Talking Points Memo

A funny thing happened last week. As you may know, TPM published a series aptly titled "The Chesebro Docs," which laid out how one man's (Kenneth Chesebro's) crackpot legal theories laid the groundwork for the insurrection on January 6th, 2021. The trove of documents revealed how, if Trump and his team had their way, the chaos would have lasted not for one day but a couple weeks and hinged in large part on the belief the Supreme Court could be pressured to help.

Well, as our attention was focused on this new series and the important information within, we noticed a different series was driving a lot of traffic: Our old friends, The Meadows Texts. This was a series we published back in December of 2022. This series also relates to the events of January 6th, but from a different perspective. If you haven't read it, we highly recommend you check it out.

Not to get all inside publishing, but we were struggling to figure out why this story surfaced at this time. We think someone clicked a link in the Chesebro series that led to the Meadows texts series, they posted that series on Reddit and/or Twitter, and it took off. It was nice to see an important older series gaining renewed life. As much as it would be nice to say the series isn't still relevant, it is.
 

Both series are illustrative of something TPM excels s important and contextualizing the conclusions for our readers and listeners. Getting the documents — that is important — but it's only half the battle: What do they mean? Why should you care? What are the stakes? These are the important questions. Fortunately, we have talented AND experienced reporters who can answer them. We'd appreciate it greatly if you'd support our work so that we can help bring you more of this.
 

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