‘It Will Not Be Dismissed’: Defiant Fani Willis Signals She Won’t Stop Prosecuting Trump, Rebuffs Republican Demands

District Attorney Fani Willis’s rebuff of Congressman Jim Jordan’s request for information on her correspondence with Special Counsel Jack Smith and House Democrats is a signal that she has no intention of slowing her prosecution of President-elect Trump.Ms. Willis charged Trump and 18 others as part of a sprawling racketeering case alleging criminal interference in the 2020 election in Georgia. Now, she writes to Mr. Jordan that “This case was not brought for political reasons” and that it “will not be dismissed for political reasons.” She describes the case as “ongoing.” Mr. Jordan leads the House Judiciary Committee.The district attorney, in a note flush with irony, references a “thoughtful correspondence” between herself and Mr. Jordan, a Republican and Trump ally. Their correspondence has been acrimonious. In March Ms. Willis wrote to the Ohioan that “nothing that you do will derail the efforts of my staff and I to bring the election interference prosecution to trial.” In Ms. Willis’s latest missive, she contends that his request exceeds the limits of congressional authority and violates constitutional principles of separation of powers, state sovereignty, and federalism.” She argues that any information he seeks is “protected from discovery by attorney-client privilege, work product privilege, and other common law protections.” This is the second time in the space of a week that Ms. Willis has refused to disclose records. A Fulton County judge found that she was in violation of Georgia’s open records laws when she failed to respond to a request from a conservative legal group, Judicial Watch. Her office was held to be “in default” and lacking in any manner of “meritorious defense.” Even after that ruling, though, Ms. Willis has stonewalled. She contends that her communications with the Democrat-controlled January 6 committee are “legally exempted or excepted from disclosure,” as they are records in a “pending, ongoing criminal investigation and prosecution.” She denies communicating with Special Counsel Jack Smith. Judicial Watch is also suing the Justice Department for these communications. The DOJ will not confirm or deny if records exist — or if the alleged contact took place. Ms. Willis’s rationale for withholding the records only works if her case against Trump is still an active one — and that Ms. Willis intends for it to stay that way. It’s unclear if the DOJ will be obliged to disgorge any information from its end now that Mr. Smith has asked for his cases against Trump to be dismissed.As for Ms. Willis, Mr. Jordan writes that his committee “continues to conduct oversight of politically motivated prosecutions,” and had given Ms. Willis a deadline last week to “voluntary” comply with his request for documents. Mr. Jordan is also leading a separate investigation into whether Ms. Willis misused federal funds when she hired her former boyfriend, Nathan Wade, as the case’s special prosecutor. Her office paid him more than $650,000, and the two took vacations together to locales like Belize and Napa while he was on the job. The Georgia Court of Appeals court is also currently weighing whether to remove Ms. Willis from the Trump case due to her secret romance, which was only exposed when an attorney from one of Trump’s co-defendants cast a spotlight on the affair. A ruling has been mysteriously delayed.Trump has requested that the case be dismissed in the wake of his victory in November over Vice President Harris. His lawyer, Steven Sadow, writes in that motion that “a sitting president is completely immune from indictment or any criminal process, state or federal.” He cites authorities stretching back to “the dawn of the Republic” to condemn the “unconstitionality” of the Fulton County case. The Supreme Court, in the 1819 case of McCulloch v. Maryland, held that states “have no power … to retard, impede, burden, or in any manner control, the operations” of the federal government. Never before, though, has a sitting president faced state criminal charges while in office. Ms. Willis has said that “the train is coming” to convict Trump. The two federal cases against him were dismissed by Mr. Smith after the Justice Department determined that there is a “categorical” ban on prosecuting sitting presidents for fear of distracting them from their duties. Mr. Smith has expressed that he understands this immunity to be “temporary” and a creature of “circumstance.” His charges against Trump were dismissed “without prejudice,” meaning that they could be refiled at some future date when circumstances conspire to ensure that Trump is no longer president. Ms. Willis appears unmoved by that logic. She writes that acceding to Mr. Jordan’s request would “expose legal theories and analysis, prosecutorial recommendations, and key evidence in an ongoing prosecution.” District Attorney Alvin Bragg of New York County, also known as Manhattan, who secured 34 criminal convictions against Trump, has acknowledged that his case cannot proceed for another four years. Mr. Bragg, though, is fighting Trump’s request to dismiss the case and has indicated he plans to resume his prosecution of Trump once he leaves office in 2029.Ms. Willis, who like Trump won an election in November, awaits word from the Georgia Court of Appeals regarding her future atop the case against Trump. The president-elect and some of his co-defendants have moved for her disqualification due to her relationship with Mr. Wade, which they alleged violated their due process rights. A trial judge agreed that it amounted to a “significant appearance of impropriety” and ordered Mr. Wade off of the case if Ms. Willis elected to continue. She did. The defendants also point to Ms. Willis’s accusations — in a historic Black church — that her opponents are “playing the race card.” That holds the potential to poison any future jury at majority-minority Fulton County, they argue. That same judge, Scott McAfee, called Ms. Willis’s comments “legally improper” but did not reckon that they required removal.

‘It Will Not Be Dismissed’: Defiant Fani Willis Signals She Won’t Stop Prosecuting Trump, Rebuffs Republican Demands

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