(Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump said he and others involved will be charged or acquitted of wrongdoing in a Georgia probe that tried to reverse his 2020 presidential election loss. We may soon know what it will be. president:
Georgia Election Tampering Probe
On Tuesday, Georgia prosecutors spoke with a judge on behalf of a special grand jury appointed in May to investigate Trump’s allegations of trying to influence the state’s 2020 election results. .
Fannie Willis, a Fulton County District Attorney and Democrat, will ultimately decide whether to indict Trump or someone else, but the grand jury has completed its task, and the decision will be “It’s imminent,” he said.
The investigation is partly focused on a phone call Trump made to Republican Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger on January 2, 2021.
Legal experts say Trump may have violated at least three of Georgia’s election criminal laws.
Mr Trump could have argued that his arguments free speech are constitutionally protected.
US Capitol attack
The U.S. Department of Justice is investigating both Trump’s actions in the 2020 election and his retention of classified documents after leaving the White House in 2021.
Both investigations involving Trump are overseen by war crimes prosecutor and politically independent Jack Smith. Trump has accused the FBI, without evidence, of launching the investigation as political retaliation.
The House Select Committee investigating the fatal January 6, 2021 assault on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters has accused the Justice Department of procedural corruption, conspiracy to deceive the United States, and making false statements. asked Trump to be indicted for conspiracy to Inciting or supporting riots.
Requests are non-binding. Only the Justice Department can decide whether to indict Trump.
missing government records
U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland has sent Smith to investigate whether Trump improperly kept classified records on his Florida estate after he resigned in 2021 and subsequently tried to obstruct a federal investigation. appointed.
Garland also appointed former Maryland federal prosecutor Robert Herr to investigate the deletion of classified records owned by President Joe Biden during his vice presidency.
It is illegal to knowingly remove or retain confidential information.
In Trump’s case, the FBI seized 11,000 documents from the former president’s estate in Mar-a-Lago, Fla., in a court-approved search on Aug. 8. About 100 documents were marked as confidential. Some were designated Top Secret, the highest level of classification.
Trump has accused the Justice Department of engaging in a partisan witch hunt.
New York State Attorney General Civil Litigation
New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a civil lawsuit filed in September that her office accused more than 200 people of misleading asset valuations by Trump and the Trump Organization’s businesses between 2011 and 2021. He said he found an example.
James, a Democrat, accused Trump of cutting loan rates and inflating his net worth by billions to get better insurance.
A judge in New York has ordered the appointment of an independent overseer to oversee the Trump Organization before the trial begins in October 2023.
e. J James permanently bans Trump and his children Donald Jr., Eric, and Ivanka Trump from running companies in New York State and allows them and his company to buy new properties in the state. and take out new loans for five years.
James also wants the defendants to turn over about $250 million, which she says was obtained through fraud.
Trump called the Attorney General’s case a witch hunt. Mr Trump’s lawyer said Mr James’ allegations were nonsense.
James said her investigation also uncovered evidence of criminal activity and called for federal prosecutors and the Internal Revenue Service to investigate.
defamation case
E. Gene Carroll is a former Elle magazine writer who was accused of raping her in late 1995 or early 1996 in New York’s Bergdorf Goodman department store locker room when Trump denied his allegations. He filed two lawsuits for defaming her.
Trump has accused her of lying to sell the book.
After denying the accusations in June 2019, Carroll told a White House reporter that he didn’t know Carroll, “she’s not my type,” and made up claims that she sold her new memoir. He first sued Trump after saying,
A second lawsuit arose from a social media post in October 2022. Trump called the rape allegations “hoaxes,” “lies,” “scams,” and “outright frauds,” saying, “This only happens to ‘Trump’!”
That lawsuit includes a battery claim under the Adult Survivors Act, which gave adults a year to sue the alleged aggressor, even if the statute of limitations had expired since Nov. 24 last year. I was.
A US judge on Jan. 13 dismissed Trump’s efforts to dismiss the second lawsuit as “absurd.”
Trump and Carroll are awaiting a decision by a Washington, DC, appeals court on whether Trump should be excused from Carroll’s original lawsuit for comments made in June 2019.
If the court determines that Trump spoke within the scope of his role as president, the lawsuit would likely be dismissed, and, as Carroll argues, Trump spoke in a personal capacity. continue.
Neither decision affects Carroll’s second defamation and battery lawsuit. A first trial is scheduled for April 10.
new york criminal investigation
Trump was not charged with wrongdoing, but his real estate firm was convicted of tax evasion in New York state on Dec. 6. , imposed a criminal penalty of $1.6 million, the maximum amount a judge could impose.
The jury found that the Trump Organization, which operates hotels, golf courses and other properties around the world, paid its management, including former chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg, personal expenses and is an independent contractor. Convicted of issuing bonus checks to them as if.
Weisselberg, the company’s former chief financial officer, was required to plead guilty and testify against the Trump Organization as part of his plea bargain. He is also a defendant in James’ civil suit.
Reporting by Joseph Ax, Luc Cohen, Karen Freifeld, Sarah N. Lynch, Jonathan Stempel, Jacqueline Thomsen.Editing by Howard Goller
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