Willis and her office were disqualified from the case against Trump last month after she had an undisclosed relationship with Nathan Wade, the lead prosecutor on the case. In an appeal to the Georgia Supreme Court filed late Wednesday, Willis asked for her office to be reinstated on the Trump case and said the state appellate court was incorrect in disqualifying her.

“The opinion managed to overreach both upward and downward, invading the provinces of the trial court and this Court simultaneously,” Willis argued in the petition to the Georgia high court

“No Georgia court has ever identified or applied a standard for disqualification unique to prosecutors. No Georgia court has ever disqualified a district attorney for the mere appearance of impropriety without the existence of an actual conflict of interest. And no Georgia court has ever reversed a trial court’s order declining to disqualify a prosecutor based solely on an appearance of impropriety,” the petition continued.

Willis was initially allowed to stay on the case after a ruling by Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee, but a 2-1 decision by the Georgia Court of Appeals in December found that McAfee “erred by failing to disqualify DA Willis.” 

The Georgia election subversion case against Trump was one of four criminal cases brought against him in 2023 while he was running for a second term in the White House.

As Trump prepares to return to the White House in 11 days, only the New York hush money case resulted in a conviction, while the two federal cases fell apart before trial, and the Georgia case appears doomed. Trump will be sentenced in the New York case Friday, but it appears unlikely he will be sentenced to jail time.

If Willis is unable to get the disqualification reversed, the case will have to be picked up by another county district attorney’s office to proceed.