ATLANTA (Diya TV) — The election interference case against President Donald Trump and several allies will continue under new leadership after the removal of Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis.
A new prosecutor, Peter Skandalakis, now holds control of the high-profile Georgia racketeering case. Skandalakis leads the Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council of Georgia, a bipartisan group of district attorneys and solicitors from across the state. He was assigned the case in September after a long legal battle over Willis’s authority.
Skandalakis confirmed Friday that he will personally take over the case. He said he tried to appoint another conflict prosecutor but could not find anyone willing to accept the job. According to his statement, several prosecutors declined the appointment for undisclosed reasons.
He said he recently received the full investigative file from Willis’ office. The material included 101 boxes of documents and an eight-terabyte hard drive. He noted that his review is still ongoing, but the approaching court deadline required him to move forward.
Skandalakis said he wants time to study the file before deciding the next steps. He did not say whether he plans to pursue the charges or scale them back.
Some legal experts question whether the case will survive. Michael J. Moore, a former U.S. attorney in Georgia, said the prosecution may be “dead on arrival.” He expects Skandalakis to cite the U.S. Supreme Court’s immunity ruling as a reason to dismiss the charges. Moore also called the case “overcharged,” criticizing the use of Georgia’s RICO statute.
He said taking over the case would be a difficult and thankless job.
Willis filed the original indictment in August 2023 after a lengthy investigation into Trump’s efforts to overturn his loss in the 2020 presidential election. The case stemmed from Trump’s January phone call urging Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” enough votes to change the outcome.
Trump and 18 co-defendants faced sweeping racketeering charges under Georgia’s RICO law. Prosecutors accused them of joining a conspiracy to unlawfully change the state’s election results. The indictment described a coordinated effort to challenge the vote count after Joe Biden defeated Trump in Georgia.
The case gained national attention in August 2023 when Trump surrendered at the Fulton County Jail and posed for his first mug shot. Many analysts viewed the Georgia case as the one most likely to reach trial because a state conviction cannot be pardoned by a future president.
Trump’s legal team says the charges should be thrown out. Lead attorney Steve Sadow said the prosecution is politically motivated and should end. He said he is confident a fair review by Skandalakis will lead to dismissal.
Many defendants argued they were acting within their legal rights to question the election. Four defendants, including three attorneys who advised Trump, accepted plea deals. They pleaded guilty to certain charges in exchange for lighter sentences.
The case suffered major setbacks after revelations about Willis’s romantic relationship with special prosecutor Nathan Wade. Defense teams argued that Willis benefited financially from the relationship because Wade paid for several vacations.
Judge Scott McAfee ruled that there was not enough evidence to show financial gain, but said the case could continue only if Wade stepped down. He resigned soon after. Even so, the Georgia Court of Appeals paused the case in June 2024 to review claims of misconduct.
In December 2024, the appeals court officially removed Willis from the case. The Georgia Supreme Court later refused to hear Willis’s appeal, ending her role in the prosecution.
The future of the case is uncertain. Skandalakis said he needs more time to review the documents before deciding whether to move forward. For now, the prosecution continues, but the timeline remains unclear.
