Donald Trump was indicted Monday by a Fulton County grand jury for attempting to overturn the 2020 presidential election in Georgia. Today’s indictment marks the fifth time the ex-president has been criminally charged since March, if you include the Department of Justice's decision to issue a superseding indictment with additional charges in the classified-documents case. In all, he faces four indictments; the first came in Manhattan, when a grand jury voted to charge him over various hush-money payments he made prior to the 2016 election. In June, he was indicted by a federal grand jury for willfully retaining national defense information and conspiring to obstruct justice, and weeks later, he was indicted by a separate federal grand jury for attempting to overturn the 2020 election. In late July, he was hit with additional charges in the documents case in a superseding indictment. Trump has denied all wrongdoing.
In Georgia, Trump was charged with 13 counts, including violating the state’s racketeering act, conspiring to impersonate a public officer, conspiring to commit forgery in the first degree, conspiring to file false documents, and soliciting a public officer to violate their oath. Eighteen other individuals were charged by Willis, including Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Mark Meadows Kenneth Chesebro, Sidney Powell, Jeffrey Clark, and Jenna Ellis.
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In a statement, the Trump campaign accused Fulton County district attorney Fani Willis of being a “rabid partisan” and baselessly claimed that her investigation was based on “fabricated accusations.” The campaign also insisted the Biden administration was connected to the proceedings, despite the fact that this is not a federal case.
Willis first announced her investigation into Trump on February 10, 2021, just over a month after his infamous phone call with Georgia secretary of state Brad Raffensperger, during which the then president demanded the state official “find” him the exact number of votes he needed to beat Joe Biden there. “All I want to do is this,” Trump told Raffensperger. “I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have, because we won the state.” Trump had also claimed that not coming up with said votes would be a “criminal offense,“ warning Raffensperger and the secretary of state’s general counsel, “You can’t let that happen. That’s a big risk to you.” (Raffensperger subsequently wrote in his book that he believed Trump was threatening him.) Trump also placed at least two additional phone calls to Georgia officials in his quest to overturn the election, one to David Ralston, who at the time was Georgia’s House Speaker, and one to Frances Watson, an investigator in Raffensperger’s office. (Trump wanted the former to convene a special legislative session to overturn Biden’s win in Georgia, and pressed the latter to expose “dishonesty” as she looked into absentee mail ballots.)
Willis’s investigation ultimately expanded to include the post-election activities of Trump and his allies in other states, and a scheme by a slate of “fake electors” to keep Trump in office.
Last year, a special grand jury was impaneled to investigate the case. It submitted a report in January that Trump’s attorneys attempted to quash (they also tried to get both Willis and the judge presiding over the inquiry thrown off the case). In February, when asked about the recommendations the special grand jury made regarding which individuals should be charged, jury forewoman Emily Kohrs told The New York Times it was “not a short list.” Asked whether the ex-president was on it, she added: “You’re not going to be shocked. It’s not rocket science.” Speaking to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in March, another juror said of the group’s report: “A lot’s gonna come out sooner or later. And it’s gonna be massive. It’s gonna be massive.”
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