Former U.S. President Donald Trump attends a campaign rally for Republican U.S. senators David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, ahead of their January runoff elections to find out control of the U.S. Senate, in Valdosta, Georgia, Dec. 5, 2020.
Jonathan Ernst | Reuters
Former President Donald Trump may seek to have his Georgia election interference criminal case moved to federal court from state court, his lawyer said in a filing Thursday.
Trump now has a month to file a proper notice of removal of the case to federal court in Georgia, his defense attorney Steven Sadow noted within the filing in Fulton County Superior Court.
If he does seek removal, Trump would join several other defendants within the Georgia conspiracy case in doing so, amongst them his former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows.
Under the law, a federal official can ask to transfer a state case to federal court if the problems in a case relate “to any act under color of such office.”
Trump and 18 other defendants were indicted last month by a Fulton County grand jury on charges related to an alleged conspiracy to overturn the outcomes of the 2020 election in Georgia, which Trump lost to President Joe Biden. All of the defendants have pleaded not guilty within the case.
A federal trial could give Trump, and other defendants, a bonus, since the jury pool might contain more Republicans than in Fulton County, and he might draw a judge whom he appointed to the bench when he was president.
Trump, in that venue, also might give you the option to assert that he’s immune from prosecution on the state charges because he was acting as president when the alleged crimes were committed.
