Georgia Appeals Court Agrees to Review Fani Willis Disqualification Ruling

“Upon consideration of the Application for Interlocutory Appeal, it is ordered that it be hereby GRANTED,” reads the May 8 order.

President Trump and eight codefendants that sought review will have 10 days to file their appeal.

He and 14 others were indicted last August under the state’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, with prosecutors alleging their actions to challenge the 2020 election results amounted to a criminal conspiracy.

After revelations that Nathan Wade, the outside attorney Ms. Willis hired to lead the case, had been engaged in an affair with Ms. Willis during the investigation for the case, the trial court judge held a days-long evidentiary hearing.

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee ultimately found that the appearance of impropriety caused by the relationship, which ended just before the indictment was handed up, could be remedied by the removal of Mr. Wade alone.

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Defendants sought review of the decision, and Judge McAfee on March 29 allowed them to take the matter to the appeals court. In the meantime, the judge continued to rule on pretrial motions.

Delay

Should Ms. Willis and her office be removed from the case, a state board would need to appoint a new prosecutor to take it on.

If the case is handed to another team, charges could be dropped or added, requiring additional litigation, or prosecutors may even choose to drop the case entirely.

While the district attorney has requested an August trial, counsel for President Trump argued that a trial that overlaps with the general election would be clear “election interference.” Meanwhile, President Trump faces three other criminal cases and is currently on trial in New York. Prosecutors in his two other cases are also pushing to bring cases to trial before the November election.

The judge had not set a trial date in Georgia.

Judge McAfee has also said that it is likely the case will be severed, trying the 15 defendants in two or three groups.

Prosecutors say the case will take three to five months each time, as they have been charged under RICO and the entire case will need to be presented each time to prove a conspiracy.

Allegations

Defense attorney Ashleigh Merchant, representing defendant Michael Roman, a GOP strategist who worked on the 2020 Trump Campaign, brought the motion to disqualify Ms. Willis in January.

Ms. Merchant told a committee of state lawmakers that she began her due diligence on researching the outside counsel the district attorney hired for the case when she agreed to represent Mr. Roman. She testified that she found the lack of paperwork associated with these hirings and the amount Mr. Wade was being paid to be unusual based on her own experience working as a state prosecutor. This led to additional investigation, whereby Ms. Merchant was told, and found corroborating evidence, that Mr. Wade and Ms. Willis engaged in an affair that began before his hiring and continued after his appointment.

Ms. Merchant had also alleged the possibility of misuse of state and county funds by the district attorney, though Ms. Willis and a county board refuted the claims because the district attorney is a state officer not subject to the county rules Ms. Merchant cited.

However, the allegations led to several additional inquiries and investigations including by Fulton County Commissioner Bob Ellis, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), and a newly formed Georgia Senate committee chaired by Bill Cowsert, who told reporters they have spoken to multiple whistleblowers alleging financial misconduct in the district attorney’s office.