Left: President-elect Donald Trump speaks at the annual Road to Majority conference in Washington, DC, June 22, 2024. (Photo by Allison Bailey/NurPhoto via AP). Right: Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis arrives during a hearing on the Georgia election interference case, Friday, March, 1, 2024, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Alex Slitz, Pool)
An appellate court in Georgia abruptly called off a hearing in Donald Trump’s appeal of a state court ruling that allowed Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis to remain on the racketeering and election subversion case involving the president-elect’s alleged efforts to undermine the results of the 2020 election.
“The oral argument scheduled to take place on December 5, 2024 at 10:30 a.m. is hereby canceled until further notice of this Court,” the Georgia Court of Appeals wrote.
The terse order did not include an explanation for the hearing’s cancellation, but comes less than two weeks after Trump resoundingly won the 2024 presidential election.
“The American people have re-elected President Trump with an overwhelming mandate to Make America Great Again,” Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung said in a statement to Newsweek. “It is now time, as President Trump said in his historic victory speech, to unify our country and work together for the betterment of our nation.”
Trump and several other codefendants earlier this year sought to have Willis disqualified from prosecuting the case in which the president-elect is facing multiple criminal charges. He and 18 other codefendants were indicted in August 2023 as part of a racketeering case over their alleged attempts to overturn Trump’s 2020 loss to Joe Biden in Georgia.
Four individuals have already pleaded guilty in the case.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee in March ruled that either Nathan Wade, the special prosecutor with whom Willis vacationed and had a romantic relationship from 2022 to 2023, or the DA and her office had to step aside from the case in the face of a “significant appearance of impropriety.” The ruling ultimately led to Wade’s swift exit from the case.
Trump and his cohorts in August appealed McAfee’s ruling, asserting that it did not go far enough, and sought to have Willis disqualified from the case as well.
Willis’ office has signaled that even if Trump is removed from the case, prosecutors will continue to pursue charges against the remaining defendants.
The order is the latest development in the multiple criminal cases involving Trump that have been turned on their heads since his election victory.
The federal criminal cases headed by special counsel Jack Smith involving Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents and election interference are both being wrapped up due to the Justice Department’s long-standing policy against prosecuting a sitting president.
In New York, a state judge paused proceedings in Trump’s hush-money case as he decides whether Trump’s felony criminal convictions will stand in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s sweeping presidential immunity decision. Prosecutors in Manhattan are scheduled to file documents on Tuesday explaining to the court the “appropriate steps going forward” in the case.
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