August 27, 2023 news on Trump’s Georgia election case

We’ve wrapped up our live coverage for the day. You can read more about the Fulton County charges against former President Donald Trump here.

A day before a key hearing in the Georgia election subversion case, two politicians with legal backgrounds weighed in on former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows’ bid to move his case to federal court.

Speaking on CBS’ “Face the Nation” today, Republican presidential candidate and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said that even if the case is moved to federal court, it will still be governed by state laws and the charges will remain the same. Christie, a former federal prosecutor, said that whether Meadows’ bid succeeds is “not going to make a substantive difference on how ultimately a jury is going to be asked to make these decisions at the time of trial.”

Christie also told CBS that Meadows has an “argument to make” in his hearing Monday regarding moving his Georgia indictment charges to federal court. Meadows is arguing that he is entitled to bring a federal immunity defense because the state charges stem from his conduct as then-President Donald Trump’s chief of staff.

In an interview with Dana Bash on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, a former constitutional law professor, said US District Judge Steve Jones will have to consider whether Meadows was acting in a federal capacity while conducting the actions for which he is charged. 

“Obviously, after four years of packing the courts with Federalist Society bloggers, someone like Mark Meadows is going to feel a lot more comfortable in federal court,” said Raskin, who led the House’s case in Trump’s second impeachment trial. He added the GOP has “worked so hard to gerrymander” the federal judiciary.

Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy speaks at The Faith and Freedom Coalition's 2023 "Road to Majority" conference in Washington, DC, on June 23.

Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy said he would have certified the 2020 election results if he were in former Vice President Mike Pence’s position on January 6, 2021.

In an interview with NBC News today, the entrepreneur said he “would have done it very differently” from Pence if he were overseeing the election certification but claimed that he would also have enacted a series of voting reforms, including making Election Day a federal holiday and eliminating early and absentee voting.

“In my capacity as president of the Senate, I would have led through that level of reform, then on that condition, certified the election results,” he said.

Pence has said he certified Joe Biden’s win in the 2020 presidential election after being advised the law did not give him the discretion to overturn the results as outgoing President Donald Trump wanted.

The former vice president’s team said in a statement after the interview that Ramaswamy has “flipped and flopped around the issue of January 6.”

Trump’s actions that day lie at the center of his federal indictment, in which he is accused of attempting to overturn the 2020 election — including by using the violence of January 6, 2021, to call on lawmakers to “delay the certification” of results.

Trump is facing four federal charges, including conspiracy to defraud the United States and conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding. He has pleaded not guilty.

Polls show Donald Trump leading Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, his nearest rival for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, by about 40 points. You might think this would cause the former president’s GOP rivals to attack him in an attempt to eat into that support, which stands at north of 50% of the primary vote.

Yet most of his opponents seem hesitant, if not totally unwilling, to do so.

A look at the numbers reveals why. Those who have gone after him have seen their popularity among Republican voters suffer, while those who have risen in primary polling are either mostly not mentioning Trump or are praising him.

You needn’t look further than former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to understand what happens when a Republican candidate is highly critical of the former president.

His net favorability rating in the latest Quinnipiac University poll stands at minus-44 points among Republicans. An astounding 61% of Republican voters hold an unfavorable view of him.

Christie’s not alone in his poor favorability ratings among Republican presidential candidates seen as anti-Trump.

Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson – who has called on the GOP to move on from Trump – was the only presidential contender during the first Republican debate last week not to raise his hand when candidates were asked if they would back the former president as the party nominee even if he were convicted in a court of law.

“I was only one that said very clearly that I would not support him. And so I was surprised at that,” Hutchinson said today.

“I stood out at that moment and I’m proud of that decision. And it was the right call and I hope more people identify with what I said,” he told CNN’s Dana Bash on “State of the Union.” 

Former President Donald Trump's booking photo taken at the Fulton County Sheriff's Office on August 24. 

Donald Trump’s campaign says it has raised $7.1 million since the former president was processed at an Atlanta jail Thursday, thanks in part to merchandise featuring his mug shot.

Trump’s fundraising total for the past three weeks, following his indictments in Washington, DC, related to the federal January 6, 2021, case and in the Georgia election subversion case, is close to $20 million, a Trump campaign official said.

On Friday, the day after his arrest in Fulton County, Trump raised $4.18 million, the highest-grossing day of the entire campaign, the source said.

The fundraising figures were first reported by Politico.

Following Trump’s arrest, his campaign immediately began selling merchandise featuring the former president’s mug shot. The sales have contributed to the high fundraising totals, according to the source.

Republican presidential candidate Chris Christie this morning slammed Trump for fundraising off the mug shot. “There’s almost nothing more that he could do that would surprise me in terms of the ongoing grift,” the former New Jersey governor said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

Former President Donald Trump arrives at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport after being booked at the Fulton County jail on August 24, in Atlanta, Georgia. 

As former President Donald Trump faces criminal charges in four cases while running his third presidential campaign, his calendar remains murky.

In the federal election subversion case, US District Judge Tanya Chutkan is expected to set a trial date tomorrow as the former president attempts to delay proceedings until after the 2024 election.

Special counsel Jack Smith’s team proposed a January 2024 trial, with jury selection starting in December. Trump’s team rejected the proposal, arguing that Smith’s timeline conflicts with the other criminal and civil cases in which the former president is a defendant.

Trump’s team has proposed an April 2026 trial — well after the election.

In the election subversion case in Fulton County, Georgia, two of the former president’s allies — Kenneth Chesebro, architect of the fake electors plot, and attorney Sidney Powell — have requested a speedy trial.

The judge presiding over the case scheduled Chesebro’s trial to begin October 23, and Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis attempted to apply the date to all defendants in the case, including the former president. However, the judge made it clear that the trial date applies only to Chesebro. A date for Powell’s trial has not been set.

Trump’s lawyers told the judge that they object to the October trial date proposal and signaled that they will attempt to separate his case from Chesebro’s to avoid a speedy trial.

Former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and former President Donald Trump.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis will lay out the first details of her sprawling anti-racketeering case against former President Donald Trump, his White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and 17 other co-defendants at a federal court hearing on Monday.

This will be the first time that substantive arguments will be made in court about the four criminal cases brought against Trump this year.

The subject of the hearing, which is set to begin at 10 a.m., is Meadows’ motion to move his case to federal court and possibly have it thrown out, but it could end up acting as a mini-trial that determines the future of Fulton County’s case against the former president.

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who received a January 2021 call from Trump to “find” the votes needed reverse the then-president’s loss in the state to Joe Biden, has been subpoenaed to testify, along with an investigator in his office and two other lawyers who were present on the call.

Read more about what to watch for.

Special Counsel Jack Smith speaks during a press conference on August 1, in Washington, DC.

Two hearings are expected Monday related to former President Donald Trump’s alleged election interference — one in Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ case and the other related to special counsel Jack Smith’s January 6 probe.

While both cases focus on the former president’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election results, here’s how they differ:

January 6 case

Smith’s team has accused Trump of attempting to overturn the 2020 election, including by using the violence on January 6, 2021, to call on lawmakers to “delay the certification” of results.

Trump is facing four federal charges, including conspiracy to defraud the United States and conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding. He has pleaded not guilty.

If elected president and convicted in this case, Trump could potentially pardon himself.

Fulton County case

This case relates to Trump and his team’s alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election result in Georgia. It focuses on the so-called fake elector scheme, as well as calls from the former president and his allies to elected officials to “find votes” and decertify the election.

Willis has charged Trump and 18 others — including his former personal lawyer and ex-New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows — with 41 charges. The charges include violating the state’s anti-racketeering law, and the indictment claims the defendants worked as an “enterprise” to overturn the election result.

Trump has been arrested and released on bond, but he has not yet been arraigned in this case.

If Trump is convicted and also elected president in 2024, he would not be able to pardon himself or his allies in this case — or dismiss the Fulton County prosecutors bringing the charges — as it would be a state conviction.

Read the full guide to Trump’s legal cases here.

Former President Donald Trump's booking photo taken at the Fulton County Sheriff's Office on August 24. 

Millions and millions of photographs have been taken of American presidents. But none like this. 

The mug shot of Donald Trump instantly became one of the most iconic images of anyone who served as commander in chief. 

Inmate No. P01135809 stares out of the booking photo, his face like stone. It’s impossible to know what Trump is feeling. But the image, taken after his motorcade drove into the Fulton County jail, does not radiate his trademark bravado. His eyes bore into you. And the seal of the Fulton County Sheriff’s Office in a top corner is a reminder that Trump, for all his former power, is beholden to a process in which he cannot control his own fate. 

Trump’s mug shot – stark in its simplicity, in a way that must surely grate for an ex-reality star for whom image is everything – is a metaphor for an election in which the potential Republican nominee and possible next president is facing 91 criminal charges across four cases. Trump denies all wrongdoing and is innocent until proven guilty in all cases, including in the racketeering accusations in Georgia related to his bid to overturn the 2020 election. 

But in some ways, the mug shot, taken after he surrendered to the authorities Thursday, represents the inevitable culmination of a life that has stretched and buckled the constraints around the presidency and frequently strained the law. More broadly, for a man who built his legend through paparazzi snaps in the New York gossip columns and who prizes Time magazines bearing his face, the Georgia mug shot, for all its indignity, represents yet another new frontier of notoriety.

But for a nation still entangled in recriminations and fury whipped up by Trump, the photograph – which flashed immediately around the world – represents a special kind of tragedy. 

Read the full analysis. 

Former President Donald Trump gives a thumbs-up as he leaves the Fulton County jail in Atlanta on August 24.

Donald Trump became the first former president with a mug shot when he was placed under arrest at the Fulton County jail on Thursday evening. 

Trump was booked on 13 counts stemming from his efforts to reverse Georgia’s 2020 presidential election result — including racketeering, conspiracy charges and soliciting a public official to violate their oath of office. 

It is the fourth time this year the former president has faced criminal charges. 

Here’s what to know: 

Top row: Mark Meadows, Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Jeffrey Clark, Sideny Powell Middle row: Mike Roman, Ray Smith, Kenneth Chesebro, Robert Cheeley, Trevian Kutti, Harrison Floyd Bottom row: Stephen Lee, David Shafer, Shawn Still, Scott Hall, Misty Hampton, Cathy Latham Center: Donald Trump.

Stephen Lee, the Illinois-based pastor accused of intimidating a Georgia election worker after the 2020 election, surrendered at the Fulton County jail Friday afternoon – the last of the 19 defendants charged in the Georgia election interference case, including former President Donald Trump, to do so. 

All but one of the defendants surrendered after negotiating a bond deal with prosecutors, allowing for a fast booking process at the Fulton County jail. The 18 agreements allow each defendant to be out on bond during the course of their case. 

The bonds range from $10,000 to Trump’s $200,000 agreement. 

Each of the 18 defendants has also pledged to a standard set of conditions, including prohibitions on discussing the case with witnesses or one another. 

The one defendant who did not negotiate before turning himself in, Harrison Floyd, remains in law enforcement custody after a judge said she wouldn’t set a bond Friday.

Here’s a list of the 19 people charged in the Georgia case, according to the indictment: 

An audio recording of former President Donald Trump talking to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger is played during a hearing by the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the US Capitol in October 2022.

Georgia prosecutors allege that former President Donald Trump and his allies broke state laws during about a dozen separate incidents after the 2020 election, according to the indictment made public this month. 

There are 41 overall charges in the case, which was brought by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis. The first charge involves Georgia’s anti-racketeering law known as the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO. But the next 40 non-racketeering charges stem from roughly a dozen key incidents after the 2020 election.  

The events, and the alleged crimes, break down this way: