Unlikely Trump’s Last-Minute Attempt to Oust Fani Willis Will Succeed

While former President Donald Trump scored a major victory by forcing the removal of special prosecutor Nathan Wade, his effort to remove Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is unlikely to succeed.

After uncovering a romantic relationship between Willis and Wade, Trump’s lawyers have sought to have Willis’s case against the former president dismissed. The new strategy is unrelated to the Willis-Wade affair and instead uses a free speech argument. Similar arguments were used prior by co-defendants Sidney Powell and Ken Chesebro — both of which failed.

Trump’s lawyers argue that his actions and rhetoric around the 2020 election were political speech and therefore protected by the First Amendment.

“The core political speech and expressive conduct alleged in this indictment against President Trump are protected from government regulation and thus criminal prosecution by the State,” Trump attorney Steve Sadow wrote in a filing late last year.

“Criminalizing President Trump’s speech and advocacy disputing the outcome of the election — while speech endorsing the election’s outcome is viewed as unimpeachable — is thus blatant viewpoint discrimination,” he said.

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The argument is similar to that used by Chesebro and Powell, who attempted to have their cases dismissed under the Constitution’s supremacy clause but failed. Soon after the failures, both defendants pleaded guilty.

After two months of disqualification hearings over her affair with Wade, Willis has expressed eagerness to get the case rolling before the November presidential election.