Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis will be unable to push forward with efforts to prosecute President Donald Trump and his allies over charges that they attempted to interfere in the 2020 election in Georgia. The state’s supreme court has upheld an earlier decision removing Willis from the case, likely delaying the case indefinitely and potentially quashing it altogether.
Court upholds removal of Willis from the Trump case
On Tuesday, the Georgia Supreme Court declined to take up an appeal by Willis, who sought to overturn an earlier ruling that removed her from the prosecution of Trump and several allies. Willis was the lead prosecutor of the RICO case, which charged Trump and various co-conspirators with attempting to influence the results of the 2020 election in Georgia illegally; Joe Biden narrowly won the state. Willis was accused of impropriety in the case for having a personal relationship with a lawyer whom she had hired to participate in the prosecution. Willis was initially allowed to retain her role as lead prosecutor in the case despite the objection of the Trump legal team. However, an appeals court reversed that decision in December and ordered that the case could only move forward without Willis. She sought to reverse that ruling, but the Georgia Supreme Court’s decision not to take up the case allows the previous ruling to stand, thus disqualifying Willis from playing a role in the case.
Georgia’s prosecution of Trump in doubt
The Georgia case was once one of several cases Trump faced, the only president in U.S. history convicted of felony offenses. After Trump won reelection, the remaining federal cases against him were dropped; however, he had no direct authority to prevent a state case from going forward. The decision against Willis essentially puts the entire Georgia case against Trump and his co-defendants on indefinite pause. The Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council of Georgia will decide whether to reassign the case to another prosecutor; that body is currently chaired by a Republican former prosecutor who previously declined to bring charges against a fake elector involved in the alleged Trump conspiracy. Even if a new prosecutor chooses to proceed with the case instead of dropping it, it’s possible they would wait until Trump leaves office to pursue the charges against him, though they could try his co-defendants in the interim.
Willis and Trump react to the decision
In a statement, Willis said, “While I disagree with the decision of the Georgia Court of Appeals and the Georgia Supreme Court’s divided decision not to review it, I respect the legal process and the courts.” She indicated that she would provide all the relevant case material to the Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council of Georgia, adding, “I hope that whoever is assigned to handle the case will have the courage to do what the evidence and the law demand.”
Trump, meanwhile, gloated over the decision, mocking Willis and referring to the case against him as a “Fake Witch Hunt.”
When reporters asked Trump about the Willis decision ahead of his departure to the U.K., Trump said, “She should be put in jail. She’s a criminal. Fani Willis is a criminal.”
Willis has not been charged with any criminal wrongdoing, nor has the case against Trump and his co-defendants been dismissed. But, for now, any prosecution of Trump and his allies for their alleged interference in Georgia will have to go on without Willis, and it is unclear if another prosecutor will be willing to push the case forward.