2 mystery lawmakers texted Mark Meadows during and after the Capitol riot about ways to overturn the election

• Several lawmakers texted Meadows during and just after the Jan. 6 riot, congressional investigators said.
• Many pleaded with Meadows to get Donald Trump to call off his supporters.

Two unnamed lawmakers continued to express support for former President Donald Trump's bid to overturn the 2020 election shortly before and after the Capitol riot, according to congressional investigators.

Several messages sent from lawmakers to former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows on January 6 were read out at Monday's hearing by the House select committee investigating the insurrection.

Rep. Adam Schiff of California, a committee member who read out several of the messages, said the identities of the lawmakers were not being disclosed because the investigation was ongoing.

Many were desperate pleas — some from lawmakers barricaded inside the chamber of the House — for Meadows to get Trump to speak out and stop the violence.

But two lawmakers continued to express support for the bid to subvert the result of the 2020 election — which had incited Trump's supporters to attack the Capitol in the first place.

In one, an unnamed lawmaker sought to persuade Meadows to push then-Vice President Mike Pence to refuse to certify Joe Biden's win.

Pence "should call out all electoral votes that he believes are unconstitutional as no electoral votes at all," it said.

The false belief that Pence had the constitutional authority to block Biden's win — which was in turn founded on groundless claims of sweeping electoral fraud — was at the heart of Trump and his allies' bid to subvert the election.

Another, sent from a lawmaker to Meadows on January 7, struck an apologetic tone for not halting the election.

"Yesterday was a terrible day. We tried everything we could in our objection to the six states. I'm sorry nothing worked," reads the message.

The message referred to a last-ditch bid to halt Biden's certification as president by Republican lawmakers by objecting to his victory in six states, where they falsely claimed that a sweeping plot by Democrats had deprived Trump of victory.

Before January 6, several Republican senators had signaled their intention to join House Republicans in making the objection, which would have resulted in a lengthy debate and delayed the certification of Biden's win but would not have blocked it.

But after the attack on Congress, many GOP senators backed away from supporting the move, and certification went ahead.

A group of Trump loyalists in the House and Senate played key roles in pushing Trump's false claims that the election was stolen from him, and have continued to do so in the wake of January 6.

No conclusive evidence has emerged indicating whether any lawmakers coordinated with rioters during the attack.

But sources told Rolling Stone in an article published last month that several House lawmakers had participated in "dozens" of meetings about rallies and other events designed to whip up support for overturning the election, including the rally that preceded the January 6 attack.

The commission also voted Monday to recommend the criminal prosecution of Meadows for refusing to fully cooperate with its investigation.