Atlanta Prosecutor Appears to Move Closer to Trump Inquiry

Mr. Worley said he would introduce the motion based on an outside complaint filed with the state election board by John F. Banzhaf III, a George Washington University law professor.

Mr. Banzhaf and other legal experts say Mr. Trump’s calls may run afoul of at least three state criminal laws. One is criminal solicitation to commit election fraud, which can be either a felony or a misdemeanor.

There is also a related conspiracy charge, which can be prosecuted either as a misdemeanor or a felony. A third law, a misdemeanor offense, bars “intentional interference” with another person’s “performance of election duties.”

“My feeling based on listening to the phone call is that they probably will see if they can get it past a grand jury,” said Joshua Morrison, a former senior assistant district attorney in Fulton County who once worked closely with Ms. Willis. “It seems clearly there was a crime committed.”

He noted that Fulton County, which encompasses much of Atlanta, is not friendly territory for Mr. Trump if he were to face a grand jury there.

The inquiry, if it comes to pass, would be the second known criminal investigation of Mr. Trump outside of federal pardon power. He is already facing a criminal fraud inquiry into his finances by the Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus R. Vance Jr. Even Georgia’s Republican governor, Brian Kemp, does not have the power to pardon at the state level, though it’s not assured that he would issue a pardon anyway, given his frayed relationship with Mr. Trump. Nonetheless, in Georgia, pardons are handled by a state board.

The question of whether or not to charge the nation’s 45th president would present a unique challenge for any district attorney. Ms. Willis, who took office only days ago, is a seasoned prosecutor not unaccustomed to the limelight and criticism. A graduate of Howard University and the Emory University School of Law in the Atlanta area, she is the first woman, and the second African-American, to hold the job of top prosecutor in Fulton County, Georgia’s most populous, with more than one million residents.

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