The Georgia indictment is the biggest threat to democracy yet
by Washington Examiner
August 17, 2023 06:46 AM
Trust in America’s institutions is at an all-time low. Partisan hostility is high and growing. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’s political indictment of not just former President Donald Trump but 18 other Republicans will further erode trust in government and fuel hostility between parties.
According to a CBS poll taken after special counsel Jack Smith’s indictment of Trump but before Willis’s, 56% of Republicans viewed the indictments as “an attack on people like you” compared to 28% who said the indictments were “upholding the rule of law.”
Considering that the Smith indictment charged just Trump with conspiracy, but Willis charged Trump and 18 others, expect that 56% to rise significantly.
Take, for example, Willis’s indictment of David Shafer, who, at the time of the alleged crime, was head of the Georgia Republican Party. Trump contested the results of the 2020 Georgia presidential election in court, and by the day the Electoral College was due to meet to approve slates of electors, litigation was ongoing.
Not wanting his party’s candidate to be without electors in the event Trump won his lawsuits, Shafer did what the Democratic Party of Hawaii did in 1960 when its presidential results were being litigated: He held a meeting of Trump supporters at the state Capitol and elected an alternative slate of electors.
Shafer told the press, “Had we not met today to cast our votes, the president’s pending election contest would have been effectively mooted. Our action today preserves his rights under Georgia law.”
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https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/editorials/the-georgia-indictment-is-the-biggest-threat-to-democracy-yet
