Georgia mounts a challenge to a statute that appears to provide for reimbursement in the event of a district attorney’s disqualification. Gift this article Share A battle is brewing over who should pay the tens of millions of dollars in legal fees racked up by the defendants in the criminal racketeering case brought against President Trump and 18 others by the district attorney of Fulton County, Fani Willis. A new filing by the state of Georgia argues that the defendants’ — which include Mr. Trump, Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, and Mayor Rudolph Giuliani — demand for $17 million rests on constitutionally shaky ground, even after Peach State lawmakers passed a bill that seems to mandate that counties pay defendants’ bills when a prosecutor is disqualified. The election interference case was dismissed after the Georgia Supreme Court left intact an appellate ruling that disqualified Ms. Willis from the case on the basis of her secret romance with her handpicked special prosecutor, Nathan Wade. The Georgia Court of Appeals found this the “rare case in which disqualification is mandated and no other remedy will suffice to restore public confidence in the integrity of these proceedings.”
