Now That Fani Willis Is Out, What Comes Next in Trump’s Georgia Case?

The Georgia appeals court’s decision to disqualify Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis from prosecuting the 2020 election interference case against Trump has launched the ongoing case into chaos. State officials must now find someone to fill her role, a process that could, at best, bring things to a screeching halt—or kill the case altogether.

The court announced Thursday that it had overturned a decision by Judge Scott McAfee allowing Willis to remain on the case after she faced accusations of having an improper relationship with Nathan Wade, her special prosecutor. McAfee said Willis could remain on the case if she cut ties with Wade.

Trump and eight of his 18 co-defendants had appealed the ruling, and the Georgia appeals court decided that the “appearance of impropriety” was just too much. While the indictment would not be dismissed, Willis’s “disqualification is mandated and no other remedy will suffice to restore public confidence in the integrity of these proceedings,” according to Thursday’s court filing.

The appeals court’s decision doesn’t just knock Willis out of the driver’s seat, though—it disqualifies her entire office from trying the case.

Willis’s office filed a notice Thursday afternoon indicating that it intends to appeal the court’s decision, which, if taken up, could move the case to Georgia’s Supreme Court.

In the meantime, Pete Skandalakis, executive director of the nonpartisan Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council of Georgia, will be responsible for determining who will take up the task of prosecuting the president-elect and his co-defendants, Lawfare’s senior editor Anna Bower wrote on X. But she warned that’s easier said than done.

“Realistically, it will be quite difficult to find another prosecutor who would be willing to take on this case. *If* the appeals court decision is not overturned by the GA Supreme Court, this likely spells the end of the prosecution against Trump and others in Fulton County,” Bower wrote.

Trump is rushing to remind the media that he is the captain of the GOP, not Elon Musk.

The “President Musk” rhetoric gained steam among Democrats after the billionaire helped kill the continuing resolution to keep the government open, voicing his opposition long before the president-elect did.

But Trump wants the world to know he’s still the one calling the shots.

“As soon as President Trump released his official stance on the CR, Republicans on Capitol Hill echoed his point of view. President Trump is the leader of the Republican Party. Full stop,” said Trump spokesperson Karoline Leavitt, as reported by Business Insider’s Bryan Metzger.

The statement may be a sign of growing friction between Trump and the world’s richest man, who backed his return to the White House.

Musk has been threatening Republicans, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, about the spending bill, even as the prospect of a government shutdown looms. “Any member of the House or Senate who votes for this outrageous spending bill deserves to be voted out in 2 years!” the SpaceX CEO and Department of Government Efficiency co-lead posted on Wednesday.

“It’s not Donald Trump asking for this, it’s very clearly President Elon Musk asking for this,” Representative Dan Goldman said Wednesday on The Last Word With Lawrence O’Donnell. “The fact that Donald Trump has been completely AWOL during these negotiations to the point where only after Elon Musk publicly tweets about his displeasure about this budget deal, all of a sudden, Donald Trump, chief of staff to Elon Musk, comes trotting in and blows up the deal.”

There’s no telling just yet how much of a rift this has caused between the two men, as Musk seems to be a long-term fixture in Trump’s inner circle. But if this kind of public one-upping continues, who knows how long this bromance will last.

Donald Trump’s defense secretary pick Pete Hegseth still isn’t in the clear just yet—and now even Republicans want to see the receipts. 

At least 12 senators have requested to review the FBI’s background check on Hegseth, according to Politico. While Hegseth’s nomination was believed to be safe earlier this month after a media blitz by his mother and a few laps around the Senate, this surprising development suggests otherwise. 

Hegseth’s background check was initially delayed by Trump’s refusal to sign key transition documents but is now likely to be completed before Hegseth’s confirmation hearing on January 14.  

“It would be helpful, given the allegations that have been lodged against Mr. Hegseth, to be able to see the FBI background check,” Republican Senator Susan Collins told Politico. 

“I’m going to see it,” said Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville. 

Usually two senators handle this kind of check, but the litany of allegations against Hegseth has prompted more attention on his confirmation. 

The former Fox & Friends host is accused of sexual assault, harassment, financial mismanagement of two different veterans’ groups, and workplace misconduct, including intoxication and sexism.

Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene has thrown her weight behind Senator Rand Paul’s ridiculous proposal that Elon Musk be elected the speaker of the House of Representatives.

“The Speaker of the House need not be a member of Congress,” Paul posted Thursday morning on X. “Nothing would disrupt the swamp more than electing Elon Musk … think about it … nothing’s impossible. (not to mention the joy at seeing the collective establishment, aka ‘uniparty,’ lose their ever-lovin’ minds).”

Quote-tweeting Paul’s proposal approvingly, Greene wrote that she would be “open to supporting” Musk for the speakership.

“DOGE can only truly be accomplished by reigning [sic] in Congress to enact real government efficiency,” Greene wrote, referring to the austerity agenda of Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, an advisory panel to be co-led by Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy. “The establishment needs to be shattered just like it was yesterday. This could be the way.”

On Thursday afternoon, according to Daily Mail reporter Jon Michael Raasch, Greene emailed her constituents a survey asking if they would support Musk as House speaker. “DOGE could become the legislative branch,” the accompanying message says. The congresswoman posed the same question in a poll on Musk’s platform, X, which has garnered over 57,000 votes by the time of writing—82.7 percent of which are in favor of him getting the gavel.

If Paul and Greene were to have it their way, Musk would be the first nonmember to hold the speakership.

Musk has been crusading against Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson’s bipartisan spending bill to avert a government shutdown. On Wednesday, the billionaire sent over 100 tweets on X railing against the bill—with “a number of misleading or outright false claims,” per Politico—and expressing indifference about the prospect of a shutdown.

Musk’s efforts culminated in President-elect Trump coming out against the bill, dealing “a likely deathblow” to budget negotiations, per the Associated Press. As Trump and Musk send the government hurtling toward a shutdown, many observers have criticized elected officials for taking marching orders from an unelected billionaire.

Amid this wrangling, the right-wing populist House Freedom Caucus, of which Greene is a member, expressed its dissatisfaction with the proposed bill, touting instead Representative Chip Roy’s proposed DOGE Act, which would slash federal spending—though not, of course, the Pentagon budget.

There’s scarcely a better illustration of Greene’s phony brand of populism than her support for installing the world’s richest man to, as she put it, reign in the people’s elected body.

This story has been updated.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has begun the steady descent out of Donald Trump’s favor.

A source close to Trump told NOTUS Thursday that the president-elect initially supported Johnson’s plan to keep the government funded, but was surprised to find that the whopping 1,547-page bill was filled with plans to spend billions of dollars on Democratic priorities, farmers, and disaster relief.

Senator Josh Hawley told CNN Wednesday that Trump had said Johnson had not told him everything in the massive spending bill.

Trump has been a staunch ally of the Louisiana Republican, including in May when Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene tried to have him removed from the speakership. Johnson has remained cozy with the president-elect, but all of that could change in the wake of his continuing resolution, which is particularly unpopular with unofficial, unelected co-President Elon Musk.

Trump’s defection could spell trouble for Johnson, who needs to be speedily reelected next year so that Congress can go on to certify the results of the presidential election.

Trump spoke with Fox Digital Thursday and indicated that Johnson would have no trouble getting reelected … so long as he is able to clean up the spending bill.

“If the speaker acts decisively, and tough, and gets rid of all of the traps being set by the Democrats, which will economically and, in other ways, destroy our country, he will easily remain speaker,” Trump said.

Meanwhile, members of Johnson’s own party appear to have already moved on. Representative Thomas Massie said Wednesday night he would not vote for Johnson as speaker in January, and some lawmakers are even suggesting Musk as a potential replacement.

Trump floated completely abolishing the debt ceiling on Thursday, surprising Democrats and Republicans alike.

The shocking demand comes as the president-elect revealed his opposition to the bipartisan spending bill, bringing the federal government another step closer to a shutdown.

Trump told NBC News over the phone that it would be the “smartest thing” Congress could do.

“I would support that entirely.… The Democrats have said they want to get rid of it. If they want to get rid of it, I would lead the charge,” Trump said.

He went on to assert that the debt ceiling is a frivolous, imaginary concept intended to scare people into abiding by it. “It doesn’t mean anything, except psychologically,” he said.

This isn’t necessarily new for Trump, who signed laws to lift the debt ceiling three separate times during his first term while also suggesting the debt ceiling be killed off in 2017. “It complicates things, it’s really not necessary,” he said of the debt ceiling then.

Still, it goes against the rest of his party, as Republicans often campaign against raising the debt ceiling, let alone abolishing it entirely. That’s not the case with Democrats. Pennsylvania Democratic Representative Brendan Boyle has been advocating for his Debt Ceiling Reform Act since 2023, a law that would weaken Congress’s ability to use shutdown as a threat to pass legislation. The bill currently has 55 Democratic Party co-sponsors.

Already, at least one Democrat has backed Trump’s demand.

“I agree with President-elect Trump that Congress should terminate the debt limit and never again govern by hostage taking,” Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote on X.

President-elect Donald Trump and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez had a peculiar exchange after the progressive lawmaker lost a bid to become her party’s ranking member on the House Oversight Committee. The interaction appeared laden with sarcasm but perhaps also revealed something deeper about shifts in American politics.

“Really too bad that AOC lost the Battle for the Leadership Seat in the Democrat Party. She should keep trying. Someday, she will be successful!” Trump posted on Truth Social Wednesday afternoon. Ocasio-Cortez replied Wednesday, in a post followed by a laughing-crying emoji, “Damn you know it’s bad when even Trump is feeling bad for me.”

The 35-year-old Ocasio-Cortez lost her leadership bid to 74-year-old Representative Gerry Connolly—whose challenge to the popular young congresswoman was boosted by Democratic power broker former Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Ocasio-Cortez’s loss was, for many, a sign that the Democratic Party learned few lessons from the 2024 election, remaining wedded to the sclerotic old guard and unwilling to embrace the popular change agents for whom America has an apparent appetite.

While Ocasio-Cortez appears to be taking the loss on the chin, a number of MAGA social media users accused her of failing to realize that Trump’s praise was tongue-in-cheek (apparently missing that the congresswoman’s reply was itself sarcastic).

But other users weren’t so sure Trump’s praise was insincere.

Corey Moss-Pech, a sociologist at Florida State University, tweeted, “What Donald Trump understands and Dem elites don’t is young people moving away from Dems is why he won. This is why he said this and why he said Dems couldn’t get student loans canceled. He wants young people disillusioned with Dems. And the party is happy to comply!”

Moss-Pech’s theory seems probable. In 2016 and 2020, Trump attempted to appeal to Bernie Sanders supporters disillusioned with the political establishment by calling the party’s nomination process rigged.

This election cycle, Trump heaped sincere praise on Ocasio-Cortez in a similar manner. And, notably, he chose to do so during what New York magazine called his “Gen-Z pivot.”

In his appearance on internet personality Adin Ross’s livestream in August, Trump was asked his opinion on a number of celebrities and politicians. When it came to Ocasio-Cortez, he initially said, “Fake,” but quickly changed course, veering into praise and comparing her favorably to former Argentine first lady Eva Perón.

“But in all fairness, look, but she knows it. She’s got a thing going. It’s a good thing—good thing for her,” Trump told Ross. “She’s got a spark that’s pretty amazing, actually. She’s got a good spark. So, I’ll change it. I’ll say spark.… She’s got a lot of sizzle.”

Following Election Day, Ocasio-Cortez solicited the opinions of voters who supported both herself and Trump in the 2024 election, seeking to understand split-ticket Trump-AOC voters. Many respondents indicated that they liked Trump and Ocasio-Cortez because both, to them, signified real change.

Rand Paul thinks the richest man in the world should be speaker of the House.

The Republican senator suggested on X that Musk take the position, after he helped kill Speaker Mike Johnson’s spending bill, pushing the federal government closer to shutdown.

“The Speaker of the House need not be a member of Congress,” Paul posted on Thursday. “Nothing would disrupt the swamp more than electing Elon Musk … think about it … nothing’s impossible. (not to mention the joy at seeing the collective establishment, aka ‘uniparty,’ lose their ever-lovin’ minds).”

The speaker of the House does not need to be an elected official, although it always has been in the past. Still, the likelihood of this MAGA fantasy coming to fruition seems low, as President-elect Trump himself told Fox News Thursday that Johnson would remain speaker so long as he “acts decisively and tough” on the upcoming spending package.

Even without the speakership, Musk’s influence on the president-elect and the greater Republican Party is undeniable. He has already been appointed to co-lead the Department of Government Efficiency and has been a constant presence at Mar-a-Lago. His oversize role was called into question recently after he and Trump publicly disagreed on raising the debt ceiling.

“It’s not Donald Trump asking for this, it’s very clearly President Elon Musk asking for this,” Representative Dan Goldman told The Last Word With Lawrence O’Donnell. “The fact that Donald Trump has been completely AWOL during these negotiations to the point where only after Elon Musk publicly tweets about his displeasure about this budget deal, all of a sudden, Donald Trump, chief of staff to Elon Musk, comes trotting in and blows up the deal.”

Georgia’s Court of Appeals disqualified Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis Thursday from prosecuting the 2020 election interference case against Donald Trump and his co-defendants over a conflict of interest. 

Willis’s office filed a notice Thursday afternoon indicating that it intends to appeal the court’s decision, which, if taken up, would move the case to Georgia’s Supreme Court. 

Trump and eight of his 18 co-defendants filed an application with Georgia’s appeals court in March, asking it to reconsider Judge Scott McAfee decision to allow Willis to continue to prosecute the case after she was accused of having an improper relationship with her special prosecutor, Nathan Wade. McAfee had allowed her to stay on the grounds that she cut ties with Wade.

“After carefully considering the trial court’s findings in its order, we conclude that it erred by failing to disqualify DA Willis and her office,” Judge E. Trention Brown wrote in the appeals court majority opinion. 

“The remedy crafted by the trial court to prevent an ongoing appearance of impropriety did nothing to address the appearance of impropriety that existed at times when DA Willis was exercising her broad pretrial discretion about who to prosecute and what charges to bring.”

“While we recognize that an appearance of impropriety generally is not enough to support disqualification, this is the rare case in which disqualification is mandated and no other remedy will suffice to restore public confidence in the integrity of these proceedings,” Brown wrote. 

The court affirmed, however, that the indictment against Trump should not be dismissed. 

“The appellants contend that the trial court erred in denying their motions to dismiss the indictment. The State responds that the appellants have failed to show that the trial court erred in finding that the appellants had not shown ‘that [their] due process rights have been violated or that the issues involved prejudiced [them] in any way,’” Brown wrote. 

He noted that dismissing the indictment would be an “extreme sanction” and should only be used for “unlawful government conduct.”

The Fulton County district attorney’s office indicted Trump, alongside 18 others, in 2023 on felony charges in a large-scale racketeering case for attempting to interfere in Georgia’s state election. It’s unclear what exactly Willis’s disqualification will mean for the case.

Trump’s lawyers had argued in a legal filing two weeks ago that the case ought to be tossed “well before” he was sworn in as president, and that both the state and district court “lack jurisdiction to entertain any further criminal process against President Trump as the continued indictment and prosecution of President Trump by the State of Georgia are unconstitutional.”

Fulton County Chief Senior Assistant District Attorney F. McDonald Wakeford hit back at the lawyers’ request, arguing that the “Appellant does not specify or articulate how the appeal—or indeed, any other aspect of this case—will constitutionally impede or interfere with his duties once he assumes office,” implying that the case would proceed regardless of Trump’s return to the White House.  

This story has been updated.

While Republicans are quickly falling in line over Elon Musk’s missives, Democrats are pointing out that the unelected billionaire bureaucrat may have actually eclipsed Donald Trump.

The president-elect didn’t deliver his opinion on the proposed continuing resolution until the end of the day Wednesday, when he demanded via his vassal JD Vance that Republicans raise the debt ceiling. Meanwhile Musk had already been ranting about it for hours online, threatening to unseat any Republicans who supported it.

During an appearance Wednesday night on MSNBC’s The Last Word With Lawrence O’Donnell, Representative Dan Goldman pointed out that the president-elect was clearly no longer calling the shots.

“It’s not Donald Trump asking for this, it’s very clearly President Elon Musk asking for this. The fact that Donald Trump has been completely AWOL during these negotiations to the point where only after Elon Musk publicly tweets about his displeasure about this budget deal, all of a sudden, Donald Trump, chief of staff to Elon Musk, comes trotting in and blows up the deal,” Goldman said.

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders also called out the unelected billionaire for trying to steer the government into a shutdown.

“The US Congress this week came to an agreement to fund our government. Elon Musk, who became $200 BILLION richer since Trump was elected, objected,” Sanders wrote on X. “Are Republicans beholden to the American people? Or President Musk? This is oligarchy at work.”

Wisconsin Representative Gwen Moore asked her X followers, “Remind me who elected Elon Musk.”

Representative Don Beyer shared a screenshot of Musk agreeing with a post calling for the government to be shut down until Trump’s inauguration. “The richest man in the world says he wants to shut down the government, forcing millions of American workers—including our troops—to go without pay through the holidays,” wrote the Virginia Democrat. “Republicans are following his orders. This is insane.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson has come under heavy pressure to scrap the lengthy bill, and has been reportedly considering a “clean” bill that would not include many of the provisions that Democrats had fought for, such as $10 billion in economic assistance for farmers and $100 billion for disaster relief.

Massachusetts Representative Jim McGovern posted a selfie Johnson had previously taken with a smiling Musk and Trump.

“Johnson negotiated w/ Democrats to keep the government open, then went back on his word (abandoning help for farmers & disaster victims) because, apparently, out of touch billionaire Elon Musk now calls the shots,” McGovern wrote. “At least we know who’s in charge. Grow a spine, Mr. Speaker!”

“President Musk” was predictably trending on X Thursday morning, which would maybe be impressive if Musk didn’t own the website that declared it.

It’s well documented that Trump, ever the showman, doesn’t much care to share the spotlight with members of his inner circle, so it’s possible that Musk may receive pushback for his promotion from billionaire bureaucrat czar of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency to unelected president of the United States—how’s that for democracy?

On Wednesday, the conservative House Freedom Caucus introduced the Disaster Offset and Government Efficiency, or DOGE, Act, which sees the government’s budget slashed by over $100 billion—but conspicuously leaves military spending alone, which happens to be where Musk gets a hefty portion of his government contracts.