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Former President Donald Trump responded to the release of a report by a grand jury in Georgia that did not implicate him in any post-2020 election wrongdoing. Writing on his Truth Social platform on Thursday following the release of the report, Trump said: “Thank you to the Special Grand Jury in the Great State of Georgia for your Patriotism & Courage. Total exoneration. The USA is very proud of you!!!”
In another ‘truth,’ he noted: “The long awaited important sections of the Georgia report, which do not even mention President Trump’s name, have nothing to do with the President because President Trump did absolutely nothing wrong. The President participated in two perfect phone calls regarding election integrity in Georgia, which he is entitled to do – in fact, as President, it was President Trump’s Constitutional duty to ensure election safety, security, and integrity…Between the two calls, there were many officials and attorneys on the line, including the Secretary of State of Georgia, and no one objected, even slightly protested, or hung up. President Trump will always keep fighting for true and honest elections in America!”
Fani Willis, the Georgia prosecutor in charge of the criminal inquiry into Trump’s efforts to investigate voter fraud during the 2020 election, is considering whether those who testified before the grand jury lied while under oath,” Newsmax reported.
The information is among the details that were disclosed in the five-page report from the special grand jury’s investigation into Trump, which was released to the public on Thursday following a judge’s order. The report could lead to new targets for Willis, who has been characterized as a “tenacious courtroom advocate.”
Willis, a member of the Democratic Party, has pursued an assertive strategy in the Trump investigation. She has issued subpoenas to some of Trump’s associates, such as Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, while also litigating to force them to provide testimony, the report noted further, adding:
Trump did not testify and has not been charged with a crime.
Trump, who in November announced another run for the presidency in 2024, has denied wrongdoing and has called Willis a “radical left prosecutor.”
At the heart of the investigation is Trump’s January 2021 call to Raffensperger asking him to “find” just enough votes that might be used as outcome determinative in the key battleground state. Willis also has examined a scheme to appoint an alternate slate of electors in a bid to award Georgia’s electoral votes to Trump, rather than Biden, ahead of congressional certification of the election results.
To aid in the Trump investigation, Willis enlisted the services of John Floyd, a private attorney from Atlanta who authored a manual on prosecuting state racketeering offenses. The move has generated speculation that she is constructing a case against Trump or his associates under Georgia’s anti-organized crime law.
The former president, meanwhile, has accused her of pursuing him for political purposes and has criticized her management of violent crime in Atlanta, which is Georgia’s most populous city and located in Fulton County.
Willis informed a judge on January 24th that a decision on whether to press criminal charges was “imminent” following the completion of the special grand jury’s work. Although pages of the grand jury’s report were made public on Thursday, any recommendations regarding criminal charges will remain undisclosed for the time being. It is conceivable that no charges will result from the investigation at all, Newsmax noted further.
“She’s a pit bull in the courtroom,” Vincent Velazquez, a former Atlanta homicide detective who worked with Willis during her time as an assistant district attorney, said. “You give her an inch, she’s going to take a foot.”
Georgia’s anti-racketeering law is more comprehensive than the federal version, allowing for the prosecution of “corrupt organizations” if the prosecution can prove that they have carried out a series of criminal acts that comprise at least two offenses.
That said, several defense attorneys have expressed unease that Willis may have exceeded the law’s intended application by targeting speech that is safeguarded by the U.S. Constitution, Newsmax noted further.
