Donald J. Trump is faces felony counts in the State of Georgia regarding Trump and his allies illegally seeking to overturn the state's election results.
If Trump is charged it will mark his fourth Indictment in five months and the second to arise from his efforts to overturn his loss in the 2020 presidential election.
Trump was charged with 13 counts, including violating the state’s racketeering act, soliciting a public officer to violate their oath, conspiring to impersonate a public officer, conspiring to commit forgery in the first degree and conspiring to file false documents.
Among those named in the sweeping indictment, charged under Georgia’s anti-racketeering law, are Rudy Giuliani, the former New York mayor who served as Trump’s personal attorney after the election; Trump’s former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows; and several Trump advisers, including attorneys John Eastman and Kenneth Chesebro, architects of a scheme to create slates of alternate Trump electors.
Also indicted were two Georgia-based lawyers advocating on Trump’s behalf, Ray S. Smith II, and Robert Cheeley; a senior campaign adviser, Mike Roman, who helped plan the elector meeting; and two prominent Georgia Republicans who served as electors: former GOP chairman David Shafer and former GOP finance chairman Shawn Still.
Several lesser known players who participated in efforts to reverse Trump’s defeat in Georgia were also indicted, including three people accused of harassing Fulton County election worker Ruby Freeman. They are Stephen Cliffgard Lee, Harrison Floyd and Trevian Kutti. The latter is a former publicist for R. Kelly and associate of Kanye West.
A final group of individuals charged in the indictment allegedly participated in an effort to steal election-equipment data in rural Coffee County, Ga. They are former Coffee County elections supervisor Misty Hampton, former Coffee County GOP chair Cathy Latham and Georgia businessman Scott Hall.
9:30pm EST: Georgia Grand Jury returns 10 Indictments; Awaiting Unsealing
10:54pm EST: Trump indictment is unsealed
10:57pm EST: Former President Trump and 18 co-defendants have been charged altogether with more than 41 counts in Georgia’s 2020 election probe (19 Total Charged)
11:05pmEST: Fulton County DA will be speaking live.
11:05pm EST: Those charged Donald Trump, Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Mark Meadows, Jeffrey Clark, Jenna Ellis, Kenneth Chesebro, Sidney Powell, Ray S. Smith III, Robert Cheeley, Mike Roman, David Shafer, Shawn Still, Stephen Cliffgard Lee, Harrison Floyd, Trevian Kutti, Misty Hampton, Cathy Latham, and Scott Hall
11:10pm EST: Read the full indictment
11:30pm EST: Awaiting Fulton County DA to speak
11:38pm EST: Fulton County DA press conference
11:45pm EST: Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis states that there will be no probation, and the minimum sentence is jail time.
She described the landmark indictment against Donald Trump and allies for attempting to alter the 2020 elections. Ms Willis said the indictment alleged a “criminal conspiracy to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in this state” which had “the illegal goal of allowing Donald J Trump to seize the presidential term of office.”
The prosecutor announced a deadline of 25 August for the defendants to turn themselves in.
11:50pm EST: All 19 will be tried together.
Sources:
Reuters: Georgia court website briefly publishes, removes document about potential Trump charges
Rolling Stone: Trump’s ‘Co-Conspirators’ Are Already Starting to Turn on Each Other
NBC News: Fulton County grand jury returns 10 indictments in 2020 election probe for Georgia
The Independent: Trump campaign launches sprawling attack as Georgia grand jury hands down indictments
MSNBC: Hillary Clinton tells Rachel Maddow: Trump indictments mean ‘the system is working’
Washington Post: Trump charged in Georgia 2020 election probe, his fourth indictment
The tastiest part here: Violation of the Georgia RICO Act carries a minimum five year prison term. If you are convicted of racketeering in Georgia, you are going to prison.
Lock him up!
Plus two year minimum for today's public witness tampering so a minimum of seven years.
This dude is so dumb (and fat). No judge in the world is going to allow you to say "witnesses shouldn't testify". That's like the stupidest form of witness tampering.
Very true, but we'll see if there's any actual recourse. So far teflon don has thumbed his nose the law every way possible. I'm not holding my breath
They'll figure out how to get it appealed up to the bought and paid for supreme court and that'll save him.
But no judge is going to rule that you can just ignore judges requests and make them look like a fool. It's like asking the cops to admit they made a mistake. They just won't do it; it goes against everything they believe.
Unless the Defendant is rich and powerful. Then they shut up and toe the line.
Watch. The judge is going to let him get away with it.
Bet you an upvote to a comment of your choice. No, I'm confident. TWO comments of your choice to one of mine.
Another tasty little tidbit I just learned after reading the wikipedia for the RICO act: Trump's team should be very familiar with it because Rudy Guiliani used it in the 80s to bring down a bunch of New York Mafia guys. It's apparently fairly easy to argue RICO in court because you just have to prove a pattern of behavior.
Giuliani used the federal version of the law, which I gather is weak compared to the Georgia version.
IF they actually get to a trial with living witnesses who haven't been intimidated into silence, it could be really bad for him.
But how easy is it to get even a single magat on the jury to not hold out forever?
That's indeed the question; so far, it hasn't happened.
Giuliani used it against the Italian mob so the Russian mob could take their place.
Minimum 5 year term and it's impossible to be pardoned in Ga. until 5 years after you've completed your sentence.
Doesn't that defeat the purpose of a pardon?
Afaik a pardon wipes it away completely as if it never happened.
Yes but I think the purpose of a pardon is that there were extenuating circumstances or nuances so that the sentence doesn't make complete sense. Like a miscarriage of justice. So the governor/president can pardon the person out of the sentence. An executive check on specific judicial cases.
It can be, and generally is, but it doesn't have to be. Like trump allegedly took bribes in exchange for pardons.
So Georgia not even allowing pardons until 5 years after the sentence is completed completely eliminates that purpose. What I'd call its main purpose.
In a case like that, the sentence can be commuted, which reduces or eliminates the sentence, at which point the 5 year clock starts before it can be pardoned, which would wipe the slate clean as if it never happened.
And Trump won't even have sick ass lyrics for the judge to say in court
As much as I'd love to see trump in an orange jumpsuit, I don't foresee any outcome where he actually serves prison time.
The best we can hope for is he gets so angry he has a heart attack.
That’s one of the worst outcomes. That would let him, once again, escape Justice. While it wouldn’t matter to him anymore, it would still very much matter to everyone else still alive.
Some of the other worst outcomes are: he escapes with no punishment yet again, he becomes unalive through nefarious means turning him into a martyr, or and actual Civil War is started over all this resulting in people dying.
Damn I think you're right but I hope to god you are wrong.
Most likely it gets reduced to home confinement and probation, due to cruel and unusual punishment guidelines. A prison sentence at his age would be a death sentence, which is beyond the punishment for the crime.