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Fani Willis Stung by Ethics Complaint

Fani Willis has been hit by an ethics complaint after her office allegedly refused to a request to provide public records.

Willis, who is leading the Georgia election interference case against former President Donald Trump, has come under pressure amid allegations she had an affair with a special prosecutor she hired in the case, Nathan Wade.

Trump and 18 others are accused in a 41-count indictment of trying to overturn his 2020 election loss in the state. The former president has pleaded not guilty to all 13 charges against him and has repeatedly said the case is part of a political witch hunt aimed at undermining his position as frontrunner for the GOP 2024 presidential nomination.

Former Trump staffer Michael Roman, a co-defendant, made the accusations about Willis without evidence, and sought to disqualify her and Wade from the trial. Willis previously rejected the allegations and said her critics were "playing the race card," given that they had singled out Wade, who is Black.

As well as alleging the affair, in a 127-page filing, Roman said two meetings took place between White House employees and Wade in 2022.

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In a letter seen by Newsweek, Greg Mantell, founder of the Substack blog Investigative News Service, wrote to the Fulton County Board of Ethics on Tuesday accusing Willis of several ethics violations concerning the filing.

He said: "I wish to file a formal ethics complaint against Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis for several violation of the Ethics Code."

He added he requested Willis's expense reports in the years 2021, 2022 and 2023, all contracts and payments to Wade in 2021, 2022 and 2023, and records pertaining to $14.6 million in awards for the Department of Justice.

However, he alleged the office only provided two of apparently three employment contracts for Wade and said his other requests were denied.

Newsweek contacted Willis by social media to comment on this story.

"I believe FCDAO illegally refused to provide the bulk of the records, apparently to cover up other actions that have also raised ethical issues," he said.

He added: "Ms. Willis is a walking ethics violation. She has violated so many sections of the Ethics Code it would be easier for me to state what sections she hasn't violated rather than the sections she has."

He added he is attempting to file a formal complaint with the new state prosecutor qualifications committee.

On Thursday, the Fulton County Board of Ethics acknowledged the complaint. In a letter seen by Newsweek, the chair said it will conduct a preliminary hearing to determine whether there is evidence that there has been a violation of the Fulton County Code of Ethics. If there is evidence, there will be a formal hearing date to further consider the claims in the complaint.

On Friday, news website Just the News said its request for records of any meetings and communications between Willis or Wade with White House or Justice Department officials was ignored. The news outlet filed a complaint with Georgia Attorney General Christopher M. Carr, after Just the News said Willis's office failed to meet the three-day deadline to respond to the request under the Open Records Act.

Meanwhile, on Monday, Georgia state Senate Republicans introduced legislation to establish the Senate Special Committee on Investigations to look into the allegations of misconduct.

On the same day, Georgia state Representative Charlice Byrd introduced a resolution to impeach the federal prosecutor, claiming she used her office for political gain.

As Trump moves to disqualify Fulton DA, could earlier misstep be a guide?

Ruling barring Fani Willis from investigating Burt Jones back in spotlight

As a Fulton County judge considers whether District Attorney Fani Willis and her office should be disqualified from prosecuting Donald Trump, Willis’ defenders and critics alike have turned to a July 2022 ruling some believe could serve as a legal precedent.

The decision, authored by Fulton Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney, relates to the DA’s only other major unforced error in the case: holding a fundraiser for a Democratic opponent of one of her onetime investigation “targets.”

McBurney’s ruling, which disqualified Willis and her office from investigating now-Lt. Gov. Burt Jones due to a political conflict of interest, is currently being met with fresh scrutiny as observers look ahead to February 15. That’s when McBurney’s colleague, Judge Scott McAfee, will hear evidence about whether to remove Willis and her colleagues from the blockbuster election interference probe involving Trump and 14 others due to an alleged undisclosed romantic relationship with the case’s top prosecutor.

Trump and at least two other defendants are alleging that Willis is not only conflicted, but that McAfee should drop the felony charges that a grand jury handed up against them in August.

In a Friday court filing, attorneys for defendant Bob Cheeley cited the McBurney decision as the basis for why Willis should be removed from the case, saying if the “appearance of political conflict” ended in her recusal in the Jones matter, “a financial benefit conferred directly to the District Attorney certainly ” should do the same.

“The fact that the District Attorney has engaged in multiple, ongoing conflicts of a political and financial nature evidences a disregard of her oath to impartially and fairly exercise the enormous power vested in her office,” Cheeley attorneys Christopher Anulewicz and Richard Rice argued.

McBurney’s ruling has also caught the eye of some Willis supporters, who look back at the decision as erroneous. They say the judge set an unfairly high standard for the DA as he sought to protect the work of the special grand jury, which collected evidence, heard testimony and helped advise Willis for nearly eight months in 2022.

“I think it was an overreaction on (McBurney’s) part,” said Buddy Darden, a former Democratic congressman and Cobb County DA. “The facts, in my opinion, did not justify a disqualification. And I’ve never seen a bar set that high in the state of Georgia on any other case.”

The attention comes three weeks after defendant Michael Roman made the bombshell allegation that Willis hired Nathan Wade as a special prosecutor in the case after they were already in a romantic relationship, one she didn’t disclose. Roman also accused Willis of financially benefiting from the case because Wade had purchased her tickets for trips together to Napa Valley and the Caribbean using money he had earned for his work.

‘Political nerves’

Willis was interested in Jones because of his role as a presidential elector for Trump, even though multiple vote counts had shown Democrat Joe Biden had won the state. Jones, at the time a state senator, and the 15 other GOP electors received letters from prosecutors in mid-2022 informing them they were investigation “targets” and could see criminal charges.

Jones soon moved to disqualify Willis, arguing she had a conflict of interest because she had hosted a fundraiser and donated to the campaign of Charlie Bailey, one of the Democrats vying to be Jones’ opponent in that year’s lieutenant governor’s race. At the time of the event, Bailey, one of Willis’ former employees, was locked in a two-person primary runoff, while Jones had already been named the GOP nominee.

The DA’s office had argued that Willis’ support for Bailey had “nothing to do with his opponent” and that Jones had been treated no differently than the other GOP electors who had also received target letters. (At the time of the fundraiser, Jones had not yet been sent a target letter but the special grand jury’s work was already underway.)

After holding a hearing on the matter — during which McBurney called the fundraiser a “what are you thinking moment” for Willis — the judge blocked the DA and her office from further investigating Jones, even as he acknowledged that she was within her rights as a partisan elected official to sponsor a fundraiser.

“An investigation of this significance, garnering the public attention it necessarily does and touching so many political nerves in our society, cannot be burdened by legitimate doubts about the District Attorney’s motives,” McBurney wrote. “The District Attorney does not have to be apolitical, but her investigations do.”

The ruling was considered a surprise.

Legal experts who had been interviewed by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and other media outlets ahead of time had predicted that Jones’ challenge was a long shot.

Finding a conflict

There are two main grounds for disqualifying a prosecutor from a case, according to the Prosecuting Attorney’s Council of Georgia: “forensic misconduct” or a conflict of interest.

In 2005, when the Georgia Supreme Court upheld the bribery conviction of former state Corrections Commissioner Bobby Whitworth, the state high court said a conflict exists when “the prosecutor has acquired a personal interest or stake in the defendant’s conviction.” Also, an “actual conflict” must be involved and be more than a “theoretical or speculative conflict.”

Georgia State University Law Prof. Anthony Michael Kreis views the McBurney ruling as “persuasive,” but “not binding or precedential in any way” for McAfee.

Kreis said what could matter is timing. A grand jury has already handed up criminal charges. The Jones ruling, meanwhile, came during the investigative phase.

“It’s entirely plausible to say that (Roman’s conflict-of-interest allegations are) much more egregious conduct than the fundraiser and if that was disqualifying, then this certainly has to be,” Kreis said. “But I think the thing that makes this different is the stage of the process that we’re at. It might be too late for them to raise it.”

Norm Eisen, former President Barack Obama’s ethics czar who has defended Willis’ probe, called the Jones and Roman conflict-of-interest claims “apples and oranges”

“There, you did have an arguable conflict when the DA had been part of a fundraiser for one of the individuals who was likely to be Mr. Jones’ opponent,” he said, referring to Willis’ fundraiser for Bailey. Whereas Roman’s accusations involve “a private relationship between two consenting adults, where you have that overwhelming evidence here of basis for charges.”

If McAfee ultimately rules that Willis and her office should be removed from the Trump case, it would be up to the Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council of Georgia to decide what to do next, including whether to appoint one of its own attorneys or another DA’s office as a special prosecutor to take over.

That’s what happened to the Jones case. Eighteen months later, the council hasn’t announced its decision about the lieutenant governor.

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Exclusive: Embattled Georgia prosecutor Willis will not recuse from Trump election case amid affair allegations, sources say

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has no plans to step down from the Georgia election subversion case over allegations she’s having an affair with her lead prosecutor, a decision driven in part over concern that her departure would effectively end the case against Donald Trump and his multiple defendants, sources familiar with the thinking inside the DA’s office told CNN.

The sprawling racketeering case still has no trial date, and Willis and her team are keenly aware that the window to go to trial before the 2024 election is rapidly shrinking. Any change in the team handling the prosecution would likely delay the proceedings, and it’s unclear if another prosecutor in Georgia would even be inclined to take up the case, given its political and legal challenges.

Willis has faced immense public scrutiny since allegations first surfaced that she has benefitted financially from a romantic relationship with lead prosecutor Nathan Wade. Despite calls by some legal experts to recuse herself from the case to protect its integrity, she is not expected to do so, the sources told CNN.

Instead, Willis is preparing to counter arguments from Trump and other co-defendants, not by necessarily disputing claims about the relationship but by arguing that defense attorneys seeking to remove her are wrong on the law, sources said.

Despite her relative public silence since the allegations surfaced, Willis has been personally involved in crafting her office’s formal response, according to a source familiar with her role.

Crucial few weeks

Willis has until Friday to provide written responses to the allegations lodged by Mike Roman, a former Trump campaign operative from 2020 who is a co-defendant in the case, setting up a crucial few weeks.

Judge Scott McAfee has scheduled a February 15 hearing for both sides to present evidence related to the allegations. CNN previously reported that defense attorneys issued nearly a dozen subpoenas for potential witnesses to testify publicly in that hearing, including to Willis, Wade and others.

While some inside the DA’s office believe the odds are low Willis will ultimately have to take the stand during the February 15 evidentiary hearing, sources acknowledge it is not out of the question.

Willis was also subpoenaed in Wade’s contentious divorce dispute in neighboring Cobb County, but the judge has paused any decision on whether she will ultimately have to testify. Wade was scheduled to testify on Wednesday over allegations he hid income from his estranged wife but on Tuesday afternoon, the dispute was temporarily settled, much to the relief of some in the DA’s office, a source told CNN.

Despite her intention to focus on the legal merits of the case, the allegations have provided cover for some political allies of Trump to resume attacking Willis and the case itself. Still, a source familiar with the thinking inside the DA’s office told CNN they would be “mystified” if it succeeds in removing her.

Norm Eisen, who served as White House Ethics czar during the Obama administration and is a CNN legal analyst, has called for Wade — but not Willis — to voluntarily step aside from the case despite arguing that neither are disqualified under Georgia law.

“I think it is the wise thing to do, but it is not legally required for him to step aside,” Eisen told reporters last month, referring to Wade. Eisen said the allegations do not concern him about Willis’ ability to try the case.

Wade’s immediate future remains unclear. Sources said there are no immediate plans for Wade to step down but if he did, Willis could replace him with another lead prosecutor or lean on her experienced staff without causing a delay in the proceedings.

Willis ‘not been a good crisis communicator’

Credit card charges that surfaced in Wade’s divorce case show he paid for two plane tickets for Willis to Miami and San Francisco, but beyond that, there has been no other evidence provided to suggest anything improper or illegal happened. Trump and two co-defendants allege the relationship and vacations they say were paid for by Wade amount to a disqualifying conflict of interest. Wade has earned more than $650,000 for his work on the case since 2021.

Former DeKalb County District Attorney Robert James told CNN he is a friend of Willis and that he is not convinced she broke any laws for allegedly having an improper relationship with her top deputy.

“I think a lot of what I’ve read is more of a distraction and not legally substantive,” James told CNN in a sit-down interview.

“Having an alleged affair with a subordinate, I don’t really know how that has anything to do with the case or the facts, or the evidence, or whether Donald J. Trump or any of these other individuals have done what’s in the indictment,” James said.

James did acknowledge that the political impact of the allegations could come into play during jury selection.

“These allegations of affairs can be distracting and can lead jurors to say, ‘You know what, I don’t like that prosecutor. I don’t like that prosecutor’s office. I don’t like this case. Doesn’t matter what the evidence says, I’m not going to convict,’” James said. “That’s the real danger here.”

Georgia State University assistant law professor Anthony Michael Kreis told CNN he believes that Willis has “not been a good crisis communicator,” but for Kreis, another issue at hand is the political threats Willis faces from partisan politicians in the GOP-controlled state legislature.

Moves by Georgia Republicans

Last week, Georgia lawmakers voted to form a special committee to investigate Willis, the latest and potentially most significant in a series of moves by the Republican-held state legislature regarding the case, including a resolution by one lawmaker to have Willis impeached – a move not supported by Georgia’s Republican Gov. Brian Kemp.

The committee will have subpoena power, giving it teeth, but it cannot disqualify Willis or bring an end to the case and can only write a report.

“A special committee in the Georgia legislature with subpoena power is an exceedingly rare thing. It’s not something that we have in Georgia quite often,” Kreis told CNN. “It’s certainly could be damaging, and I think if nothing else it will create a huge headache for the DA’s office.”

Kreis told CNN while he does not believe any of the efforts in the Georgia legislature will derail the case in a significant way, he does believe they are “politically symbolic,” and worth watching.

“I think what we really have here at the worst-case scenario is an ethical problem. There will certainly be questions about whether this was the wisest use of public taxpayer money. That’s a big political problem. It’s an optics problem. It’s a reelection problem. I think it’s very unlikely that we’ll see any criminal action come out of that,” Kreis told CNN.

While Willis and select prosecutors on her team have been working on their written response to the allegations, others in the DA’s office are working to address other outstanding motions to dismiss the case. If Willis ultimately survives the current push to disqualify her, the case would effectively be back on track, sources told CNN.

McAfee has signaled he wants to rule on the remaining motions by the end of February and if they are denied, the case would move into the trial preparation phase.

And if the federal election case overseen by Jack Smith is delayed by several months, the Fulton County DA’s office would be willing to ask the judge to set a trial date that’s earlier than their initial August request, the sources said.

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