Trump ‘all but certain’ to be charged with a new crime this summer: report
Donald Trump is “all but certain” to be indicted this summer, according to a report published Wednesday. It would be the second time the former president is hit with criminal charges this year.
“You could even mark it in your calendar” that Fulton Country District Attorney Fani Willis will issue the indictment between July 11 and Sept. 1, Vice reported.
In a letter to local law enforcement, Willis has “formally asked local officials to beef up security during that window, when she plans to announce charging decisions in her long-running investigation of Trump’s attempt to reverse his 2020 election defeat in Georgia,” the report said.
Titus Nichols, a former prosecutor in Georgia, told the outlet: “The Fulton DA’s letter makes it almost certain that Trump is getting indicted. There is no other reason to send something in writing to the sheriff.”
If it happens and Trump becomes the Republican presidential nominee for 2024, he will likely run while battling separate charges in New York and in Georgia. Last month, he was arraigned on felony charges accusing him of falsifying business records involving a hush money payoff to a porn star who claims to have been involved in an extramarital affair with him.
He’s also in the middle of a civil trial after E. Jean Carroll claimed he raped her decades ago and then defamed her by denying the attack.
Separately, Trump is being investigated in two federal probes that are looking into his attempts to deny the result of the 2020 election, and his stashing of classified government documents in his Florida home.
Willis’ letter to the Fulton County Sheriff expresses concern of unrest following Trump’s indictment, Vice reported.
“We have seen in recent years that some may go outside of public expressions of opinion that are protected by the First Amendment to engage in acts of violence that will endanger the safety of our community,” she wrote. “As leaders, it is incumbent upon us to prepare.”
Trump’s attorneys said in a statement that the letter doesn’t mean charges are imminent.“The public release of this letter does nothing more than set forth a potential timetable for decisions the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office previously announced would be coming,” it said.
Trump has denied all the allegations against him.