The Georgia supreme court on Monday unanimously rejected Donald Trump’s attempt to thwart the Fulton County, Ga., district attorney’s probe into his alleged efforts to interfere in the state’s 2020 elections.
In March, Trump’s lawyers moved to quash the special grand jury’s report that had been commissioned by district attorney Fani Willis, arguing that the panel was unconstitutionally constituted in the first place and that it failed to protect Trump’s right to due process. His legal team also argued that the bizarre media tour of the grand jury’s forewoman “poisoned” the inquiry.
The report that was produced was based on the testimony of 75 witnesses as well as phone calls, emails, and other documents. Following his loss to Joe Biden in the state, Trump asked Georgia’s secretary of state to “find” another 11,780 votes to propel him to victory. His campaign also organized a slate of false electors to certify that he had won the election in the state. The evidence gathered by the special grand jury can be put to a regular grand jury by Willis, which Trump is seeking to prevent. The former president first appealed to the superior court, but later tried to circumvent the lower courts in his petition to the justices in Atlanta.
“Petitioner contends that such extraordinary relief is necessary in this case because, according to him, the entire special purpose grand jury scheme in Georgia is so vague that it violates his constitutional rights to due process under the law both facially and as applied in this case,” noted the justices, adding that Trump has argued that because he is running for president, “he would suffer irremediable reputational harm were he to be forced to defend, via the regular channels, an indictment which he contends would be based on unlawful evidence.”
“He makes no showing that he has been prevented fair access to the ordinary channels,” as the justices put it. Judge Robert McBurney of the superior court has yet to rule on the same requests from Trump that were filed to him in March.
“Furthermore, this Court has held that, even where a defendant had established that a special purpose grand jury acted illegally, neither dismissal of the subsequent indictment nor suppression of the evidence was the proper remedy for the grand jury’s overreach because no violation of defendant’s constitutional rights and no structural defect in the grand jury process occurred,” the justices wrote.
Trump’s legal team also wanted the Georgia supreme court to disqualify Willis, who is considering filing racketeering and conspiracy charges against the former president, arguing that she is operating under a conflict of interest.
According to the Georgia supreme court, “petitioner has not presented in his original petition either the facts or the law necessary to mandate Willis’s disqualification by this Court at this time on this record.”
The justices thus dismissed Trump’s long-shot bid.
Both Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg and special counsel Jack Smith have filed charges against the former president in separate cases. Willis is the last prosecutor probing Trump criminally who has not yet acted.
She has suggested she’ll act in August, and two grand juries that could decide Trump’s fate were impaneled last week.
Smith may also pursue additional charges against Trump in connection with the attack on the Capitol on January 6, precipitated by the former president’s denial of the 2020 election’s validity.