Mark Meadows takes the stand at removal hearing -- and it's 'not a good look' for his case: analysis

Mark Meadows made a surprise appearance on the stand Monday as he seeks the removal of his Georgia criminal case to federal court.

The former White House chief of staff appeared before U.S. District Judge Steve Jones in Atlanta to argue that he should be shielded from state prosecution because he was acting within his capacity as a federal official when he tried to help Donald Trump overturn his election loss, and Meadows surprised many legal experts by testifying on his own behalf in that hearing.

"Nearly every former prosecutor I know predicted Mark Meadows would not take the stand at his removal hearing," said MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin. "The risks to him from cross would simply be too great, they agreed. And they were wrong."

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Meadows told the judge the post-2020 election period was a "challenging" time, and he testified that he was "invited to almost every meeting" the former president had on the topic, and he even met with others who wished to pass along messages to Trump about the election.

"That a lawyer as experienced as former U.S. Attorney George Terwilliger allowed his client to take the stand tells you two things," Rubin said. "First, Meadows and his team believe moving his case to federal court is so critical that it’s worth the risk of his being cross-examined. Second, Meadows’s team concluded they had no other way of shouldering their burden of proof that he was acting as a federal officer beyond Meadows’s own testimony."

That leads Rubin to conclude they were unable to find other witnesses who were willing or able to testify.

"That means either they were unable to convince any Meadows allies with firsthand knowledge of his activities and/or Trump’s directives to take the stand for him — or that because of the secrecy with which they operated, no such witnesses exist," Rubin said. "Either one is not a good look."