Just two weeks ago former President Donald Trump predicted that, though he faces multiple criminal charges elsewhere, the post-election meddling case being pursued against him in Georgia by District Attorney Fani Willis was not causing him concern.
Trump wrote on Truth Social: “I predict that the Racist District Attorney in Atlanta, with the per capita WORST crime record in the Country, Fani Willis…will be dropping all charges against me for lack of a case.”
This makes me think that he, or his lawyers, were told something. Maybe not, but this seems rather random for him to make this prediction today. pic.twitter.com/VakCVDFnVD
— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) June 30, 2023
But Trump’s confidence in the futility of Willis’s prosecution has weakened, to judge from actions taken by his lawyers, who last week filed new petitions in the case seeking to throw out evidence, ban the empaneled Grand Jury from hearing the evidence, and to get Willis removed from the proceedings.
(If Willis were dropping all charges, her dismissal presumably would not be sought by Trump’s side.)
1/Trump is on the defensive in Georgia where he filed a petition for mandamus in GA's Supreme Court Thursday. Mandamus asks a court to order a judge to do something they are obligated to do, but won’t. Trump wants an order that in essence prevents Fani Willis from indicting him.
— Joyce Alene (@JoyceWhiteVance) July 16, 2023
Now Trump’s lawyers must deal with another intransigent prosecutor in Special Counsel Jack Smith who sharply objected to a motion by Trump’s lawyers to delay the former President’s trial in Florida, where even Trump doesn’t expect the charges to be dropped.
Seeking to put off the trial at least until after the 2024 presidential election, Trump’s lawyers — according to Smith’s response and numerous legal experts — ignored the law, specifically the Speedy Trial Act of 1974, which establishes “time limits for completing the various stages of a federal criminal prosecution.”
Smith’s response, submitted to Judge Aileen Cannon, claims Trump’s defense team has no cause to ignore the law, which allows little recourse for anything other than a speedy trial.
Former U.S. Attorney and legal expert Joyce Vance slammed the Trump lawyers’ maneuvers as “embarrassing” and cites the Speedy Trial Act, which dictates:
“In any case involving a defendant charged with an offense, the appropriate judicial officer, at the earliest practicable time, shall, after consultation with the counsel for the defendant and the attorney for the Government, set the case for trial on a day certain, or list it for trial on a weekly or other short-term trial calendar at a place within the judicial district, so as to assure a speedy trial.”
Trump’s team also cites the Presidential Records Act (PRA) in its defense. (Trump himself frequently references the PRA now during stump speeches, claiming it essentially clears him of wrongdoing.)
Regarding the PRA — which Smith asserts “is not a criminal statute, and in no way purports to address the retention of national security information”) — Smith’s response tells Judge Cannon that Trump’s lawyers “should not be permitted to gesture at a baseless legal argument, call it ‘novel,’ and then claim that the Court will require an indefinite continuance in order to resolve it.”
[NOTE: Special Counsel Smith is also, like Fani Willis, investigating Trump’s actions in Georgia, having subpoenaed Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who Trump asked to ‘find’ 11,780 votes for him in the 2020 election.]
