One of the Georgia fake electors says he was just doing what Trump’s lawyers told him to do:
Lawyers representing David Shafer, the embattled chairman of the Georgia Republican Party, are arguing their client should not be charged with any crimes for his actions following the 2020 election because he was following advice provided by attorneys working for former President Donald Trump, according to a letter sent to Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis last week.
Specifically, Shafer’s attorneys say their client was relying on “repeated and detailed advice of legal counsel” when he organized a group of “contingent” electors from Georgia and served as one himself, thus “eliminating any possibility of criminal intent or liability,” according to a copy of the May 5 letter.
The letter, which was first reported by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, comes as Willis and her team of prosecutors investigating efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia are planning to make an announcement on possible charges against Trump or his allies later this summer.
Shafer, who sources previously told CNN could be among those indicted when Willis makes her charging announcements, has come under scrutiny for his role in the effort to put forward alternate slates of electors to block the certification of the 2020 presidential vote.
In their letter to Willis’s office, Shafer’s lawyers say he was “given very direct, detailed legal advice on the procedure he should follow, and he followed those instructions to the letter.”
“I believe that any fair-minded person, with possession of all the facts, would conclude that Mr. Shafer and the other presidential elector nominees acted lawfully and appropriately,” the letter adds.
I suppose that doesn’t implicate Trump specifically, but we know he was heavily involved in Georgia, don’t we? I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest this really does implicate Rudy Giuliani who ran the Georgia legal gambit. Bring popcorn.
BtW, they’re still nuts:
Even though Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp romped to an easy reelection victory last fall, a faction of Georgia Republicans loyal to former President Donald Trump are still trying to give him the boot.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports that the Georgia Republican Assembly is proposing a new plan that would give the state party the right to block candidates from running for office as Republicans if they are deemed insufficiently loyal.
What’s more, the group has made clear that its targets include not only Kemp, but also Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who refused former President Donald Trump’s pleas to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
“If the candidate has shown himself to be a traitor to the principles of the party, then the party can vote to exclude him from qualifying at the next election,” Nathaniel Darnell, a GRA leader, said in justifying the new rule.