Judge orders release of communications in Fani Willis' imploding RICO case against Trump

By richardbrown // 2024-12-05

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Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has been ordered by a local judge to release all communications between her office, Special Counsel Jack Smith's office and the House January 6 Committee regarding her RICO case against President-elect Donald Trump and his allies. This ruling comes after Willis was found to have violated federal law by withholding these records. The judge's order mandates that Willis conduct a thorough search of her office records for any relevant materials and provide them within five business days. Any records that are not legally exempt from disclosure must be shared, and if the materials are not found, Willis is required to explain why such correspondence does not exist. The order follows a legal dispute in which Willis was served by the conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch on March 11, 2024. She missed an April 10 deadline to respond to the request. Afterward, she claimed to have "misunderstood" the court's directive and argued that releasing the documents would jeopardize her ongoing RICO case against Trump. Back in mid-2023, Willis publicly stated that her office was not coordinating with Smith's office on any investigations related to Trump. Smith, who has brought charges against Trump for both classified document-related and election-related crimes, operates in separate jurisdictions. Willis, on the other hand, has charged Trump and several others with alleged election-related crimes in Fulton County. (Related: Georgia appeals court cancels hearing to disqualify Fani Willis from Trump RICO case.) In July 2023, Willis told a local radio station: "I don't know what Jack Smith is doing and Jack Smith doesn't know what I'm doing. If Jack Smith was standing next to me, I'm not sure I would know who he was. My guess is he probably can't pronounce my name correctly." Since then, Willis has not commented further on Smith's investigation. A letter sent by Willis' office on December 17, 2021, to the House January 6th Committee requested access to records relevant to her investigation into Trump's efforts to challenge the 2020 election results. This included recordings and transcripts of witness interviews, depositions, electronic and print communications, and records of travel. House Republicans, investigating Willis’s actions, released a report on this request last year.

Willis claims to be target of partisan attacks

Willis has frequently criticized Republican-led investigations into her office and her case against Trump. She accused House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) of attempting to interfere with her criminal investigation. In an interview with MSNBC's Rachel Maddow in May, Willis said: "Jim Jordan has, time after time after time, attacked my office with no legitimate purpose. Anyone who knows Jim Jordan’s history knows that he only has the purpose of trying to interfere in a criminal investigation." In a letter issued to Republicans in 2023, Willis further claimed that they were trying to obstruct Georgia's criminal proceedings and advance “outrageous partisan misrepresentations.” Meanwhile, her case against Trump has encountered some setbacks – excluding the fact that Trump has been reelected to a second term. Earlier this year, one of Trump’s co-defendants filed a court claim alleging that Willis and then-special prosecutor Nathan Wade had been in a romantic relationship. Although both confirmed the relationship, they denied any misconduct. A judge overseeing the case ruled in March that Willis could continue working on the case, provided that Wade resigned, which he did hours later. Trump and several co-defendants appealed the decision to the Georgia Court of Appeals, where the case remains pending. Watch this episode of "The Breanna Morello Show" as she discusses how the Georgia Supreme Court ruled that Fani Willis can be sued. This video is from the MyPodcastDropped2320 channel on Brighteon.com.

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Willis claims to be target of partisan attacks

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