Donald Trump’s lawyers in the Georgia election annulment case asked on Monday that Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis and her office be removed from the case, saying she led a “deliberate injection of false allegations of racism” into the trial.
Much of the filing in the Georgia Court of Appeals focused on a speech by Willis, who is black, at a church in January. In those statements, Trump’s lawyers argued that he “deliberately chose to ‘play the ‘race card'” in a deliberate attempt to obtain a public condemnation of the accused and to divert the public’s attention away from himself.
In his address to the church, Willis criticized Trump’s legal team for saying he should be disbarred because he had an inappropriate relationship with the prosecutor he hired. He noted that prosecutor Nathan Wade was the only black person he had hired at that level.
“Aren’t they playing the race card when they question just one?” Willis said in front of the companions. “Aren’t they playing the race card when they keep thinking that I need someone from another jurisdiction in another state to tell me how to do a job that I’ve been doing for almost 30 years?”
In their new filing, Trump’s lawyers argued that Willis’ remarks were made as “racial remarks” and that he “apparently meant that any potential Fulton County juror who heard or read Willis’ racist speech would label the defendants racist.”
Willis’ office did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the allegations made by Trump’s legal team.
Monday’s filing was made with the Georgia Court of Appeals, which stayed Fulton County’s Trump lawsuit in June while it considers whether Willis should be removed from the case. Its first session is scheduled for December.
That development has stalled the case, which was initially expected to end before Election Day this year, in which Trump is vying for the GOP presidential nomination.
Efforts to remove him from the case began in January when Mike Roman, one of Trump’s co-defendants accused of swaying Georgia’s 2020 election results, alleged that Willis had a relationship with Wade that created a conflict of interest for him. work. Willis admitted the following month that he had a “personal relationship” with Wade, but denied it had any bearing on the trial.
Shortly after Roman filed his complaint, Trump’s legal team made very similar claims to their Monday filing, alleging that Willis “inappropriately injected race and incited race” during his speech at the church.
The judge overseeing the case ruled in March that there was not enough evidence that Willis improperly benefited from Wade’s hiring. However, the relationship created a “significant appearance of impropriety,” he said, ordering either Willis or Wade to step down from the case. Wade resigned that day.
