13 March 2024 , 15:52
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Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee - who is overseeing the Georgia election interference case - on Wednesday dismissed several of the charges against former President Donald Trump, but many other counts in the indictment remain.
Judge McAfee wrote in an order that six of the counts in the indictment must be quashed, including three against Trump, the 2024 Republican presidential hopeful. However, the order leaves intact other charges, and the judge wrote that prosecutors could seek a new indictment on the charges he dismissed, leaving Trump's fate in the matter up in the air.
The six charges in question have to do with soliciting elected officials to violate their oaths of office, including two charges related to the phone call Trump made to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a fellow Republican, on January 2, 2021. The ruling comes as a worrying blow for Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, whose case has already been on shaky ground with an effort to have her removed from the prosecution over her romantic relationship with a colleague shook the case.
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This is one of multiple criminal cases against the Republican ex-President (AFP via Getty Images)It's the first time charges in any of the controversial ex-President Trump's four criminal cases have been dismissed, with the judge saying prosecutors failed to provide enough detail about the alleged crime in Georgia. "All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have," Trump said during that call.
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This particular case accuses Trump and 18 others of conspiring to overturn his 2020 election loss in the state to Democrat Joe Biden, which he vocally challenged. The nearly 100-page indictment details dozens of acts by Trump or his allies to undo his defeat, including harassing an election worker who faced false claims of fraud and attempting to persuade Georgia lawmakers to ignore the will of voters and appoint a new slate of electoral college electors which Trump preferred.
Trump spread the idea that voter fraud had been comitted (AFP via Getty Images)“The Court’s concern is less that the State has failed to allege sufficient conduct of the Defendants – in fact, it has alleged an abundance. However, the lack of detail concerning an essential legal element is, in the undersigned’s opinion, fatal,” McAfee wrote in Wednesday’s order.
“As written, these six counts contain all the essential elements of the crimes but fail to allege sufficient detail regarding the nature of their commission, i.e., the underlying felony solicited. They do not give the Defendants enough information to prepare their defences intelligently, as the Defendants could have violated the Constitutions and thus the statute in dozens, if not hundreds, of distinct ways.”
The new ruling did not address the ethics allegations brought against Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, surrounding a romance, by the defendants, but McAfee has pledged to issue a ruling on that issue by the end of the week.