Reposted from My Substack
We've heard a lot about this. The story goes that Fulton County DA Fani Willis hired her boyfriend to be the Special Prosecutor against Donald Trump and is paying him an exorbitant amount while he paid for lavish vacations with Willis.
Trump himself has loudly crowed that these allegations destroy the case of election interference/racketeering against him after Willis admitted her relationship with Special Prosecutor Nathan Wade.
Donald Trump posted an all-caps-riddle rant Friday responding to Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ acknowledgement of her personal relationship with the special prosecutor in her Georgia election racketeering case.
“THAT MEANS THAT THIS SCAM IS TOTALLY DISCREDITED & OVER,” Trump declared. “By going after the most high level person, and the Republican Nominee, she was able to get her ‘lover’ much more money, almost a Million Dollars.”
But then Trump was never good at reading the fine print.
Generally, many in the legal profession have called for Willis to recuse herself or remove Wade from the case, including people like CNN legal analyst Ellie Honig.
Honig started out by slamming Willis' case itself on its merits, saying that to date she has "handed out four embarrassingly cheap, no-prison plea deals," which undermine "those grand-slam RICO charges." Honig adds that "while Willis was the first among the Trump-pursuing prosecutors to launch her investigation, she charged last and is the only one with no trial date."
He then points to the recent defense allegations about Willis’s personal relationship with lead prosecutors Nathan Wade (which she admitted to today). "The DA’s office paid Wade exorbitantly, then he paid for lavish personal recreation for himself and Willis," Honig writes.
Honig says before he was hired by Willis to the case, Wade was “conspicuously underqualified” for the job.
“According to [Wade’s] own website, he has primarily practiced personal-injury and family law. Well, his defenders note, the man was a judge and a prosecutor. With all due respect: not really, or not in any way that would prepare him for the task at hand. Wade held those titles only at the municipal level, handling petty misdemeanors or less. He has never — repeat, never — tried a single felony criminal case. Yet Willis selected him to lead the most complex and important racketeering case in Georgia history? Something’s up,” Honig writes, adding that Wade was paid over $650,000 to date for his work, which is exponentially higher than the "$73,000 and $90,000" figures other contract lawyers have billed the DA over the past two years.
Willis and Wade have also been subpoenaed to testify at a hearing on this issue.
While representing co-defendant Mike Roman, Ashleigh Merchant's law firm brought a lawsuit claiming Willis' office had deliberately violated the Open Records Act by refusing to turn over documents related to a Feb. 15 hearing. The district attorney's office said that it complied with state law.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee set the Feb. 15 hearing after Merchant filed a motion demanding Willis and Wade be disqualified from prosecuting the case because they allegedly had an affair.
[...]
"Mr. Roman believes that Willis' use of money budgeted to (the DA's office) is of utmost importance in evaluating whether Willis and Wade have an irreparable and fatal conflict of interest and whether, and to what extent, Willis has otherwise used public monies for personal gain," Merchant said in Tuesday's lawsuit demanding records.
It was to this subpoena and hearing that Willis responded to.
And in finally having a chance to respond to all of this — things turn out to not be anything like what they seem. In an under-oath affidavit, Wade states that his relationship with Willis didn’t start until after he was hired as Special Prosecutor — so she didn’t give a sweetheart gig to her boyfriend — and that Willis paid for her portion of their travel expenses out of her own pocket, which means she didn’t profit herself from the job she gave Wade.
"The chances of a successful disqualification went from 5% to .05%," wrote Kreis, noting that according to Wade's affidavit, "The relationship with Fani Willis started after his appointment as special prosecutor, the two have never cohabitated, and travel expenses have been split between them."
The existence of a relationship between Willis and Wade, in and of itself, would not pose any legal conflict of interest, because the two of them are on the same prosecutorial team and their professional interests are aligned regardless.
As far as his pay being exorbitant, it turns out the payments aren’t just to him — but the payments are to Wade’s law firm which includes two partners. Plus his payment rate isn’t higher than other lawyers, he’s just allowed — by terms of his contract — to log more hours than average.
First, they walked through the financial compensation for Wade, who has earned far more, despite claiming he is paid the same as other prosecutors. Wade is paid the same rate as leading RICO lawyer John Floyd, despite the latter's expertise.
"Even if Willis paid Floyd the same hourly rate as Wade, Wade could earn much more per month because the terms of his contract permit him to work far more hours," the analysts explained. "In addition, $250 per hour is hardly an exorbitant rate for the work Wade is doing on this complicated, sprawling, and unprecedented case — many Special Assistant Attorneys General (SAAGs) in Georgia earn $250 or more per hour."
He also has more experience than has been previously noted
They then cited arguments about Wade's experience "as a prosecutor, criminal defense lawyer (including in reportedly at least 75 criminal cases in state and federal court, including serious felony offenses), and civil practitioner."
Willis also points out in her filing that Michael Roman’s own attorney campaigned in support of Wade when he ran for an elected judge position.
So Wade, and his firm, actually have the experience to do the job, he wasn't hired because he was Willis’ boyfriend — because he wasn't at the time — he hasn’t been overpaid, and he’s been apparently reimbursed by Willis for their joint travel.
All they’ve done is have a workplace relationship after they began working together. And that’s not a conflict because their goals are already aligned.
None of this has anything to do with the merits or validity of the case against Trump and his associates, some of whom have already pleaded guilty and none of them are asking for a reversal on appeal on the basis of Willis hiring or dating Wade.
This is why people should take their time and examine an issue from all sides before jumping to conclusions. Appearances can always be deceiving — and we all know that the Right-wing is always jumping desperately to the wrong conclusion.
There are some like Richard Painter who may still call for Willis and Wade to recuse, but then that would be giving Trump exactly what he wants — more reason to delay which puts him closer to the election and regaining power.
Should we really endorse handing Trump exactly what he wants just for the sake of “appearances” when so many of these allegations appear to be baseless?
We already have Jim Jordon on a fishing expedition into Willis and Wade’s finances.
Jordan issued a letter last month ordering Wade to hand over a slew of documents linked to Willis' investigation and communication with the House Jan. 6 committee and special counsel Jack Smith, who has filed parallel charges against Trump in Washington, D.C.
And Marjorie Taylor Greene making “criminal” referrals against Willis for something or the other.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) believes the Georgia prosecutor spearheading the sweeping racketeering case against Trump and 18 others for allegedly conspiring to meddle with the 2020 election results — committed a crime and she's calling on the governor to intervene, according to NBC News.
So, I don’t think so, but the issue is up to Judge Scott McAfee on Feb 15th.
We’ll all see what he decides soon.
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