Credit: (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)Donald Trump’s attempts to overthrow the election he lost in 2020 is once again the subject of a criminal indictment, this time by a grand jury in Georgia.
Authorities in Fulton County, Georgia have been investigating for over two years allegations that Trump and his allies attempted to interfere with that state’s election results. On Monday, the grand jury in Georgia handed up a 41-count indictment against Trump and several others including Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor who acted as Trump’s attorney, and Mark Meadows, the former president’s White House chief of staff.
Trump and his co-defendants face state charges of criminal conspiracy, forgery, criminal attempt to influence witnesses and perjury.
“Trump and the other Defendants charged in this Indictment refused to accept that Trump lost, and they knowingly and willfully joined a conspiracy to unlawfully change the outcome of the election in favor of Trump,” the Georgia indictment reads.
Credit: (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)Monday’s 98-page indictment details Trump and his team’s efforts to pressure Georgia elections officials, state officials and members of the U.S Justice Department. It claims that Trump and that team falsely accused local elections officials of misconduct, and then spread those lies in an attempt to undermine the election results.
“Members of the enterprise, including several of the Defendants, corruptly solicited high-ranking United States Department of Justice officials to make false statements to government officials in Fulton County, Georgia, including the Governor, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, and the President Pro Tempore of the Senate. In one instance, Donald Trump stated to the Acting United States Attorney General, “Just say that the election was corrupt, and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressmen,” the indictment reads.
Trump focused on Georgia as part of his plans to derail congressional certification of the 2020 election results. Trump’s team attempted to sow doubt on the results from several states, falsely claiming the votes were inaccurate in hopes that would give friendly Republican lawmakers a reason to postpone the Jan. 6 certification vote.
As part of that push, Trump called the Georgia secretary of state urging him to manipulate the results from that state won by President Biden.
“So what are we going to do here, folks? I only need 11,000 votes. Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break,” Trump said in a recording of that call made public days before the Jan. 6 insurrection.
Credit: (AP Photo/Jon Elswick)Campaign for 2024 election
Trump leads in a campaign for the Republican nomination to regain the presidency and these indictments appear to be emboldening him and his supporters.
As he has throughout the multiple investigations into his efforts to reject the results of the election, Trump took to social media to attack the prosecutors and a possible witness before the state grand jury. Trump has been admonished by a judge in one of his federal cases to refrain from such invective.
Credit: (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)“I am reading reports that failed former Lt. Governor of Georgia, Jeff Duncan, will be testifying before the Fulton County Grand Jury. He shouldn’t. I barely know him but he was, right from the beginning of this Witch Hunt, a nasty disaster for those looking into the Election Fraud that took place in Georgia,” Trump posted on his social media platform.
In March, a state grand jury in New York returned felony charges that Trump falsified business records related to hush-money payments to an adult film actress.
In June, Trump was indicted by a grand jury on charges of mishandling classified documents, making him the first former president to face federal criminal charges.
On Aug. 1, a federal grand jury indicted Trump for leading a scheme “built on prolific lies” to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
In that federal case, Trump faces four specific charges related to his role to steal the election won by President Biden and his later efforts that led to the deadly Jan. 6 insurrection. Those charges include conspiracy to defraud the United States, obstructing an official government proceeding, denying people their civil rights and an additional count of obstructing an official proceeding. The indictment also refers to six co-conspirators.
That federal indictment is lengthy and detailed, offering a specific timeline of the actions by Trump and his allies to publicly and privately derail the election certification. The indictment claims Trump and that team met with members of Congress and elected state officials from key states where they tried to claim the vote counts were in dispute. Georgia is among the states included in the prosecutor’s outline of the events that lead to the charges.