Mark Meadows Mocked Trump’s Gripes About a Rigged Election in Text: Report

Donald Trump's former chief of staff Mark Meadows joked in a text about Trump's baseless claims that the 2020 presidential election he lost was rigged, the Washington Post reported Saturday.

Meadows said in the text message to a White House lawyer — which has reportedly been examined by federal prosecutors — that his own attorney son had been scrutinizing voter roles for any signs of dead people casting a ballot, as Trump claimed was the case, according to the newspaper.

His son, Atlanta-area attorney Blake Meadows, had only been able to find a handful of possible votes cast by dead people, Meadows reportedly noted dismissively.

Trump was claiming at the time that untold thousands of such votes had been cast for rival Joe Biden.

The White House lawyer reportedly quipped that maybe they could come up with Trump votes some other way.

The text is one of several among many officials expressing deep skepticism about Trump's various baseless claims that the election was fraudulent, the Post reported.

Special Counsel Jack Smith, who's investigating Trump and his state of mind leading up to the storming of the Capitol Jan. 6, 2021, is attempting to determine how aware the former president and his associates were that the baseless fraudulent vote claims were totally without merit, various media have reported.

The Post characterized Meadows' relationship to the truth as "playing both sides." He was sympathetic to skeptics who doubted anything was amiss with the presidential vote, while also currying favor with his boss.

Just days after Meadows dismissed Trump's claims of a rigged election in his text to the lawyer, he indicated in a phone call with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger that the White House had indeed found evidence of fraudulent votes, the Post reported.

Meadows made the claim on Trump's phone call to Raffensperger after the 2020 election was over and done with, and the votes counted and recounted, giving Biden the victory in Georgia.

Trump told Raffensperger on the call then to "find" him just enough votes to put him over the top.

"Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break," Trump told Raffensperger and his office's general counsel in the tape-recorded phone call.

Raffensperger told Trump the vote count had been checked and rechecked and it was completely legitimate.

Meadows could not immediately be reached for comment.