Not Removing Meadows’s Case to Federal Court Could Set ‘Chilling’ Precedent: Attorney

An 11th Circuit Court of Appeals panel heard arguments on Friday regarding former chief-of-staff Mark Meadows’s attempt to move his case out of Georgia state court to federal court, where he would seek dismissal under a federal immunity defense. Mr. Meadows had been an aide for former President Donald Trump with whom he was indicted in a Georgia racketeering case that originally accused 19 individuals of interfering with the 2020 presidential election results. He had promptly sought removal after the indictment was handed up, but a federal judge had remanded the case back to state court. One issue being debated is whether the acts of racketeering that name Mr. Meadows were taken as a federal officer or not. Defense attorney George James Terwilliger III argued that the federal removal statute does not require Mr. Meadows to define the “outer limits” of his office, as one judge suggested, but that case precedent requires the officer seeking removal to show that the measure of his conduct was within the nexus of his office....