, she pleaded guilty to a felony for helping fuel lies about thousands of dead people casting votes in 2020. I failed to do my due diligence. And smiling for her mugshot just two months ago, now the fourth codefendant to flip and fulton countys Sprawling Election Interference case against the former president and more than a dozen others. Mr. Trump has pleaded not guilty, arguing hes been targeted by democratic prosecutors because hes the republican front runner. He was back in a manhattan courtroom today, facing the states star witness, his former fixer attorney, michael cohen. This is about accountability, plain and simple. Raise your right hand . It was cohens congressional testimony that jumpstarted that new york case, were his former boss now stands to lose his namesake company, accused of exaggerating the value of his assets to receive better loan terms, in a 250 Million Dollar civil fraud suit. It was my experience that mr. Trump inflated his total assets went and served his purposes. Today, cohen said he was tasked by the former president with who is ticked mr. Trumps total assets to achieve a number he arbitrarily elected. While mr. Trumps legal team has argued, realistic values are subjective. Outside of court, mr. Trump took aim at cohens credibility, pointed to cohens guilty plea for tax fraud and lying to congress. Hes a liar, as you know. Hes a liar. Hes trying to get a better deal for himself. With all of that to cover, lets get smarter with the help of our leadoff panel. Tonight peter bakers here, chief White House Correspondent for the new york times. Katie benner, pulitzer prizewinning Justice Department reporter. Also with the times and former federal prosecutor and my chief legal explainer, glenn kirschner. So glenn, of course im going to you first. We are stuck with us abc news reporting about meadows. What does immunity and a case like this mean . How big of a deal is it . You know, i think its an important development, staff, but i am a little concerned. Heres why. When a witness has incriminating evidence that prosecutors want, there are a few different ways to extract that incriminating information out of a guy like mark meadows. What way is you can subpoena him to the grand jury and ask nicely, would you please testify about it . But i got like mark meadows, apparently, has a Fifth Amendment right against Self Incrimination which he will invoke. So thats not an affective way to get out of him. The preferred way to get information out of a guy like mark meadows, who remember, was burning lots of documents in his fireplace, presumably not for the warmth, those documents generated. It feels like it was up to no good. A guy like that, you would want to charge him with his crimes, you would want to convince him to plead guilty, take responsibility for his crimes, flip, and testify truthfully against others. That is apparently, based on this reporting, not the way jack smith opted to proceed with mark meadows. Instead, he granted meadows immunity. I dont Call Immunity and immunity deal or an immunity agreement. It is sort of The Last Resort for the prosecutor. It is a prosecutors least preferred method to get evidence out of a guy like mark meadows. Why . Because what you can for immunity, technically its called a compulsion order, your compelling him to testify by extinguishing his Fifth Amendment right against Self Incrimination. Guess what, hes not being held accountable for any of his crimes. So and important development, yes, because this is the vehicle apparently jack smith used to extract incriminating information from mark meadows that will, perhaps, but used against donald trump. But again, its not a preferred method. It would have been better if mark meadows had been held accountable for his crimes, assuming jack smith had enough to charge him with those crimes. That would have been a better way in my experience to bring mark meadows into the fold. Do you think theres a chance jack smith didnt have enough . I think there is a chance, or we would have seen him indicted or perhaps negotiate a guilty plea behind the scenes before it was necessary to indict him, and flip him, turn him into a cooperator. But i think there are forces at play behind the scenes that we just dont know much about at this point. And look. Mark meadows is charged in a r. I. C. O. Conspiracy in georgia. So its not like hes getting off completely free and clear. But again, i think the Immunity Angle with mark meadows its a bit of a curiosity. Peter, youve got to tell me what trump world is saying tonight. And i dont want to hear, mark meadows, never heard of him. Thats not an option. Hes just the guy who brought a diet coke, right . This is a big deal. I think, if in fact, he is cooperating with federal prosecutors to the extent that the report indicates, it is hard to see how this is not a devastating moment for donald trump. Mark meadows is in the room if not all key meetings, certainly must keep meetings. He was part of almost all the key conversations with the Justice Department, with the georgia officials, he flew to georgia himself as part of the effort to try to convince them to find 11, 000 votes, donald trump put it into a phone call with the Secretary Of State there. He knows everything there is done, and presumably, that the prosecutors want to know. And at versus a lot of interesting questions. Why would they only get with immunity, as opposed to forcing some sort of plea deal . Remember, mark meadows was asked to speak to the January 6th Committee and congress, refused to do so, and congress referred him for contempt to the Justice Department. The Justice Department state, no, were not going to charge. Him at that point, we began to wonder whether mark meadows was cooperating with prosecutors. Why would they not prosecute him at that point . Was it because he was already cooperating with them . We dont know. That if hes been cooperating with him all this time, maybe hes been a more significant assistant to prosecutors that we know. We are obviously going to find that out at some point. Speculation. But maybe that explains why there wouldnt to get lighter on him then fani willis is on witnesses flipping in georgia. Katie, what is this reporting tell us about how meadows sees his own position and potential to be indicted . Yes, i think two things. Its very interesting both what peter and dylan have said. Meadows is a key witness. We have seen in the past close to donald trump including in the documents case, being compelled to give testimony, being granted immunity, and its unclear whether or not that testimonies actually yielded prosecuted for much. I think its too early to say. I think for meadows, he would not have done this unless he had to. But of course, there is always outweigh under oath with a prevalent too much information. He has One Of The Best Defense Lords in the business and he knows his Defense Lawyer knows that Justice Department into an. Its clear he felt he had, to but its not clear how much of the department actually. Got somebody who knows mark meadows very, very. Well cassidy hutchinson. She was on our air earlier this evening and i want to share some of her comments. Mark was sort of all over the court in some ways. Hey would privately admit to me sometimes, we had lost the election, or hit privately admit to me trump had said we had lost the election. Mark also was a key player and breaking and characters like Sidney Powell and like jenna ellis, who now have pled guilty. Glenn, does this help or hurt meadows credibility as a witness . I, maine all over the map, she took us around several impact there. You know, what i like peters. Point maybe its because meadows has been so helpful for so long, on so many fronts, that the prosecutors gave him the gift of immunity, meaning, you are not going to be held accountable for your crimes. But ill tell, you he better give us the shooter on the grassy knoll and the Gps Coordinates of body and donald trump, if hes not going to be held accountable for any of his, what seems to, be pretty significant misconduct. But the our thing immunity does, is it makes for of the rate challenging trial witness. Because he will be crossexamined mightily. White a minute, you engaged in all of this misconduct and you were never held accountable for any of it . Instead, they gave you immunity and now you expect us to believe your testimony when you incriminate authors even though you never had to take responsibility for your own crimes . I have seen that bright bed and ive seen juries, you know, look pretty skeptical of accepting the Trial Testimony of someone who got a free pass for his crimes. As you can tell, im not enamored of immunity. Im enamored of people held accountable for their crimes, tech responsibility, and in agreed to testify truthfully about the crimes of others. Peter, take us down a wildcat memory line as it relates to donald trump and mark meadows relationship. Because last year we learned that Donald Trumps pack gave 1 million to Mark Meadows Nonprofit just weeks after the january Six Committee was fraud. Remember, he went down to maralago, he kind of Kiss The Ring and voila, 1 Million Dollars. What can you tell us about their relationship . Thats exactly it. Mark meadows was first of all Donald Trumps number one highlight in many ways. In congress, in the freedom caucus. And then when he quit the congress to become Chief Of Staff. It was Chief Of Staff he basically believed was most intimate with what President Trump wanted to do at the time, one most eager to fulfill the president s wishes, or is at or chiefs of staff before him head at times resisted, Resistance Decisions the president was trying to make they felt were unwise or illegal or unconstitutional. Mark meadows was aligned with trump sticking on all of these things. Kaz hutchinson, in her book described this in great vivid color. Just how much meadows was trying to please the boss. Its phrases like, that youve heard all the time. He obviously was also very strict. Her recounting in the, we saw him trying to appease a very angry president , who wasnt satisfied with whatever it is mark meadows had come up with. And therefore he was anxious and finding increasingly desperate ways to satisfy. When as you point out, he was of course loyal to him even after leaving office. They have been wondering about him in trump world for a while now. Wondering if he was loyal to him. Meadows has not been public, has not been kissing the ring lately, turn. Lets go to georgia. One of trumps attorneys, jenna ellis, who has been very close to him, very loyal to him, whom in that georgia case now the latest alleged coconspirator pleaded guilty. Katie, what does this mean for fani williss case and also, jims credibility was just weeks ago she was i did absolutely nothing, no way, no how. Yeah, you know so i think this tells us to things that phone evils case she was building using cooperative witnesses. Using people who have. Flipped building evidence about main parts of our case. These allegations came to undercut georgias election laws, election results. We have ken chesebro who was part of the fake electors prod, we have and Sidney Powell, who are spreading most many, ill say many of the false claims of widespread voter fraud. In part, for paul, and tell us they were either because they were times favored by donald trump or because they were so close to people like rudy giuliani, particularly janet ellis. They were in the inner circle. And this is something that no prosecutor has been ab to really get at with the exception of the civil case in new york, and michael cohen. People in the inner circle have a better chance of telling us what trump was actually saying, doing and thinking. And thats also something that we have not seen in any public filings by any prosecutors. That State Of Mind issue is going to be key in trying to get a jury to find donald trump guilty of these crimes. Thats the first big thing. Breeze driftin on. [coughing]. By, you know how i feel. If youre tired of staring down your copd,. Its a new dawn, its a new day. Stop settling. And im feelin good. Start a new day with trelegy. No oncedaily Copd Medicine has the power to treat copd in as many ways as trelegy. 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