Steve Sadow defending Donald Trump for first time on Friday
ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) – Former President Donald Trump’s lead Georgia attorney said Friday that trying his client during a presidential election would amount to election interference.
In the historic case of The State of Georgia v. Donald John Trump, Steve Sadow also argued before Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee that the U.S. Constitution’s right to free speech, under the First Amendment, protects Trump from Fulton County District attorney Fani Willis’ indictment.
“Can you imagine the notion of the Republican nominee for president not being able to campaign for president because he is … in a courtroom defending himself?” Sadow, who was making his first Georgia court appearance on behalf of Trump, asked. “That would be the most effective election interference in the United States. I don’t think anybody wants to be in that position.
“If Republicans believe he should be the nominee, he should have the same fair chance at national politics as the Democratic nominee, which appears at the time to be President Biden.”
Sadow also argued no trial date should be set at the time, while Fulton County prosecutors said they don’t believe trying Trump in August, as Willis has requested, constitutes election interference.
In a Monday court filing, Sadow said Trump believed the 2020 election had indeed been stolen from him; thus, his statements about election malfeasance are protected by the First Amendment.
“Here, the indictment’s recitation of supposedly ‘false’ statements and facts, undisputed solely for purposes of a First Amendment-based general demurrer/motion to dismiss, show that the prosecution of President Trump is premised on content-based core political speech and expressive conduct protected by the First Amendment,” Sadow wrote.
“This is the ordinary course in free society,” the filing said. “(‘The response to the unreasoned is the rational; to the uninformed the enlightened: to the straight out lie the simple truth.’) The remedy is not a state RICO prosecution against the former President of the United States.”
Trump is facing 91 felony counts in four criminal cases in Washington, New York, Florida and Georgia and could potentially be looking at years in prison if convicted.
Trump is charged alongside others — including former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows — with violating the state’s anti-racketeering law by scheming to illegally overturn his 2020 election loss.
The indictment, handed up in August, accuses Trump or his allies of suggesting Georgia’s Republican secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, could find enough votes for him to win the battleground state; harassing an election worker who faced false claims of fraud; and attempting to persuade Georgia lawmakers to ignore the will of voters and appoint a new slate of Electoral College electors favorable to Trump.
Willis is seeking to try Trump beginning Aug. 5, 2024 which, according to her court filing, “balances potential delays from Defendant Trump’s other criminal trials in sister sovereigns and the other Defendants’ constitutional speedy trial rights.
“Currently, Defendant Trump is set for trial in the District of Columbia on March 4, 2024, and the Southern District of Florida on May 20, 2024. A start date of August 5, 2024, is therefore unlikely to be subject to delay or interference from these other trials.”
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