Trump and former officials indicted for asking for phone numbers, encouraging people to watch TV, reserving rooms and other "petty" offenses
By bellecarter // 2023-08-20
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Hours after the Fulton County website prematurely uploaded former President Donald Trump's "inaccurate" indictments to their official government website, the Georgia county district attorney's (DA's) office secured the long-sought charges against the Republican presidential candidate. Among the "petty" charges are Trump encouraging voters to tune into televised broadcasts and his top-ranking official asking for phone numbers. On Monday evening, DA Fani Willis successfully indicted 19 total defendants she plans to bring to trial together, making her the Democrats' latest arm in their election interference. (Related: Roger Stone explains how charges against Trump are FATALLY FLAWED.) With 13 additional counts from Georgia prosecutors over objections to the 2020 presidential election, Trump is now faced with 91 charges as he leads the race for next year's Republican nomination, the Federalist reported. Those now facing charges along with the former POTUS are Trump's last White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and attorney Rudy Giuliani. Among the "treasonous" acts indicated in the indictment is Meadows' SMS soliciting phone numbers from a pair of Pennsylvania lawmakers. "Meadows sent a text message to United States Representative Scott Perry from Pennsylvania and stated, 'Can you send me the number for the speaker and the leader of PA Legislature? POTUS wants to chat with them,'" the indictment reads. This was, apparently, an overt act in furtherance of the conspiracy as per the DA decision. Provided in Act 22, the Georgia indictment said that Trump encouraging voters to watch television is a "conspiracy." "On or about December 3, 2020, DONALD JOHN TRUMP caused to be tweeted from the Twitter account @RealDonaldTrump, 'Georgia hearings now on @OANN [One America News Network]. Amazing!'" the 98-page paper included. Moreover, Act 100 of the indictment faulted the president for encouraging supporters to tune into Newsmax and Act 101 listed another tweet that encouraged supporters to tune into the Right Side Broadcasting Network as an act of "conspiracy." Trump's team's grassroots campaigning is also conspiratorial as per Act 38 of the criminal indictment which charged Giuliani for retweeting a "Patriot Call to Action" that encouraged voters to call their members of Congress to advocate for their cause. "Georgia Patriot Call to Action: today is the day we need you to call your state Senate & House Reps & ask them to sign the petition for a special session. We must have free & fair elections in GA & this is our only path to ensuring every legal vote is counted @realDonald Trump,"  the posted tweet said. Furthermore, defendant David Shafer was also indicted for reserving a room, which was used for a meeting of alternate presidential electors at the Georgia Capitol in December 2020. The act was declared by GA prosecutors to be a conspiracy as well. Act 32 of the criminal indictment further charged the former president for calling on state leaders to ensure signature verification and call a special session. The 45th Act, meanwhile, provided that defendant Michael Roman is at fault for requesting an unidentified "unindicted co-conspirator" to encourage co-defendant Misty Hampton to attend a House committee hearing in Georgia on election fraud. Trump calling President Pro Tempore of the Georgia Senate Butch Miller on Dec. 3 and Dec. 26, 2020, were overt acts in furtherance of the conspiracy as well as per Willis.

GA County website posted "premature" indictments, then took them down right away, while the jury is hearing the case

The Fulton County official website posted a long list of criminal charges against Trump, including state racketeering counts, conspiracy to commit false statements, and solicitation of violation of oath by a public officer. But it was quickly taken down because it was published before the grand jury officially returned the indictments. The jury just began hearing from more witnesses Monday but shortly after noon of the same day, Reuters reported on the list of several criminal charges. According to Willis's office, the charges being filed were "inaccurate." The DA representative declined to comment further. The county courts clerk Che Alexander's office called the posted document "fictitious." It said that the list came out with no official case numbers, thus, was not considered official filings. However, the Associated Press saw that there was actually an assigned number on the document. Alexander declined to comment when the news outlet inquired. Meanwhile, "experts" think that this is just a "minor booboo" as prosecutors may have already drafted indictments that they would present to the grand jury, which ultimately decides whether to hand charges down and this is what was posted on the site. "I think this tells us what they are planning to present to the grand jury, and the grand jury could say no," said Georgia State University law professor Clark Cunningham. Indeed, Trump quickly reacted, further citing how the investigations are clearly politically motivated and possibly rigged. "The Grand Jury testimony has not even FINISHED but it is clear the District Attorney has already decided how this case will end," the former president wrote in the email. "They are trying to rob me of my right to due process. This is an absolute DISGRACE." His legal counsel said this could not be a simple administrative mistake. "It showed that the prosecutors' office had no respect for the integrity of the grand jury process," Trump's campaign group lamented. Visit Trump.news for the latest updates on former POTUS Trump's legal battles and presidential candidacy.

Sources for this article include:

TheFederalist.com DocumentCloud.org NYPost.com
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