I spoke with colleagues Andrew McCarthy and Thaddeus McCutter about the Fulton County indictment

of former President Trump. The weaknesses of the case are many, but there are strengths,

and Andy explocates that the advantage to the prosecutor is that it's in Fulton County,

it's in Georgia, and there is a presumption, at least at first, that there is something

unethical about the conduct of the former president and his colleagues. That is not

determinative, but I learned from Andy that there are advantages on the home court. Here's Andy.

Yes, John. The one thing I should have been clear on when we were talking about removing

the case to federal court, all that would happen if that were to happen would be that the case

would be tried in federal court under federal procedural law. It would still be a case that was

brought by the Fulton County District Attorney, and it would still apply substantive state law.

So you would have the law of Georgia, but it would just be the case. The venue, the jurisdiction

would be the federal court. So she would retain those advantages, even if the case was removed.

And when I say that she has advantages, what I mean is in comparison to Jack Smith,

who also brought an election into fear in case, because the federal government is not in charge

with conducting and policing elections, which are generally a state law thing, Smith has had to

stretch federal law concepts that aren't meant to be applied to elections, like obstruction,

and the civil rights statute, and the fraud charges in particular. Fannie Willis, on the other hand,

because she's a state prosecutor, the state does have election integrity laws, and she's got the

advantage of using them. So for example, I think the strongest count in the counts in the indictment,

which by the way, Trump is not named in are the ones that are related to this idea of hacking

into the state database for elections and for voters. That's a very serious offense. There's

no real federal analog to it, and it's probably the strongest set of counts in her indictment.

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