Former federal judge: Trump’s Michigan recording 'bolsters' Jack Smith and Fani Willis prosecutions

23 December 2023

Both Department of Justice special counsel Jack Smith and Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis are likely interested in obtaining a copy of the recording of former President Donald Trump pressuring Michigan election officials, according to a former federal judge.

In an interview with Politico, J. Michael Luttig — a George H.W. Bush-appointed judge who served on the 4th Circuit US Court of Appeals — opined that the November 17, 2020 call the Detroit News first reported on would be valuable in both the ongoing Washington, DC and Georgia prosecutions.

"This new evidence is of a piece with, and bolsters, the considerable other similar evidence of the former president’s interference in the 2020 presidential election that both Jack Smith and Fani Willis have assembled,” Luttig said. "The president was not acting in furtherance of his duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed when he attempted to interfere in the presidential election in Michigan and elsewhere."

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In the call, both Trump and Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel urged two members of the Wayne County Board of Canvassers — Monica Palmer and William Hartmann (now deceased) — to not certify election results. McDaniel told both Palmer and Hartmann to go home without signing certification documents, and added she would ensure they had legal representation in return for their refusal to certify. Trump added, "we'll take care of that."

Shan Wu, who was a federal prosecutor in former President Bill Clinton's Department of Justice, said that any promise to offer a gift to a public official in exchange for that official not carrying out their duties could be a violation of the state's bribery law, which would be a felony.

"[T]his offer of something of value — the paid lawyers — goes a step further than Trump’s mere 'browbeating' that he engaged in during his call with the Georgia secretary of state," Wu wrote in a Friday op-ed in the Daily Beast.

Both Palmer and Hartmann ultimately tried and failed to take back their previous votes against certifying the 2020 presidential election results in Wayne County, which houses Detroit.

Read Politico's full report by clicking here.

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