The attorney Sidney Powell’s decision to make a deal with the Fulton County district attorney, Fani Willis, is likely to be met with dismay at Mar-a-Lago, where the manse’s master, President Trump, is now in even greater legal jeopardy. 

Ms. Powell informed Judge Scott McAfee that she pleads guilty to five misdemeanors. She will be placed on probation, to last for six years. She will also be fined $6,000 and must pay an additional $2,700 in restitution to Georgia. She has already filed a requisite letter of apology with the court. 

In exchange for her contrition and avoiding jail time — the racketeering charge she faced carried a minimum sentence of five years — Ms. Powell has agreed to cooperate with prosecutors and testify truthfully. Jury selection for her trial, alongside another attorney, Kenneth Chesebro, was scheduled to begin tomorrow.

During a Thursday morning plea hearing, Judge McAfee noted that Ms. Powell had “already recorded a proffer with the state,” meaning that she agreed to the terms on camera. This included a promise to “testify truthfully, against any and all co-defendants in this matter at any upcoming proceedings.” Ms. Powell cannot discuss her case with any other defendant or with the press.

It’s a stunning comedown for Ms. Powell, whose career has been in freefall since she avidly pursued the claim that the 2020 election was stolen. Prosecutors say that she played a role in Mr. Trump’s effort to overturn the election and gave a number of interviews to Fox Business News, which contributed to the network’s $787 million settlement with Dominion Voting Systems. 

In a court filing on Thursday, Ms. Powell admits to “willfully tampering with electronic ballot markers and tabulating machines”  with the “intention of taking and appropriating information, data, and software” that was the “property of Dominion Voting Systems Corporation.” She also confesses to “examining personal voter data, with knowledge that such examination was without authority.” 

Ms. Willis’s team has indicated that it prepared deals for both Ms. Powell and Mr. Chesebro because both exercised their statutory right to a speedy trial. It appears that, for now, Mr. Chesebro will take his chances at trial. Ms. Powell is the second defendant to plead guilty after a bail bondsman, Scott Hall. He was charged for participation in the same voting machine scheme for which Ms. Powell faced charges.  

The Sun spoke to the lawyer Harvey Silverglate, who is on the team representing another Georgia defendant, the attorney and professor John Eastman. Mr. Silverglate pondered that the “age old question” of those who agree to cooperate with the government — like Ms. Powell — is whether they have “agreed not only to sing, but to compose,” meaning to tell prosecutors what they want to hear.

Mr. Silverglate adds that Mr. Eastman is “going to trial” and will not be following Ms. Powell’s path to cooperation. He explains that pleading guilty is particularly perilous for lawyers, who could be disbarred if they accrue rap sheets. Mr. Eastman already faces such proceedings in California for his role advising Mr. Trump in the months following the 2020 presidential election. 

In an earlier filing, Ms. Powell asserted that she “appeared in no courtrooms or hearings” for Mr. Trump and has “had no contact with most of her purported conspirators and rarely agreed with those she knew or spoke with.” The proffer of a plea deal, though, suggests that Ms. Willis believes that she has information to share.

That arrangement covers only state crimes. Mr. Powell was charged with racketeering and computer theft for her involvement in a scheme to gain access to voter rolls at Coffee County, in Georgia’s southeast. Her lawyers insist that she “did not plan or organize the Coffee County trip,” and that a “unanimous Coffee County Election Board gave permission for the forensic inspection, and nothing was stolen.” Those arguments are now moot. 

One prosecutor who could be especially attentive to what Ms. Powell says is Special Counsel Jack Smith. Ms. Powell is allegedly unindicted Co-Conspirator 3 in Mr. Smith’s January 6 charges, where he alleges that Mr. Trump “embraced and publicly amplified” her “disinformation.” He also alleges that Mr. Trump called Ms. Powell’s schemes to contest the election “crazy,” an indication that he knew the contest was lost.

In the wake of the 2020 election, Ms. Powell filed a number of unsuccessful independent lawsuits after her relationship with Mr. Trump’s campaign came to an end in the weeks following the election. She promised to “release the Kraken,” a catchphrase from a 1981 movie, “Clash of the Titans,” that starred Harry Hamlin and Laurence Olivier. This pledge to expose voter fraud came to naught.   

As the Sun reported, Mr. Smith was particularly interested in a December 18, 2020, Oval Office meeting at which Ms. Powell was present. Allegedly on the agenda at that meeting were plans to declare martial law, seize voting machines, and appoint Ms. Powell a special counsel to investigate voter fraud. While Ms. Powell’s deal only covers state charges, her testimony could be used in a federal case.

Even as Ms. Powell’s cooperation with Ms. Willis’s office brings some clarity to her future in the Peach Tree State — she is unlikely to go to jail — the lawyer faces a defamation suit brought by Dominion Voting Systems that seeks more than $1.3 billion in damages. So far, she has been unsuccessful in attempts to dismiss those claims.