Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis made it absolutely, undeniably clear that she is not messing around following her bombshell, late-night, 11-count indictment against scandal-ridden former US President Donald J. Trump and his band of cronies that dropped last night when she made it very clear during a press conference on the matter that the ex-president and his fellow charged allies have a hard deadline of noon on Friday to “voluntarily surrender” themselves for their arrest.
Willis’ statement to the ex-president and his allies came during a late press conference last night, following her surprise, explosive indictment that was dropped against Donald Trump and others in the late hours of yesterday. Fani Willis’ indictment now serves as the fourth formal criminal indictment against disgraced ex-president Trump — joining Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s infamous hush money indictment and DOJ Special Counsel Jack Smith’s federal indictments in the stolen document case and the case related to election interference and Donald’s role in the January 6th Capitol attack.
“Subsequent to the indictment, as is the normal process in Georgia law, the grand jury issued arrest warrants for those who are charged. I am giving the defendants the opportunity to voluntarily surrender no later than noon on Friday the 25th day of Aug. 2023,” Fulton County DA Fani Willis told the press late last night.
Willis publicly announced the names of all who were indicted in this case before going on to outline the premise of her indictment against 19 different people, on 41 different counts.
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“Specifically, the participants in association took various actions in Georgia and elsewhere to block the counting of the votes of the presidential electors who were certified as the winners of Georgia’s 2020 general election. As you examine the indictment, you will see acts that are identified as overt acts and those are that are identified as predicate acts, sometimes called acts of racketeering activity,” DA Willis explained in the presser. “Overt acts are not necessarily crimes under Georgia law in isolation but are alleged to be acts taken in furtherance of the conspiracy.”
She went on to explain that some of those acts did not take place in the state of Georgia but were included in the charges because they were part of Donald and his allies’ overall efforts to overthrow the results of the 2020 presidential election in the state of Georgia.
“The acts identified as predicate acts or acts of racketeering activity are crimes that are alleged to have been committed in furtherance of the criminal enterprise,” Willis further explained. “Acts of racketeering activity are also charged as separate counts in the indictment against those who are alleged to have committed them. All elections in our nations are administered by the states which are given the responsibility of ensuring a fair process and an accurate counting of the votes. That includes elections for presidential electors, Congress, state officials and local offices. The state’s role in this process is essential to the functioning of our democracy. Georgia, like every state, has laws that will allow those who believe the results of an election are wrong, whether because of intentional wrongdoing or unintentional error, to challenge those results in our state courts. The indictment alleges that rather than abide by Georgia’s legal process for election challenges, the defendants engaged in a criminal racketeering enterprise to overturn Georgia’s presidential election result.”
The DA went on to confirm that she intends to try all 19 defendants together in this case.
Watch DA Fani Willis’ press conference here:
Featured image via Political Tribune Gallery
