Top allies of Donald Trump are facing unprecedented indictments in at least five states as the former president fights off his own slate of four criminal cases in the heat of the 2024 election season.
On Friday, former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and Mike Roman, a former member of Trump’s campaign team, appeared virtually in Arizona court for a state case to enter “not guilty” pleas to nine felony counts, including conspiracy and forgery. Meadows and Roman were among 18 people an Arizona grand jury indicted in April, which alleges 11 state Republicans and seven Trump aides conspired to send alternate electors to Washington, D.C., to contest President Joe Biden’s narrow victory in the state.
Arizona Democratic Attorney General Kris Mayes announced the indictment on April 24. Meanwhile, three other defendants in the Arizona case, including state Republican James Lemon and former Trump attorneys Jenna Ellis and Boris Ephsteyn, are slated to be arraigned on June 18.
Earlier in the week, three men, two of whom are Trump’s co-defendants in his Georgia case, were charged with attempts to overturn Wisconsin‘s 2020 election results. But unlike the Georgia case, Wisconsin Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul filed the felony without using a grand jury, making it one of the most openly partisan indictments against pro-Trump allies thus far.
“Our approach has been focused on following the facts where they lead,” Kaul said at a news conference on Tuesday when he announced three Trump allies were each charged with one count of “forgery,” a felony. In response to Kaul’s case, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) called it “outrageous.”
“Now Democrats are weaponizing Wisconsin’s judiciary,” Johnson posted on X, formerly known as Twitter. “Apparently conservative lawyers advising clients is illegal under Democrat tyranny. Democrats are turning America into a banana republic.”
