GA Senate Set to Question Fani Willis  12/17 06:04

   

   ATLANTA (AP) -- After more than a year of legal maneuvering, Fani Willis 
will face questions Wednesday from a Georgia state Senate committee over her 
prosecution of Donald Trump.

   The question is whether Fulton County's Democratic district attorney will 
answer any of them.

   The Republican-dominated state Senate in January 2024 created the Special 
Committee on Investigation to examine allegations of misconduct against Willis 
concerning her case seeking criminal convictions for efforts to overturn 
Trump's 2020 election loss in Georgia. Even before Trump embarked on a 
retribution campaign against his enemies, Republicans on the Georgia committee 
were eager to bring Willis in for questioning.

   When Willis announced the indictment against Trump and 18 others in August 
2023, she used the state's anti-racketeering law to allege a conspiracy to try 
to illegally overturn Trump's narrow loss to Democrat Joe Biden in the 2020 
presidential election in Georgia.

   Republicans didn't like that, but the committee has focused on Willis' 
hiring of special prosecutor Nathan Wade to lead the election interference 
case. The resolution creating the committee said a romantic relationship 
between the two amounted to a "clear conflict of interest and a fraud upon the 
taxpayers." But now the case is defunct after Willis was removed and another 
prosecutor dismissed it. Thus far, the committee has turned up few new facts 
regarding Willis' activities. And she may choose to be guarded after Trump 
called Willis a "criminal" who should be "prosecuted" and "put in jail."

   Democrats have decried the panel as a partisan time-waster driven by 
political ambition. Four Republicans on the committee are running for statewide 
office in 2026. Chairman Bill Cowsert of Athens is running for attorney 
general, while Sens. Greg Dolezal of Cumming, Blake Tillery of Vidalia and 
Steve Gooch of Dahlonega are each seeking the Republican nomination for 
lieutenant governor. Another Republican who had been on the committee, John 
Kennedy of Macon, resigned from the Senate last week to pursue his own bid for 
lieutenant governor.

   Amid a court battle over the committee's power to order her to appear, 
Willis didn't show up last year when subpoenaed. A judge agreed that Willis 
couldn't ignore the subpoena, and her lawyers worked out an agreement for 
Willis to appear when the subpoena was reissued this year.

   But Roy Barnes, the former Democratic Georgia governor representing Willis, 
told state Supreme Court justices last week in a hearing over the validity of 
an earlier subpoena that there may be limits to what Willis will answer.

   "You can't just pick somebody out and say, 'We're going to embarrass you; 
we're going to try you; we're going to harass you,'" Barnes told justices. "So 
we'll make an appropriate objection at the time. I'm not a potted plant."

   Willis' prosecution began to fall apart in January 2024, when a defense 
attorney in the case alleged that Willis was involved in an improper romantic 
relationship with Wade.

   In an extraordinary hearing, both Willis and Wade testified about the 
intimate details of their relationship. They both vehemently denied allegations 
that it constituted a conflict of interest.

   The trial judge chided Willis for a "tremendous lapse in judgment," 
ultimately ruling that Willis could remain on the case if Wade resigned, which 
he did hours later.

   But after defense attorneys appealed, the Georgia Court of Appeals cited an 
"appearance of impropriety" and removed Willis from the case. The state Supreme 
Court in September declined to hear Willis' appeal.