Trump will not try to move Georgia election fraud case to federal court

Donald Trump will not seek to move a criminal case alleging he conspired to reverse his 2020 presidential election loss in Georgia from state to federal court, his lawyers said on Thursday.

Trump, the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, and 18 others are charged with pressuring Georgia election officials to overturn his 2020 loss in the state to the current president, Joe Biden, a Democrat.

Trump has denied wrongdoing and said the case is part of a political witch-hunt. He and his co-defendants have pleaded not guilty.

Thursday’s filing is significant because Trump was expected to join several co-defendants in seeking to move his case from state to federal court, where he might face a friendlier jury than in Fulton county, Georgia, the Democratic stronghold where the case was filed.

Seeking to move the case could also have mired it in hearings and appeals.

Prosecutors are pushing to try all 19 defendants together as soon as 23 October, though a judge has said he is skeptical that timeline is feasible.

Trump had initially indicated he would follow the lead of his onetime chief of staff Mark Meadows, who quickly sought to move his case to federal court but was rebuffed this month when a judge ruled against him. Meadows is appealing that ruling.

Trump, Meadows and 17 others were charged in a sprawling indictment in August.

Trump has said the criminal case and three others he faces are part of a political plot aimed at preventing him from retaking the White House in next year’s election.

Trump faces criminal charges in four cases. He is also under indictment in Florida for his handling of classified documents after leaving office, in Washington for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election and in New York over hush money paid to a porn star before the 2016 election. Trump has denied wrongdoing and pleaded not guilty in those cases as well.

Earlier Thursday an appeals court rejected Trump’s attempt to delay a civil trial in a lawsuit brought by New York’s attorney general, allowing the case to proceed days after a judge ruled the former president committed years of fraud and stripped him of some companies as punishment.

The decision, by the state’s intermediate appellate court, clears the way for Judge Arthur Engoron to preside over a non-jury trial starting Monday 2 October in Manhattan in the civil lawsuit brought by the New York attorney general, Letitia James.

Trump is listed among dozens of possible witnesses, setting up a potential courtroom showdown with the judge. The fraud ruling on Tuesday threatens to upend his real estate empire and force him to give up prized New York properties such as Trump Tower, a Wall Street office building, golf courses and a suburban estate.

Trump has denied wrongdoing, arguing that some of his assets are worth far more than what is listed on annual financial statements that Engoron said he used to secure loans and make deals. Trump has argued that the statements have disclaimers that absolve him of liability. His lawyers have said they would appeal.

Trump’s lawyers had sought the trial delay before Engoron’s ruling, alleging the judge abused his authority and hindered their preparations by failing to comply with a June appeals court order that he narrow the scope of the trial based on the statute of limitations.

They filed a lawsuit against Engoron on 14 September under a provision of state law known as Article 78, which allows people to challenge some judicial authority, and asked that the trial be postponed until that matter was resolved.

An appeals court judge, David Friedman, granted an interim stay of the trial while the full appeals court considered the lawsuit on an expedited basis. Thursday’s ruling lifted the stay, allowing the trial to proceed as scheduled.

Engoron ruled on Tuesday that Trump and his company, the Trump Organization, defrauded banks, insurers and others with annual financial statements that massively overvalued his assets and exaggerated his wealth. Engoron ordered some of Trump’s companies removed from his control and dissolved. James alleges Trump boosted his net worth by as much as $3.6bn.

Engoron’s fraud ruling, in a phase of the case known as summary judgment, resolved the key claim in James’s lawsuit, but six others remain. They include allegations of conspiracy, falsifying business records and insurance fraud. The judge will also decide on James’s request for $250m in penalties.

James’s office argued Trump’s lawsuit against Engoron was a “brazen and meritless attempt” to usurp his authority and that any delay “would likely wreak havoc on the trial schedule” and could cause conflicts with Trump’s four pending criminal cases.

The civil trial is the culmination of a years-long investigation by James’s office that saw Trump questioned under oath and millions of pages of documents change hands. Engoron has said it could take three months.