The lawyers for former President Donald Trump asked a judge to throw out two charges in his Georgia election case, arguing that Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has gone outside of her legal jurisdiction in bringing them.
Trump lawyers Steve Sadow and Jennifer Little on Wednesday filed court papers asking Fulton County Judge Scott McAfee, who is overseeing the case, to dismiss two charges against the former president and co-defendants. Namely, the filing wants dismissed the conspiracy to file false documents and filing false documents counts.
Those charges, the lawyers argued, impacted the U.S. election at the federal level, not state level. As a result, those charges can only be prosecuted by federal officials, rendering Ms. Willis’s case moot, the lawyers added.
“The alleged conduct which the state is attempting to prosecute in counts 15 and 27 is addressed by the federal false statement statute and thus jurisdiction is exclusively vested in federal court,“ the court motion said. ”As such, the state is without jurisdiction or authority to prosecute President Trump when the plain purpose of doing so is to protect the integrity of federal matters.”
One of the counts pertains to the filing of documents in a federal court several weeks after the 2020 election, including paperwork that involved a slate of Republican electors that the district attorney’s office said was fake. The other count focuses on a lawsuit that included what prosecutors say is alleged false claims of election fraud.
The two charges “cannot stand because the State of Georgia lacks the authority to criminalize conduct under a state statute ... where such conduct is directed at a federal forum, here the federal judiciary,” his lawyers also said.
Mr. Sadow and Ms. Little added that “because the conduct charged in both counts actually and directly impacts the judiciary of the United States, it contravenes federal, not state criminal law,” adding Ms. Willis shouldn’t be able to prosecute the ex-president.
“Using false documents in the jurisdiction of the judiciary of the United States is criminalized by a specific federal statute“ that is ”designed to protect the federal interest against the use of allegedly false documents in connection with the United States judiciary,” the court papers added.
Ms. Willis’s office has not yet submitted a filing in response to the latest request by the Trump legal team.
In March, Judge McAfee ruled that six of the charges in the indictment must be thrown out, but it allowed several other charges to remain. Prosecutors could also try to seek a renewed indictment on the charges that were dismissed, he also ruled, although it was the first time in any of President Trump’s cases that charges were dropped.
The allegations made by prosecutors lacked details, he ruled, adding that there was a “fatal” lack of information “concerning an essential legal element.” President Trump had originally faced 13 counts, but only faces 10 in Fulton County.
The former president has pleaded not guilty in the case, arguing that it’s a form of election interference designed to imperil his chances of winning in 2024. The judge has not yet set a date for the trial, coming after allegations surfaced earlier this year that Ms. Willis engaged in a secretive relationship with her former special counsel in the Trump case.
Those allegations, however, have so far failed to result in Ms. Willis’s removal from the case. Judge McAfee last month ruled that she can stay on as the chief prosecutor in the case, but must remove the former special prosecutor, who later resigned.
Last month, President Trump’s attorneys appealed Judge McAfee’s ruling and said he was wrong not to disqualify Ms. Willis as well, arguing that “providing DA Willis with the option to simply remove Wade confounds logic and is contrary to Georgia law.”
The application added dismissal of the case is “the truly appropriate remedy” because the damage done to the defendants and their due process rights cannot be fully undone even by disqualifying the district attorney and her office. But her disqualification is “the minimum that must be done to remove the stain of her legally improper and plainly unethical conduct from the remainder of the case,” it added.
The appeals court has 45 days to make a decision on whether to take up the appeal. Both Ms. Willis and Judge McAfee have said they will continue to press on with the case during the appeals process.
Days after she survived the disqualification attempt, Ms. Willis told CNN that her case against former President Trump and the others is ongoing.
“While that was going on, we were writing responsive briefs, we were still doing the case in a way that it needed to be done. I don’t feel like we’ve been slowed down at all. I do think there are efforts to slow down this train, but the train is coming,” she said in late March.
