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- Fulton County Senior Judge Scott McAfee ruled that jurors must decide whether President Trump broke the law, not dismiss the election intimidation charges.
- Trump had argued that even if his statements about the election were false, they should be protected from criminal prosecution as political speech.
A Georgia judge in Donald Trump’s election interference case said Thursday that the First Amendment protects him from extortion charges because his baseless claims of widespread election fraud are political speech. rejected the claim.
Trump’s lawyer, Steve Sadow, argued that the charges should be dismissed because Trump was talking about politics as president. Sadow argued that even if Trump made false statements, as alleged in the indictment, he must be protected for the sake of solid political debate.
But Fulton County Senior Judge Scott McAfee said the First Amendment does not protect speech that is part of a crime, and a jury will have to decide whether that applies in Trump’s case. It was decided that there was.
“The question that the defendants’ words and actions were carried out with criminal intent can only be resolved by a jury,” McAfee wrote.
Sadow said in a statement Thursday. He politely disagreed with McAfee’s order, but said he might raise the issue again later.
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The Georgia case is one of four criminal cases pending against Trump, and he has maintained his innocence in each case. He previously tried to remove Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis from the case because of her relationship with another prosecutor, but special prosecutor Nathan Wade was forced to resign. It was just that.
President Trump and 18 co-defendants were charged with racketeering conspiracy to try to steal the 2020 election by encouraging state officials to overturn the results. Four of the co-defendants have pleaded guilty, and the rest are awaiting trial.
The indictment alleges that Rudy Giuliani, Ray Smith and Robert Chealey “knowingly and knowingly made false statements” to state lawmakers about election fraud. The indictment also alleges that the Trump campaign recruited Republicans, three of whom were charged in the case, to pose as presidential electors and submit false documents, even though President Joe Biden won the state. claims. The indictment alleges that Trump and co-defendant John Eastman conspired to submit false documents in a federal lawsuit challenging the election results.
McAfee rejected Trump’s request to dismiss the charges, ruling that a jury must decide whether he and the other defendants “knowingly” and “knowingly” violated the law. .
“During oral argument, the defendants argued that the speeches at issue, even if false, were political and could not be prosecuted for falsehoods alone,” McAfee wrote. “Instead, the indictment consistently denies that the defendants acted ‘knowingly’ and ‘knowingly’ to influence matters of concern to the government.”
Sadow had urged McAfee to drop the charges, saying they were based on Trump’s comments questioning the election results and pressuring state officials to overturn them.
“Falsehood alone is not enough,” Sadow said. “Obviously, being president at the time and working on elections and campaigning and questioning what happened, that’s the pinnacle of political discourse.”
But prosecutors argued that Trump’s comments contributed to a broader conspiracy that included making false statements to government officials, submitting false and forged documents, and impersonating public officials. President Trump asked Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a fellow Republican, to “find” the votes needed to retain the Peach State.
“It’s not just that he lied over and over again,” prosecutor Donald Wakeford said. “Each of them was used as part of a criminal activity with criminal intent.”
McAfee found that the allegations went beyond political speech. “The state claims to be more than just an expression of a political nature,” McAfee wrote. “Rather, the indictment charges the defendants with knowingly and knowingly making false statements to public officials and knowingly and knowingly submitting documents containing false statements and misrepresentations within the jurisdiction of state departments and agencies. are doing.”
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