Former President Donald Trump won’t have to stand trial in Georgia next month over his alleged 2020 presidential election interference after the judge overseeing the case separated two co-defendants in the case from the trial of Trump and 16 others.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis had pushed for an October 23 start date for Trump and his 18 co-defendants, but Judge Scott McAfee said that rushing the trial could jeopardize the rights of each defendant. Trump’s trial will take place at a later, undetermined date.
“The precarious ability of the Court to safeguard each defendant’s due process rights and preparation ensure adequate pretrial preparation on the current accelerated track weighs heavily, if not decisively, in favor of severance,” McAfee ordered.
Kenneth Chesebro and Sidney Powell, lawyers who worked with Trump following the presidential election in Georgia, will go to court on October 23 after McAfee ruled to sever their trials. Chesebro faces seven charges, including two counts of first degree conspiracy to commit forgery and two counts of conspiracy to commit false statements and writings. Powell also faces seven charges, including two counts of conspiracy to commit election fraud.
According to McAfee, there would be logistical problems with trying all 19 defendants at the same time, which Willis had wanted.
“The Fulton County Courthouse simply contains no courtroom adequately large enough to hold all 19 defendants, their multiple attorneys and support staff, the sheriff’s deputies, court personnel, and the State’s prosecutorial team,” he said.
The 19 co-defendants are facing a variety of charges, but all are charged with taking part in an alleged conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election results under Georgia’s version of the federal RICO statute, an anti-racketeering law constructed to take down the mafia and other organized criminal enterprises.
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Trump has pled not guilty to the 13 charges he is facing, and has requested that charges be thrown out, arguing that his actions were outside of the state’s authority to prosecute.
The former president, and current Republican presidential primary frontrunner, has said that the charges in Georgia, like the others he faces in New York, Florida, and Washington, D.C., are politically motivated. After his arrest in Fulton County, Trump maintained his innocence, saying that his actions in Georgia were within his rights.
“We did nothing wrong at all,” he said. “And we have every right every single right to challenge an election that we think is dishonest. We think it’s very dishonest. So thank you all very much and I’ll see you very soon. Thank you very much.”