Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis must be disqualified from overseeing the criminal case in Georgia against President-elect Donald Trump and his allies, a state appeals court ruled Thursday, delivering a win to Trump and his allies as it reversed a lower court decision that kept Willis on the case—even as judges still declined to throw out the case.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis looks on during a hearing on March 1 in Atlanta, ... [+]
Trump and other allies indicted in Georgia asked an appeals court to determine whether Willis should be disqualified from the case due to her romantic relationship with prosecutor Nathan Wade, after a lower judge ruled Wade had to leave the case but Willis could continue her prosecution.
The appeals court ruled Willis must be disqualified, arguing her relationship with Wade gave the “appearance of impropriety” and “no other remedy” besides disqualifying her “will suffice to restore public confidence in the integrity of these proceedings.”
It did not throw out the case entirely, however, ruling against the defendants’ motion to dismiss the charges due to Willis’ alleged impropriety.
While the lower court ruled Willis could stay on the case as long as Wade left, the appeals court said that solution “did nothing to address the appearance of impropriety” regarding the steps Willis has already taken in the case, like deciding what charges to bring.
Willis’ actions aren’t enough for the appeals court to impose the “extreme sanction” of throwing out the case entirely, the judges ruled, upholding the lower court’s decision that her relationship with Wade didn’t violate the defendants’ due process rights at all.
The Fulton County District Attorney’s office can now no longer handle the case against Trump and his allies at all, the appeals court ruled, arguing that Willis no longer being able to lead the case also means that the lower-ranking prosecutors in her office can’t be on it at all. Finding a replacement will now be up to the executive director of the Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council of the State of Georgia, and it’s unclear how long that could take. The Council’s director, Pete Skandalakis, told CNN in February that appointing a replacement will require finding “somebody with the resources and experience” necessary for handling such a complex case. The New York Times notes Democratic-appointed prosecutors in Georgia’s DeKalb or Cobb counties could likely be best equipped to take up the case. While the charges against Trump were already expected to be delayed until he leaves office—if they’re not thrown out before then—the process means that the trials against Trump’s co-defendants, including ex-attorney Rudy Giuliani and former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, will now likely be significantly delayed.
This story is breaking and will be updated.