It’s official: Trump gets away with attempts to overturn 2020 election

3 months ago 21

He had already proven that attempting to overturn the results of a democratic election is an easily forgivable sin as far as voters are concerned. Now, Donald Trump has officially gotten away with it.

The final criminal case against him – racketeering charges in the state of Georgia involving multiple alleged co-conspirators – has been dropped on the recommendation of a new prosecutor.

The criminal conspiracy case against Donald Trump in the US state of Georgia has officially been dismissed.

This is the case relating to an infamous phone call on January 2, 2021 – four days before the Capitol riots – where Trump told Georgia’s Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger: “I just want to find 11,780 votes.”

That would have been just enough to change the outcome in Georgia, which Joe Biden won by 11,779 votes, and deliver Georgia’s 16 electoral college votes to Trump. A grand jury indicted Trump in August 2023, following an investigation headed by district attorney Fani Willis.

Federal cases against Trump were ultimately dropped after the Supreme Court found presidents were immune from federal prosecution for acts undertaken in their official duties. That left the case in Georgia.

But, with Trump back in the White House, and the case fatally undermined when it turned out Willis was in a romantic relationship with the special prosecutor she appointed to run the trial, it was dead in the water.

Ultimately, it was left to the Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council of Georgia to find a new prosecutor. On Thursday (AEDT), the council’s executive director, Peter Skandalakis, filed to dismiss the case, which was quickly agreed to by Judge Scott McAfee.

Some will find it outrageous and a denial of justice, but Skandalakis’s reasons are compelling and laid out in a comprehensive 22-page document. The phone call took place nearly five years ago. The charges themselves are more than two years old.

More pertinently: “There is no realistic prospect that a sitting president will be compelled to appear in Georgia to stand trial on the allegations in this indictment.

“Donald J. Trump’s current term as President of the United States of America does not expire until January 20, 2029; by that point, eight years will have elapsed since the phone call at issue.”

Rudy Giuliani speaking to the media at a press conference held in the car park of Four Seasons Total Landscaping days after the 2020 election.

Not only that, but a 2029 trial would be impossible. Litigating the implications of the Supreme Court’s ruling on presidential immunity for these state charges “would require months, if not years”, and it was not at all clear the state would prevail, Skandalakis wrote.

He also concluded it was not worth pursuing the case against Trump’s alleged co-conspirators, which included former lawyers Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman, and former chief of staff Mark Meadows. That is despite other conspirators, such as Trump campaign lawyer Sidney Powell, pleading guilty to misdemeanours in a plea deal.

Skandalakis said prosecuting Trump’s advisers and attorneys without him would be “futile and unproductive”. Delivering justice in a timely manner would require the trials to commence immediately, he said, and his office lacked the resources to do so. The people of Georgia would benefit more from having those limited resources directed elsewhere.

He also concluded the case was flawed from the start. The alleged criminal conduct – conspiring to overturn the election result in Georgia – was conceived in Washington, not in Georgia. The federal government was the right system to pursue prosecution in this case, and that attempt has now been extinguished.

Skandalakis said his decision to dismiss the case would not be universally popular, and predicted he and his family would receive threats. “Such is the state of public discourse in our country.”

It seems intuitively wrong that the extraordinary charges faced by Trump and his co-accused will never come before a jury.

But in a way, they have. That Trump believed the election was rigged – and that he pressured officials (including his own vice president) to overturn the results – was never in doubt. It was well known when voters went to the polls in November 2024 and made him president again.

There need not be a trial. The verdict is already in.

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