Virginia Thomas, the wife of US conservative Supreme Court Judge Clarence Thomas urged Trump's chief of staff Mark meadows to try to overturn the 2020 US election results, the Washington Post and CBS News have reported.
US Justice Clarence Thomas and his wife Virginia Thomas in October 2021. Photo: AFP/ Getty Images
Thomas sent Meadows a series of text messages in the weeks following the 3 November presidential election. They show Thomas advised Meadows to "make a plan" and "release the Kraken" in a bid to preserve Donald Trump's presidency, the Post and CBS News said.
Thomas, a conservative activist and attorney, could not immediately be reached for comment.
Now-President Joe Biden was projected to win the race on 7 November, 2020.
"Sounds like Sidney and her team are getting inundated with evidence of fraud. Make a plan. Release the Kraken and save us from the left taking America down," she said in one of 29 messages shared between the two, according to the Post.
Sidney Powell, who represented Trump's campaign when he sought to overturn the election result, filed lawsuits challenging counts in multiple states in support of Trump's false claims of widespread election fraud. She had previously vowed to "release the Kraken" to expose the alleged fraud, a reference to the sea monster of Scandinavian folklore.
The messages were handed over to the congressional committee investigating the 6 January attack on the US Capitol, according to the Post and CBS, who said, without elaborating, that they had obtained copies of the messages.
Reuters could not independently verify the reports.
A spokesperson for the 6 January committee declined to comment.
Reuters sought comment from Meadows at the Conservative Partnership Institute, an organisation that helps elect conservatives to office where Meadows now serves as partner, but was unable to immediately reach him. An attorney for Meadows did not return a request for comment.
The messages do not directly reference Thomas' husband or the Supreme Court, according to the Post.
Trump's campaign distanced itself from Powell after she claimed without evidence at a 19 November, 2020 news conference that electronic voting systems had switched millions of ballots to Biden.
The news comes almost a week after Justice Thomas was admitted to a Washington hospital.
Thomas was released from hospital on Friday.
- Reuters