Mark Meadows has one foot planted in the executive branch and the other the legislative branch of the federal government.
The Republican North Carolina representative and incoming White House chief of staff spent Tuesday on Capitol Hill as a member of the Trump White House team to negotiate the terms of a coronavirus financial relief package.
Meadows, 60, is slated to take over as the president’s chief of staff soon but hasn’t yet resigned from the western North Carolina House seat he’s held since 2013.
“I am still a member of Congress. Mick Mulvaney is the acting chief. I am the transition,” Meadows told the Washington Examiner as he walked toward the office of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
The White House, meanwhile, said in a statement to the Washington Examiner that “[Meadows is] still incoming chief of staff. Going through orderly transition with Mulvaney.”
Meadows’s chief of staff, Ben Williamson, responded to questions concerning whether the congressman was serving jobs in two separate branches of government.
Williamson tweeted, “Folks, RE: these Article I questions: Mark Meadows is not serving in two jobs. He is still a member of Congress. Mick Mulvaney is still the acting chief of staff. Meadows will resign from Congress toward the end of the month and move to the White House full-time.”
Meadows, a founding member of the House Freedom Caucus, announced in December that he would not run for another term amid rumors President Trump was strongly considering him for chief of staff.
By early March, Trump confirmed those suspicions and named the North Carolina conservative as his next chief of staff.
“I am pleased to announce that Congressman Mark Meadows will become White House Chief of Staff. I have long known and worked with Mark, and the relationship is a very good one,” Trump tweeted. “I want to thank Acting Chief Mick Mulvaney for having served the Administration so well. He will become the United States Special Envoy for Northern Ireland. Thank you!”
It’s likely Meadows will vote in the House in the next day or two on the very coronavirus-related financial relief bill he helped negotiate for the White House.
