Mark Meadows pushed the Justice Department to investigate claims Donald Trump lost the election after Italians hacked voting machines using satellites.
Meadows, who served as chief of staff in the Trump White House, sent five emails in the final weeks of Trump's presidency to then-acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen urging him to investigate the unproven claims, The New York Times reported.
The emails particularly show Meadows urging Rosen to investigate the conspiracy theory dubbed 'ItalyGate' which bizarrely suggests Italians hacked voting machines using satellites to change votes in the 2020 election from Trump to Joe Biden.
They depict the frantic measures the Trump administration took to try to undermine the 2020 presidential election result with claims of voter fraud, after a multitude of failed lawsuits and recount attempts.
Rosen never agreed to the investigations, according to emails provided to Congress and obtained by the outlet. Sources said that Rosen rejected the requests from Meadows.
Mark Meadows, left,, sent five emails in the final weeks of Trump's presidency to then-acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen urging him to investigate the unproven claims of voter fraud
On Saturday, Trump spoke in Greenville, North Carolina reiterating his false claims that the election was stolen
In one email to another Justice Department official, Rosen indicated he had refused to arrange for FBI officials to meet with Brad Johnson - a former CIA employee who claimed he could prove the outlandish theory.
In a bid to prove that the Justice Department should investigate the ItalyGate theory, Meadows had sent Rosen a link to a YouTube video made by Johnson.
Meadows also pressed the Justice Department to investigate the already disproven theory that Georgia's Fulton County ballots had enough irregularities that the results should have gone for Trump in an email on January 1.
As noted by The New York Times, the emails from Meadows show a break from Justice Department policies that prevent White House staff from requesting particular Justice Department investigations.
Meadows, and avid ally and defender of the former president, was reported to have been involved with Trump's attempts to undo the results - having made a surprise appearance in Georgia's Cobb County to review the election audit taking place.
He also joined Trump's controversial January 2 phone call to Georgia's Republican secretary of state Brad Raffensperger in which Trump repeatedly told him to 'find' votes needed to alter the outcome of the election.
Two days before that phone call, Meadows had forwarded Rosen an email written by Trump campaign lawyer Cleta Mitchell about the allegations of voter fraud in Georgia.
The Senate Judiciary Committee is investigating if Justice Department officials participated in Trump's efforts to reverse the results of the election, and the emails were revealed as a part of those efforts.
Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump step into Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on January 20 after the inauguration of President Joe Biden
Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin, the committee's chairman, told The New York Times in a statement that the emails underscore 'the depths of the White House's efforts to co-opt the department and influence the electoral vote certification.'
'I will demand all evidence of Trump's efforts to weaponize the Justice Department in his election subversion scheme,' Durbin said.
The House Oversight Committee and the inspector general for the Justice Department are also investigating aspects of those efforts.
The New York Times reported that Rosen 'is in talks' with the House Oversight Committee to discuss whether the Justice Department faced pressure to investigate election fraud and its response to the deadly riots at the U.S. Capitol on January 6.
What Rosen may reveal to the House Oversight Committee depends on what is allowed to disclose as he is obligated to not interfere with current investigations, the outlet reported.
On Saturday, Trump spoke in Greenville, North Carolina reiterating the unfounded claims that the election was stolen.
'The 2020 presidential election, that election, the 2020 presidential election was by far the most corrupt election in the history of our country,' Trump said.
'They used COVID and the mail-in ballots to steal an election. It was the third world country election like we've never seen before. Look at what took place.'
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