A U.S. District Court judge has denied former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows’ attempt to prevent his arrest in a Georgia election interference case. The announcement was made on Wednesday.
Judge Steve Jones in Atlanta dismissed Meadows’ plea to transfer the case to federal court and bypass a scheduled state court hearing. Meadows’ lawyer had filed an “emergency motion” hoping to expedite the case and avoid Meadows’ surrender at a Fulton County jail by the end of the week, CNBC reported.
Jones also rejected a secondary proposal from Meadows that sought to prevent Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis from arresting Meadows before next week’s hearing.
The judge found the arguments and cases cited by Meadows in his bid to avoid the hearing “not persuasive”, and ruled that “there are strong countervailing reasons” not to prevent the district attorney from enforcing the arrest warrant.
Earlier, Willis had described Meadows’ requests as “baseless” and “meritless”. She stated that Meadows’ effort is essentially “a plea to this Court to prevent the defendant from being arrested on the charges lawfully brought by the State of Georgia.”
Former President Donald Trump, Meadows, and 18 other co-defendants have been ordered to surrender by noon on Friday. The charges are related to Willis’ probe into attempts to overturn President Joe Biden’s 2020 election win in Georgia.
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