Fani Willis can stay on Donald Trump’s election interference case, judge rules

Fulton County district attorney Fani Willis will be allowed to continue to criminally prosecute Donald Trump and more than a dozen co-defendants who are accused of mounting a “criminal enterprise” to unlawfully overturn Georgia’s election results in 2020.

The judge overseeing that case has rejected efforts from Mr Trump and his allies to disqualify the district attorney following allegations of misconduct with a prosecutor she hired to lead the case.

In his 23-page decision on Friday, Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee wrote the defendants “failed to meet their burden” in proving a “conflict of interest” that would require her removal, but he noted that any appearance of “impropriety” could necessitate Ms Willis or prosecutor Nathan Wade withdrawing for the case to move forward.

Ms Willis may “choose to step aside, along with the whole of her office”, or Mr Wade can withdraw, which would allow the parties in the case “and the public” to “move forward without his presence or remuneration distracting from” the proceedings, according to Judge McAfee’s order.

“As long as Wade remains on the case, this unnecessary perception will persist,” he wrote.

Attorneys for Mr Trump and his co-defendants accused Ms Willis of financially benefiting from the case against the former president by hiring a lead prosecutor with whom she was romantically involved.

Mr Wade and Ms Willis have acknowledged their prior relationship, but they have repeatedly testified that they started dating after he was hired, split their expenses, and that the relationship ended last summer before an indictment.

Judge Scott McAfee says the district attorney must step aside or remove the prosecutor

But, the judge wrote, “an odour of mendacity