THE JANUARY 3, 2021, OVAL OFFICE MEETING
At Rosen's request, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows arranged a meeting with the President at 6:15 p.m. that evening.[288]
We should pause to reflect on the timing and purpose of the meeting. Congress was set to meet in a joint session in less than 72 hours. The States had already certified their electors. Former Vice President Biden was going to be certified as the winner of the 2020 Presidential election. There was no material dispute over Biden's victory. Trump and his lawyers had not produced any evidence of significant fraud. Instead, they presented one nonsensical conspiracy theory after another. The DOJ and FBI were forced to debunk these claims—and they did.
None of this stopped President Trump's effort to subvert DOJ. Quite the opposite. The President pushed forward with a plan to install Jeff Clark as the Acting Attorney General, apparently to attempt to interfere with the certification of the electoral college vote on January 6th. It is for this reason Rosen requested an emergency meeting on January 3rd.
Before heading into the Oval Office, Rosen and Donoghue discussed the possible leadership change with Cipollone and Pat Philbin. "They were completely opposed to it," Donoghue explained.[289] In fact, no one who attended the Oval Office meeting supported the leadership change—other than Jeff Clark.[290] Donoghue didn't initially join the meeting, but the President soon called him in.[291]
During the meeting, Clark attempted to defend the last-minute move to make him Acting Attorney General. Clark said he would "conduct real investigations that would, in his view, uncover widespread fraud."[292] Clark declared that this was the "last opportunity to sort of set things straight with this defective election," and he had the "intelligence," the "will," and "desire" to "pursue these matters in the way that the President thought most appropriate."[293] Everyone else quickly disagreed.[294]
President Trump asked Donoghue and Engel what they would do, and both confirmed they would resign.[295] Donoghue added that theirs would not be the only resignations. "You should understand that your entire Department leadership will resign," Donoghue recalled saying.[296] This included every Assistant Attorney General. "Mr. President, these aren't bureaucratic leftovers from another administration," Donoghue continued.[297] "You picked them. This is your leadership team. You sent every one of them to the Senate; you got them confirmed."[298] Donoghue argued that the President would look bad in the wake of the mass resignations. "What is that going to say about you, when we all walk out at the same time?"[299] Donoghue recalled asking the President. "And what happens if, within 48 hours, we have hundreds of resignations from your Justice Department because of
