Fulton County DA Requests Special Grand Jury to Investigate Trump’s Efforts to Overturn GA Election, Including Subpoenaing Raffensperger to Testify
Fulton County (Georgia) District Attorney Fani Willis has requested a special grand jury to subpoena evidence and witness testimony related to her investigation into “possible criminal disruptions” into the State of Georgia’s administration of the 2020 election, including former President Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the presidential race in the state, which was won by President Joe Biden.
CNN’s Sara Murray reported on the letter that Willis sent to Fulton County Superior Court Chief Judge Christopher Brasher (embedded below), which requests the special grand jury to begin in May, for no longer than 12 months.
As Murray noted, Willis had announced she was opening her investigation after a recording of “the infamous phone call that Donald Trump had with Brad Raffensperger,” the Georgia Secretary of State, where Trump pleaded and threatened Raffensperger in an attempt to get him to “find” 11,870 votes — enough for Trump to win the state by one vote — along with a laundry list of unproven and baseless claims of election fraud.
“We have made effort to interview multiple witnesses and gather evidence,” Willis wrote in her letter, “and a significant number of witnesses and prospective witnesses have refused to cooperate with the investigation absent a subpoena requiring their testimony.” She specifically cited Raffensperger as an example, calling him “an essential witness to the investigation,” and wrote that he “has indicated that he will not participate in an interview or otherwise offer evidence until he is presented with a subpoena by my office.”
Raffensperger is in a difficult political position, being on the ballot for re-election and facing a Trump-supporting primary challenger. He’s spoken openly about his concerns about Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election and the threats he and his family received from Trump supporters but has still refused to rule out voting for Trump if he runs again in 2024.
“Essentially what this letter tells you,” said Murray, “is that she’s serious about pursuing a potential criminal indictment, either against former President Donald Trump or allies who were helping him with this campaign in Georgia. It’s not a done deal that she will get the special grand jury. There are judges who have to sign off on this request, but it tells you how serious she is in this pursuit.”
Host Ana Cabrera then turned to CNN legal analyst and former Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Elie Honig, asking him if he were the prosecutor in this case, “Why make this move and why now?”
Honig replied that there were two reasons, and the first was that it was “it’s time to play hardball”:
This district attorney has said, I need to speak with witnesses and several of them, she says in her letter, have not agreed to speak with me voluntarily. That’s why you need a grand jury. Grand juries issue subpoenas. A subpoena is a formal command that you must testify. That’s enforceable by the courts, and ultimately potentially by law enforcement, and that’s how you get people who may be reluctant to testify.
The second reason, Honig continued, was that a special grand jury was able to focus on just the one case:
Normal grand juries, your everyday grand juries — first of all, they only sit for a limited amount of time, could be a month, could be a couple months, and they’re hearing different cases all throughout the day. By asking for a special investigative grand jury, the DA here is looking for a grand jury that will be solely dedicated to this case and that can sit for a longer period, as long as she needs.
Law & Crime’s Adam Klasfeld has a longer analysis here with the legal implications of Willis’ request for a special grand jury.
Watch the video above, via CNN.
