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‘Smell of Desperation’: Legal Experts Slam State and Federal Republicans Pushing to Discipline or Derail DA Fani Willis

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Warning of possible violence and “civil war,” an allegation of “Nazism,” and calling to pass laws and hold hearings, Republican lawmakers at the state and federal level are working to delegitimize, derail, discipline, or defund Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis and her prosecution of Donald Trump and his 18 co-defendants. Some legal experts are calling it “dangerous,” and “a recipe for constitutional crisis.”

“Do you want a civil war? I don’t want a civil war. I don’t want to have to draw my rifle,” Georgia Republican state Senator Colton Moore told Steve Bannon, as Raw Story reported (video below). “I want to make this problem go away with my legislative means of doing so, and the first step to getting that done is defunding Fani Willis of any Georgia tax dollars.”

Moore added, “it’s just like Nazi Germany. I mean, they want to call us the Nazis and their actions are Nazism.”

Moore is not alone.

READ MORE: ‘She’s Bringing It’: Legal Expert Explains Why Hearing ‘Could’ve Been Worse for Trump’ but ‘Not Sure How’

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports the “Republican-led effort to reprimand District Attorney Fani Willis after she brought charges against former President Donald Trump in Fulton County is poised to expand, as state and federal lawmakers pursue new efforts to sanction the prosecutor.”

“State Senate Majority Leader Steve Gooch said in an interview that Republican leaders could hold legislative hearings into whether Willis is using ‘her position in a political manner’ after accusing Trump and his allies of a complex conspiracy.”

Trump and his co-defendants are all charged with racketeering, or RICO, related to alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election, which Willis calls a “criminal enterprise.” Trump faces 13 charges, as does his former attorney Rudy Giuliani. Other defendants face a variety of charges.

“We believe she is definitely tainted,” Gooch says of Willis. “She’s politicizing this, and we want to make sure these people get a fair trial and a fair shake.”

He told the AJC “that he sees Senate Bill 92, a new law that empowers a state panel to investigate and oust wayward prosecutors, as a powerful ‘tool in the toolbox’ that Trump’s allies can deploy to delve into Willis’ use of public resources.”

U.S. Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-GA), known for wearing an assault rifle lapel pin, co-sponsoring the federal vigilante “Don’t Say Gay” bill, and calling the January 6 insurrection a “normal tourist visit,” now “wants to use an upcoming appropriations bill to slash federal funding for Willis, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and federal special counsel Jack Smith. Each is a top prosecutor in one of the four cases Trump is currently facing.”

Georgia Republican U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene “is among the GOP members who urged the House Judiciary Committee to launch an investigation into how much her office receives in federal dollars and whether it has interacted with White House officials,” the AJC also reports.

Legal experts are waving the red flag.

READ MORE: Tennessee House Speaker Silences One Expelled Democrat, Pushes Another

“It’s the smell of desperation: attacking prosecutors when a defendant has no defense to stand on,” says professor of law Joyce Vance, the well-known MSNBC legal analyst former U.S. Attorney. “But in Georgia, it’s being taken to new and dangerous levels. Impossible to view this as anything other than an effort by Georgia GOP to place Trump above the law.”

MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin adds, “GA legislators are now openly and loudly discussing how to punish Fani Willis. Why? Because she dared to come for the king.”

“Keep your eyes on how they deploy SB 92 once October comes,” Rubin adds.

Georgia Public Broadcasting has called SB 92 the “divisive district attorney oversight bill,” which “would create a commission with power to remove district attorneys.”

Criminal law professor Carissa Byrne Hessick, pointing to that new law, writes: “Publicly stating that your new commission to discipline and remove prosecutors is an easier way to interfere in the Trump prosecution doesn’t seem like it will help your side of the pending constitutional litigation over that commission.”

READ MORE: ‘Joy Reid and Rachel Maddow’ Didn’t Indict Trump, ‘Regular People’ Did: Fox News Host Destroys ‘Two-Tiered’ Justice Claims

Professor of law at the Georgia State University College of Law, Anthony Michael Kreis, says: “To be clear: Three institutions and three juries determined crimes may have happened here: the January 6th Committee, the United States DOJ, a federal grand jury, the Fulton DA, and two Fulton County grand juries— plus a federal court ruling on the crime-fraud exception.”

He continues, warning: “If, despite that, legislators believe DA Willis should be removed for malfeasance, then they’re simply arguing to replace home rule with their own political judgment. That’s not countenanced by the Georgia Constitution or the rule of law. It’s a recipe for constitutional crisis.”

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‘Disgraceful’: ICE Slammed After Allegedly Pepper-Spraying US Congresswoman

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U.S. Rep. Adelita Grijalva (D-AZ) is accusing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents of pepper-spraying her in her face while she was at a local Tucson, Arizona restaurant.

Rep. Grijalva in a video on social media said she saw about 40 mostly-masked ICE agents at a restaurant she frequents weekly.

The agents were “in several vehicles that the community had stopped right here, right in the middle of the street, because they were afraid that they were taking people without due process, without any kind of notice.”

READ MORE: Warning Signs Flash as Trump Slump Raises Fears of 2018 Blue Wave Rerun: Conservative

She said that the community was “protecting their people” when she was “sprayed in the face by a very aggressive agent,” and “pushed around by others when I literally was not being aggressive.”

“I was asking for clarification, which is my right as a member of Congress,” she continued. “So, once I introduced myself, once I did, I assumed that it would be a little calmer, but there was literally only one person that was trying to speak to me in any kind of civil tone, and everyone else was being rude and disrespectful, and I just can only imagine if they’re going to treat me like that, how they’re treating everybody else.”

Congresswoman Grijalva said she saw “people directly sprayed,” including “members of our press” and staff members.

She blasted President Donald Trump, saying that he “has no regard for any due process, the rule of law, the Constitution — they’re literally disappearing people from the streets.”

Critics slammed the agents’ action.

READ MORE: Trump: Democrats Are Plotting ‘Total Obliteration’ of Supreme Court

U.S. Senator Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) wrote that Rep. Grijalva “was doing her job, standing up for her community.”

“Pepper-spraying a sitting member of Congress is disgraceful, unacceptable, and absolutely not what we voted for. Period,” he added.

“This is unacceptable and outrageous,” observed Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes. “Enforcing the rule [of] law does not mean pepper spraying a member of Congress for simply asking questions. Effective law enforcement requires restraint and accountability, not unchecked aggression.”

The Bulwark’s Sam Stein noted, “quite the beginning for Grijalva, who wasn’t seated for weeks, [cast] the decisive vote to get the Epstein files, and now has apparently been pepper sprayed in the face by immigration agents.”

Also calling the action “outrageous,” U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) wrote: “We are Members of Congress with oversight authority of ICE. Rep Grijalva was completely within her rights to stand up for her constituents. ICE is completely lawless.”

“First they tackle a sitting Senator,” noted U.S. Rep. Adriano Espaillat (D-NY). “Now they’re pepper spraying a Representative. It’s clear ICE is spinning out of control. We will hold the agency accountable.”

READ MORE: Trump’s Ballroom Seen as ‘Key Evidence’ He’s Out of Touch as Cost of Living Spikes

 

Image via Reuters 

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Warning Signs Flash as Trump Slump Raises Fears of 2018 Blue Wave Rerun: Conservative

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A well-known conservative commentator has a warning for the Republican Party: take action now or face a repeat of the 2018 midterms when the GOP lost 41 House seats in a landslide. And this time, he says, the Senate could go to the Democrats as well.

Award-winning writer and journalist Bernard Goldberg reminded readers at The Hill that in 2018, during President Donald Trump’s first term, “Republicans got walloped … and a good chunk of that had President Trump’s name written all over it.”

Trump’s “approval ratings were in the low 40s, and independents — the folks who usually decide elections — had seen enough. They broke hard for the Democrats,” Goldberg noted. “Now here we are, staring down 2026, and you can almost hear history clearing its throat, getting ready to repeat itself.”

READ MORE: Trump: Democrats Are Plotting ‘Total Obliteration’ of Supreme Court

Goldberg noted that Trump’s approval rating is currently the lowest it’s been this term.

“Among Republicans, his support dropped from 91 percent right after the 2024 election to 84 percent last month. Among independents, it cratered — from 42 percent to just 25 percent.”

“If the trend continues,” he warned, “Republicans could be headed for another blue wave — and this time, it could wash away not just the House majority, but control of the Senate too.”

Why?

“It’s the economy — still,” he wrote.

“Trump is out there saying the economy is humming. Biden said the same thing before him. But voters didn’t buy it then, and they’re not buying it now. Why? Because it’s not GDP numbers that matter. It’s affordability,” Goldberg noted.

READ MORE: Trump’s Ballroom Seen as ‘Key Evidence’ He’s Out of Touch as Cost of Living Spikes

That’s a word that President Trump continues to call a “con job,” while his own administration tries to claim he is focused on.

He pointed to a Karl Rove Wall Street Journal column and wrote: “The Republicans may have ‘avoided disaster’ in Tennessee, but the result should be a wake-up call for Republicans. He’s right.”

Goldberg asked: “will anyone in the Republican Party actually pick up the phone?”

“Because if Republicans don’t wake up — and fast — they’re going to find out the hard way what happens when you keep rerunning the same movie and expecting a different ending. To lose in 2026, all they have to do is nothing. And right now, that’s pretty much what they’re doing.”

READ MORE: Trump Urges Judge Aileen Cannon to Keep Jack Smith Report Secret

 

 

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Trump: Democrats Are Plotting ‘Total Obliteration’ of Supreme Court

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President Donald Trump is claiming that the top priority of Democrats is the “total obliteration” of the U.S. Supreme Court. His remarks came just hours after SCOTUS gave Republicans a 6-3 win along partisan lines, in the form of approving Texas’s redrawn mid-decade congressional maps that could help add five GOP-held seats to the U.S. House of Representatives. A lower court had ruled the redrawn Texas maps were likely racially biased.

Although there are different ways to measure, one study by Court Accountability this fall found that the Supreme Court has ruled in Trump’s favor 90% of the time.

“Most of these wins for the president came from the court’s ‘shadow docket’ slate of opinions — where the court has typically, in the past, only ruled on administrative measures,” according to Truthout. “However, in recent years, the Supreme Court has been making announcements on cases, issuing injunctions or allowances of actions to remain in place, that have the same effect, essentially, as a final decision.”

READ MORE: White House Touts Trump’s ‘Track Record’ on Affordability

On Friday, the president declared that the “Democrats number one policy push is the complete and total OBLITERATION of our great United States Supreme Court.”

“They will do this on their very first day in office, through the simple Termination of the Filibuster, SHOULD THEY WIN THE UPCOMING ELECTIONS,” he wrote.

Trump has strongly advocated for Republicans to eliminate the Senate filibuster.

“The Radical Left Democrats are looking at 21 Justices, with immediate ascension,” he wrote, claiming that Democrats would more than double the current size of the court.

“This would be terrible for our Country. Fear not, however, Republicans will not let it, or any of their other catastrophic policies, happen. Our Country is now in very good hands. MAGA!!!”

Some court reform advocates have suggested the Supreme Court be expanded to 13 justices, one for each of the thirteen U.S. Courts of Appeals.

READ MORE: Trump’s Ballroom Seen as ‘Key Evidence’ He’s Out of Touch as Cost of Living Spikes

 

Image via Reuters 

 

 

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