Fani Willis Seeks to Reinstate Dismissed Charges in Trump Georgia Case
Posted on 10/17/2024
The prosecutor overseeing the election interference case against Donald J. Trump in Georgia has asked an appeals court to restore six charges that a judge had dismissed in the case, including one related to a call that Mr. Trump made to Georgia’s secretary of state in January 2021.
In March, Judge Scott McAfee of Fulton County Superior Court quashed the six charges, which asserted that Mr. Trump and other defendants had pressured public officials to break the law by violating their oaths of office. One count against Mr. Trump, for example, said that he “unlawfully solicited, requested and importuned” Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, to violate his oath of office by decertifying the election.
On Tuesday, the prosecutor, Fani T. Willis, appealed that ruling.
The core of Ms. Willis’s case against Mr. Trump and his allies remains intact, alleging a broad effort by the defendants to overturn Mr. Trump’s 2020 loss in Georgia. But Judge McAfee has thrown out a number of charges. Mr. Trump was originally charged with 13 crimes; he is now likely to face eight charges, unless a higher court overturns the judge’s rulings.
The case, however, is largely on hold while the Georgia Court of Appeals considers a defense effort to disqualify Ms. Willis, the Fulton County district attorney, following revelations that she had a romantic relationship with the lawyer she hired to manage the prosecution.
The other defendants covered by the quashed charges include Mark Meadows, the former White House chief of staff, and Rudolph W. Giuliani, Mr. Trump’s former personal lawyer. The three others are Trump-allied lawyers: John Eastman, Ray Smith III and Robert Cheeley.
In his March ruling, Judge McAfee said that prosecutors were not specific enough about which violations the defendants were pressuring public officials to commit, writing that the charges “do not give the defendants enough information to prepare their defenses intelligently.”
Ms. Willis’s office disputed that in its appeal. It argued that the August 2023 indictment “included an abundance of context and factual allegations about the solicitations at issue, including when the requests were made, to whom the requests were made, and the manner in which the requests were made.”
Steven H. Sadow, a lawyer for Mr. Trump, declined to comment on Ms. Willis’s appeal on Wednesday.
In March, Judge Scott McAfee of Fulton County Superior Court quashed the six charges, which asserted that Mr. Trump and other defendants had pressured public officials to break the law by violating their oaths of office. One count against Mr. Trump, for example, said that he “unlawfully solicited, requested and importuned” Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, to violate his oath of office by decertifying the election.
On Tuesday, the prosecutor, Fani T. Willis, appealed that ruling.
The core of Ms. Willis’s case against Mr. Trump and his allies remains intact, alleging a broad effort by the defendants to overturn Mr. Trump’s 2020 loss in Georgia. But Judge McAfee has thrown out a number of charges. Mr. Trump was originally charged with 13 crimes; he is now likely to face eight charges, unless a higher court overturns the judge’s rulings.
The case, however, is largely on hold while the Georgia Court of Appeals considers a defense effort to disqualify Ms. Willis, the Fulton County district attorney, following revelations that she had a romantic relationship with the lawyer she hired to manage the prosecution.
The other defendants covered by the quashed charges include Mark Meadows, the former White House chief of staff, and Rudolph W. Giuliani, Mr. Trump’s former personal lawyer. The three others are Trump-allied lawyers: John Eastman, Ray Smith III and Robert Cheeley.
In his March ruling, Judge McAfee said that prosecutors were not specific enough about which violations the defendants were pressuring public officials to commit, writing that the charges “do not give the defendants enough information to prepare their defenses intelligently.”
Ms. Willis’s office disputed that in its appeal. It argued that the August 2023 indictment “included an abundance of context and factual allegations about the solicitations at issue, including when the requests were made, to whom the requests were made, and the manner in which the requests were made.”
Steven H. Sadow, a lawyer for Mr. Trump, declined to comment on Ms. Willis’s appeal on Wednesday.
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