Former United States Attorney Brett Tolman said on Thursday that Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ RICO case against former President Donald Trump was “weak” because the defendants sought to challenge the election through the court system.
A grand jury in Fulton County, Georgia, handed down indictments on Aug. 14, charging Trump and other associates over Trump’s efforts to contest the 2020 election results in that state. Tolman told “America’s Newsroom” co-hosts Dana Perino and Bill Hemmer that the “pattern” of allegedly “criminal behavior” that prosecutors were citing in the case as “racketeering” was what actually hurt the case. (Related: Jonathan Turley Says Prosecutions Of Trump Prove Him ‘Right’ About Weaponization Of Government)
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“I found it fascinating that the county attorney, you may have heard him make reference to the pattern, the pattern is the part of the racketeering charge, a pattern of corruption or criminal activity that has to be presented,” Tolman said. “And he is throwing that in because the indictment itself is incredibly weak in terms of its treatment of a pattern of criminal behavior.”
Willis claimed that Trump and others “made false statements concerning fraud in the November 3, 2020, presidential election” and included efforts to sway then-Vice President Mike Pence, officials in the Justice Department and state officials as the basis for criminal charges in the indictment.
ATLANTA, GEORGIA: Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis speaks during a news conference at the Fulton County Government building on August 14, 2023 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
Harvard University law professor Alan Dershowitz said that a similar indictment of Trump on federal charges secured by special counsel Jack Smith in August not only attacked the First Amendment, but also Trump’s Sixth Amendment right to counsel during an Aug. 2 appearance on Fox Business Network.
WEST PALM BEACH, FLORIDA – MARCH 24: Republican presidential candidate and former President Donald Trump speaks during an awards ceremony held at the Trump International Golf Club on March 24, 2024, in West Palm Beach, Florida. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
“When you have, you know, folks like Ronna or you have in Georgia and other states you have individuals suggesting that the electors need to be replaced, that they don’t have it right there is fraud that has occurred, I mean then they challenge it in court, that’s very difficult to say that’s a pattern of corruption or criminal activity when they are doing it through the court system.”
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