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By Katherine Fung
Senior Writer
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Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is trying to revive three of the charges against former President Donald Trump, and legal analysts say she might have a good chance.
Willis asked an appeals court on Thursday to reverse Judge Scott McAfee's decision to dismiss six charges in the sweeping RICO case against Trump and 18 co-defendants for their alleged efforts to interfere with Georgia's 2020 election. Willis did not give a reason why the charges should be reinstated.
In March, McAfee ruled that the counts, which included three against the former president, lacked sufficient detail about the nature of the violations. The charges quashed by the judge had to do with soliciting elected officials to violate their oaths of office. The order brought the total number of charges against Trump down from 13 counts to 10. Trump has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
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As part of the appeals process, the Georgia appeals court will review her appeal from the beginning and without any deference to McAfee's ruling.
"For this reason, the appeal does have a relatively good chance of success," former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani told Newsweek.
Former federal prosecutor and elected state attorney Michael McAuliffe agreed, telling Newsweek: "The prosecutors may well believe they have a strong chance of prevailing and adding the counts back in the case."
In his ruling, McAfee said that the "lack of detail concerning an essential legal element" was "fatal" to the six counts and that it did not give the defendants "enough information to prepare their defenses intelligently."
The other three challenged counts were against former Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani, who no longer faces two counts of solicitation and one count of false statements and writings. If the counts are reinstated, Giuliani would face 13 counts.
Two of the counts that were dismissed against Trump involved the phone call he made to Georgia Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger asking him to "find 11,780 votes."
Rahmani and McAuliffe said it is not unusual for Willis' appeal not to include a reason to have McAfee's ruling overturned.
"Other issues—mainly the order denying the defense request for the DA's disqualification—also are on appeal so it may well be that the DA decided that appealing the dismissal wouldn't delay the trial schedule more than it already has been postponed," McAuliffe said.
Rahmani added: "It's normal to not to give a reason in a notice of appeal or in this case, a notice of cross-appeal. Willis will make her arguments in her appellate brief."
Trump and some of his co-defendants have filed their own appeal of a different ruling from McAfee that allowed Willis to remain on the case.
Defendants filed a motion earlier this year to have Willis disqualified because of her relationship with Nathan Wade, who was tapped by the district attorney as special counsel in the case.
McAfee found that while their relationship clouded the case, it did not amount to a conflict of interest. He ruled that Willis could remain on the case as long as Wade stepped down. Wade resigned hours after the ruling. This month, an appeals court agreed to hear their appeal of the disqualification ruling.
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