Former President Donald Trump now faces eight charges, down from 13 in the original indictment accusing him of illegally attempting to overturn the 2020 election results to make himself winner.
ATLANTA (CN) — The judge overseeing the Georgia election interference case against Donald Trump has thrown out two more charges against the former president, as well as a third against several of his allies, that were included in an original indictment last year.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee on Thursday said the U.S. Constitution’s Supremacy Clause mandates removal of the counts, as it prohibits state prosecutions of activities that fall under federal jurisdiction. In a written order, he stressed his finding does not bar the indictment entirely but does preempt the state’s ability to prosecute charges in federal court.
McAfee’s ruling comes six months after he dismissed three other charges against Trump and some of his co-defendants for soliciting members of the Georgia Senate and House of Representatives to violate their oaths by unlawfully appointing presidential electors.
Trump now faces eight charges, down from 13 in the original indictment.
“President Trump and his legal team in Georgia have prevailed once again,” Steve Sadow, Trump’s lead Atlanta attorney, said after McAfee’s order.
Thursday’s dropped charges — for filing false documents, attempting to file false documents and criminally conspiring to file false documents — all stem from a December 2020 meeting of 16 Trump electors, ostensibly to cast electoral votes for the former President even though he had lost the state.
Trump’s slate of alternative electors signed certificates that were mailed to the National Archives, Congress and federal court. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, who first brought the indictment, argues these actions amounted for forgery.
For now, McAfee’s ruling affects only two of the 15 remaining defendants in the case: attorney John Eastman and state Senator Shawn Still. But the judge’s findings would also apply to the other defendants charged of those counts, including Trump, once the Georgia Court of Appeals lifts a stay that has put the bulk of the case on hold.
That comes after several defendants, including Trump, appealed a March ruling from McAfee declining to disqualify Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis from prosecuting the case against them. The Georgia Court of Appeals said it will hear oral arguments Dec. 5 in that appeal, which centers on the claim that Willis’ personal relationship with special prosecutor Nathan Wade created a conflict of interest.
Separately on Thursday, McAfee rejected a motion from Eastman and Still to toss the indictment entirely on the grounds that it relied on an overly broad reading of the state’s racketeering statute. Quashing the three counts does not affect the corresponding overt acts listed in the racketeering charges against all of the defendants, he wrote.
Those charges accuse Trump and other defendants of “knowingly and willfully joined a conspiracy to unlawfully change the outcome of the election in favor of Trump,” in Georgia and other battleground states after the 2020 election. McAfee also noted that even if a defendant was acquitted for an overt criminal act, they could still be found guilty in the conspiracy.
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