The Court of Appeal has stopped Georgia Former US President's Election Interference Case Donald Trump and others while reviewing a lower court judge's decision to allow Fulton County D.A. Fanny Willis Continue to investigate this case.
The Georgia Court of Appeals issued an order Wednesday barring Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee from moving forward with pretrial motions as planned during the appeal. While the case is unlikely to go to trial before the November election, when Trump is expected to become the Republican presidential nominee, the order makes that more likely.
The appeals court accepted the appeal filed by Trump and eight others on Monday and said that “if oral arguments are requested and granted,” the appeal date is tentatively scheduled for October 4. The court must make a ruling by mid-March, and the losing party can appeal to the Georgia Supreme Court.
A spokesman for Willis declined to comment on the appeals court's ruling.
In August, a Fulton County grand jury indicted Trump and 18 others for their roles in a massive scheme to illegally overturn the 2020 presidential election in Georgia. Four defendants pleaded guilty after reaching agreements with prosecutors, but Trump and the others pleaded not guilty. This is one of four criminal cases against Trump.
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Trump and eight other defendants had tried to have Willis and her office withdraw from the case, saying her romantic relationship with special prosecutor Nathan Wade created a conflict of interest. McAfee ruled in March that there was no conflict of interest and that Willis should not be forced to withdraw from the case, but he granted a request by Trump and the other defendants to appeal the ruling to a state appeals court.
“The whiff of lies remains,” McAfee wrote. He said there were “reasonable questions” about whether Willis and Wade testified truthfully about the timing of their relationship, “further corroborating the finding that misconduct occurred and the corresponding efforts needed to correct it.” He said Willis could only stay on the case if Wade left, and the special counsel submitted his resignation hours later.
Willis was accused of improperly profiting from her relationship with Wade, leading to a turbulent few months in the case as intimate details of Willis and Wade's personal lives were made public in court in mid-February.
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