Mark Meadows in a police booking mugshot released by the Fulton County Sheriff’s Office.
Fulton County Sheriff’s Office | via Reuters
Former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows was booked and released from an Atlanta jail Thursday in connection with the Georgia criminal case accusing ex-President Donald Trump and his allies of illegally trying to overturn the state’s 2020 election results.
Meadows is charged with racketeering and soliciting a violation of an oath by a public officer. His bond was set at $100,000 earlier Thursday.
The same day, the bond for Jeffrey Clark, a pro-Trump former Department of Justice lawyer, was set at $100,000 as well. Clark faces the same racketeering charge, along with one count of attempting to commit false statements and writings.
The consent bond orders in Fulton County Superior Court came hours before Trump was expected to travel to Atlanta to surrender on his own criminal charges in the sprawling grand jury indictment being prosecuted by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis.
Trump said in a Thursday afternoon social media post that he would be arrested at 7:30 p.m.
Meadows’ bond sheet forbids him from speaking with any other co-defendant or witness about the facts of the case. It also prohibits any effort to intimidate witnesses or co-defendants “or to otherwise obstruct the administration of justice.”
Trump, Meadows and Clark are three of the 19 co-defendants in Willis’ case. Trump’s bond is set at $200,000. The former president is charged with 13 counts, including racketeering, criminal conspiracy and filing false documents.
Meadows and Clark were not indicted in special counsel Jack Smith’s federal election interference probe against Trump, a separate case that centers on many of the same events featured in the Georgia indictment.
All 19 co-defendants charged in Georgia face a Friday deadline to surrender at the Fulton County Jail. Nine of them, including pro-Trump lawyers John Eastman and Sidney Powell, and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, have already been booked and released.
Meadows is seeking to move the case from state court to federal court. Earlier this week, he asked a federal judge to quickly take up the case before Friday’s deadline so that he can avoid being arrested.
The judge denied that request, as well as another proposal for him to issue an order blocking Willis from arresting Meadows. Willis has denied Meadows’ request for an extension of his arrest deadline.
One of Meadows’ charges is related to his participation in a Jan. 2, 2021, phone call in which Trump urged Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” enough votes to undo Biden’s win in the state.
Willis on Thursday subpoenaed Raffensperger to appear at a hearing Monday morning centered on Meadows’ effort to move the election case to federal court. Raffensperger’s office declined CNBC’s request for comment.
Clark’s other charge relates to his efforts to challenge President Joe Biden’s electoral victory by drafting a document in December 2020 that falsely claimed the Justice Department had “identified significant concerns that may have impacted the outcome of the election” in key states. Clark tried to get other DOJ officials to sign off on that December 2020 memo and send it to officials in Georgia.
Trump, who is indicted in four active criminal cases, has pushed to delay his trials until after the 2024 presidential election.
But Kenneth Chesebro, another co-defendant in the Georgia case, filed a motion in Fulton County Superior Court on Wednesday demanding a speedy trial.
In a court filing Thursday, Willis asked a judge to begin the trial on Oct. 23.