February 29, 2024
Trump Defense Team Unravels In Disqualifying Fani Willis
The evidentiary hearing for Fani Willis and her misconduct allegations has left Trump’s defense team needing more to get her disqualified.
In the latest news surrounding the misconduct allegations against Fani Willis, the Trump defense team’s quest to disqualify the Fulton County District Attorney has seemed to unravel in the evidentiary hearing.
MSNBC reports that in light of new testimony by Nathan Wade’s former divorce attorney, Terrence Bradley, the hearing prompted by Trump’s defense amassed virtually no evidence to disqualify Willis. Upon learning of her past relationship with Wade, one of the special prosecutors she appointed to the Trump indictment, the ex-president’s legal team questioned Willis’ ethics.
Katie Phang shared with viewers that the judge presiding over the case, Judge Scott McAfee, could not find further evidence on when Wade’s relationship with Willis started through the hours of questioning Bradley.
“Terrence Bradley has zero, and I want to emphasize zero, personal knowledge as to when any personal relationship between Nathan Wade and Fani Willis began,” shared Phang, a correspondent for the news outlet. “Why is that important? Well, this is a continuation of an evidentiary hearing…He [Bradley] is a gossip. He is a busybody. But gossip and innuendo do not make evidence despite what the defense wants to happen in this case. This is just a highlight of how far afield we’ve gone from the purpose of this hearing.”
Bradley was considered a star witness in the hearing, whose testimony was supposed to not only deliver Willis’ disqualification but also prompt the derailment of Trump’s case overall.
However, he failed to provide concrete knowledge of Willis and Wade’s relationship timeline. Bradley took the stand for the third time to note that his words were speculative.
Fellow commentator Andrew Weissmann, a former U.S. Department of Justice prosecutor, also referred to the hearing as a “sideshow” that could have been handled by an Ethics Office. He argues that the allegations never warranted disqualification but have become a distraction from the case’s original and weightier claims of election interference.
“The hearing then became a bit of a ‘hot mess,'” explained Weissmann. “You realize that this has sort of gone down this rabbit hole from an incredibly historic, important indictment. Even if this all ends up going well for the Georgia prosecutor, there’s this taint that I think was needlessly inflicted.”
While Willis’ removal from the prosecution due to the hearing’s findings seems unlikely, the spectacle still has taken a significant turn away from the more prominent issue. Trump’s alleged election interference in Georgia is expected to have a trial date once the hearing concludes.