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By Jack Queen

(Reuters) - A Georgia state law against racketeering could be a powerful tool in
prosecuting Donald Trump, but applying charges traditionally used to take down
organized crime risks miring the case in legal and logistical complications.



Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis on Monday charged the Republican
former president and 18 associates in a wide-ranging scheme to reverse his 2020
presidential election loss in Georgia to Democrat Joe Biden.



All are accused of running afoul of the state's Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt
Organizations, or RICO, law.

Originally designed to take down mafia bosses, RICO charges are now broadly used
to go after groups of loosely associated people bound only by their common
participation in a criminal enterprise. But casting such a wide net has
drawbacks.

“You can tell a great story in your indictment, and you might be able to prove
it. But you also might be making it more complicated,” said former federal
prosecutor Harry Sandick.

Echoing his criticism of the many other investigations he has faced, Trump
assailed the indictment as a political "witch hunt" and accused Willis, an
elected Democrat, of trying to sabotage his 2024 presidential comeback bid.

By contrast, U.S. Special Counsel Jack Smith this month charged only Trump in a
four-count indictment of conspiring to defraud the U.S. by preventing Congress
from certifying Biden's victory. The case cites six co-conspirators who are
unindicted and unnamed.

Smith has asked that a trial begin as soon as Jan. 2. Willis faces a longer
road.




She has said she aims for a trial in the next six months, but experienced
lawyers expect the case to almost certainly be delayed due to the sheer number
of defendants, each of whom is likely to raise a unique set of pre-trial issues.



“The problem with RICO is that it takes a lot longer because there are so many
more elements to it,” said Jerry Froelich, a Georgia criminal defense attorney
and former prosecutor. “I don’t know if you could even find a courtroom big
enough for 19 defendants.”

But the numbers may also work in prosecutors’ favor.

In RICO cases, defendants are often loosely associated, making it easier for
prosecutors to get them to "flip," or turn on one another.

“That’s why the net is spread so wide,” Froelich said. “There’s going to be a
lot of pressure on people to cut deals.”

RICO also enables prosecutors to charge defendants for so-called "overt acts"
that would not necessarily be criminal on their own but are part of a larger
conspiracy.



Willis’ 98-page indictment is thin on narrative detail, but it lists 161 overt
acts by the defendants that allegedly demonstrate how they “willfully joined a
conspiracy to change the outcome of the election in favor of Trump.”

Some of those acts - including Trump’s social media posts and meetings with
elected officials - are not inherently criminal.

“It’s going to be a challenge - though certainly not an insurmountable one - for
prosecutors to prove these individuals knew they were part of an enterprise that
had a common, illegitimate aim of overturning an election," said Boston College
law professor and former federal prosecutor Jeffrey Cohen.

Georgia’s RICO statute is more expansive than a federal law on which it is
modeled and does not require criminal enterprises to be long-running. Georgia
courts have upheld the law’s use in novel contexts that include Willis'
successful prosecution of teachers who falsified scores on standardized tests.

The unprecedented nature of the case could work in Trump's favor, allowing his
lawyers to argue it is inappropriate to charge a former U.S. president and his
allies like gang members.

But the risks of trial may be higher than in typical conspiracy cases.

"In a normal case, if you’re convicted and looking at five years, you might get
probation," Froelich said. "Here there’s a minimum of five years. And the judge
might say: 'You tried to overthrow the U.S. government. I’m not cutting you any
slack.'"

(Reporting by Jack Queen in New York; Editing by Noeleen Walder and Howard
Goller)




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Former President Trump’s refusal to sign the Republican National Committee’s
(RNC) loyalty pledge is putting the organization in a bind as next week’s GOP
primary debate approaches.

Trump said he wouldn’t sign the pledge last week and is expected to announce in
the coming days whether he will attend the event.

RNC chairwoman Ronna McDaniel must now navigate the thorny situation of
appeasing Trump — both a ratings draw and the clear front-runner in the primary
— while maintaining her control as head of the party. 

“It’s a distinct possibility that the Republican nominee for president could
simply decide to shun the RNC itself,” said Brian Seitchik, a Republican
strategist and Trump campaign alum. “When a candidate refuses to play by the
rules, it obviously weakens the RNC’s position.” 




Ronna McDaniel appears at an election night event in November 2022. (Tom
Williams/CQ Roll Call/ Getty Images)



However, McDaniel has given no indication that the RNC will make any exceptions
for the former president. 

“It’s the Beat Biden Pledge,” McDaniel told CNN’s Chris Wallace in an interview
last month. “And what we’re saying — and the debate committee has met for over
two years people from Alaska to Illinois to Tennessee — is if you’re going to
stand on the Republican National Committee debate stage you should be able to
support the nominee and beat Biden.” 

“Everybody has to sign the Beat Biden Pledge. Everybody,” she added, when asked
by Wallace if that applied to Trump as well. “It’s across the board. The rules
aren’t changing. We’ve been very vocal with them.” 

The pledge states that the candidate will support the eventual nominee of the
party’s primary and that the candidate will not participate in any debate the
RNC has not sanctioned. The pledge is a part of the criteria Republican
candidates must meet to qualify for the first presidential primary debate set
for Aug. 23.

This isn’t the first time Trump has gone against the RNC’s push for primary
candidates to rally around the eventual nominee in the name of party unity. In
August 2015, then-candidate Trump was the only candidate on stage at one of the
debates to not raise his hand to show that he would support the eventual nominee
in the 2016 primary. At the time, there were 17 Republicans competing for the
nomination. 




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Trump ended up signing a loyalty pledge in September 2015, but by March 2016
said that he was no longer sticking with the pledge. By then, he was one of only
three candidates running in the primary. 




“The only reason that there was a need to do a loyalty pledge was because of
Donald Trump,” said Alex Stroman, a Republican strategist and RNC alum. “I
thought it was unnecessary in 2016.”



“The pledge, whether signed or not, whether followed or not, has never meant
anything more than a piece of paper,” he continued. 

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) and then-Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R) both signed
the pledge when they ran in the 2016 GOP primary but did not end up supporting
Trump in the general election. 

The Hill Elections 2024 coverage

Seven years later, Trump’s grip on the Republican primary base is as tight as
ever.

Poll after poll shows Trump dominating the Republican primary field at the state
and national level. The latest Real Clear Politics average shows Trump leading
the candidates with 54.5 percent support, while Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis
distantly trails in second place with 14.8 percent support. The rest of the
field is polling at single digits or below. 



So far, DeSantis, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, businessman Vivek
Ramaswamy, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott have
signed the pledge. Former Vice President Mike Pence has said he will also sign
it. 

“These are individuals who still believe that the strength comes from the party,
organization comes from the party, victory comes from the party,” said Jennifer
Horn, former chairwoman of the New Hampshire Republican State Committee and
co-founder of the anti-Trump group the Lincoln Project. Horn specifically
referred to Haley, Scott and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who has
suggested he will eventually sign it.

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However, Republican strategists are quick to point out that there is a
disconnect between Trump’s hardcore base and the Republican Party
establishment. 

“It speaks to the complicated relationship between Trump voters and the
Republican Party,” Seitchik said. 



That dynamic has forced the party establishment to rely heavily on Trump when it
comes to turnout and fundraising. A number of Republican strategists voiced
concerns to The Hill amid Trump’s legal issues that the party could see a
turnout disaster if the former president is somehow removed at the top of the
ticket. 

“The RNC needs Trump a lot more than Trump needs the RNC,” Horn said. “Whether
they want him to be the head of the party or not, the party is following him,
not the RNC.”

“If they lose Trump, then they lose the support of the Trump voters and their
base for their Senate candidates, their House candidates, their state
candidates,” she added. 

Horn said that if Trump decides to debate without signing the pledge, the other
candidates should be given the same treatment. 

“If they’re going to let Trump on the stage and not insist that he take the
pledge and sign the paper, then no one else on that stage should have to do it
either,” she said. 



In an interview Sunday on ABC News’s “This Week,” Christie said he believes the
RNC would keep Trump off the debate stage if he did not sign the pledge. 

“I think that they are serious about wanting this pledge signed and I do think
they would keep Donald Trump off the stage if he chose not to sign the pledge,”
Christie said.

But like Trump, Christie has also been an outspoken critic of the loyalty
pledge, calling it “a bad idea.” Christie said Sunday that he has not yet signed
the pledge because he has not yet been presented with it. The former governor
suggested it was due to the RNC going through the process of verifying donors. 

Other Republicans say they do not see a scenario in which Trump’s hand is
somehow forced to sign the document. 

“If he decides he wants to do [the debate], it’s hard to see how he wouldn’t be
allowed to, pledge or no,” said Doug Heye, a Republican strategist and former
RNC communications director. 

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to The Hill.




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