Simply put, while in Georgia you may be able to lie to the public — or even lie to officials on matters outside of their remit — if you lie to state officials about important or meaningful facts in matters they directly oversee, you must become a law enforcement officer take risk. That is exactly what Trump and his allies in the indictment have done time and time again throughout the campaign.
The most striking example is provided in Act 113 of the indictment, which alleges that Trump made a series of false statements to Georgian Foreign Minister Brad Raffensperger and his deputies in Trump’s infamous January 2, 2021 phone call. Most legal commentators, myself included, focused on that call because it contained a not-so-veiled threat against Raffensperger and his attorney. In recorded comments, Trump told them they were at “great risk” of criminal prosecution for claiming they were aware of voter fraud and were taking no action to stop it.
Willis, on the other hand, doesn’t focus on the threats, but on the lies. And when you read the list of Trump’s alleged lies, they are absolutely unbelievable. His claims are not only wrong; They’re transparent and blazingly stupid. This was not a sophisticated attempt to overturn the election. It was a shotgun blast of blatant untruths.
This is where the legal nuances get quite interesting. While Willis still has to prove intent — the law prohibits “knowingly and intentionally” falsifying material facts — challenging the evidence is simpler than in Smith’s federal case against Trump. To comply with federal law, Smith’s indictments must link any Trump lie to a larger criminal plot. In contrast, Willis only needs to prove that Trump willfully lied to a government official about important facts on a matter within that official’s purview. This is a much simpler case.
Yes, it is true that the individual allegations of lying are also linked to much larger allegations of a criminal conspiracy and a blackmail company. But when I’m a prosecutor, I can build on this single, simple foundation: Trump lied, and those lies themselves violate Georgia criminal law. Once you’ve proved this simple case, you’ve laid the groundwork for the larger racketeering allegations that add to Trump’s legal vulnerability. Adding to Trump’s danger is that presidents do not have the power to pardon state sentences, and even the governor of Georgia does not have direct authority to pardon Trump for his crimes.
