Republican presidential candidate and former President Trump participates in a question and answer session at the National Association of Black Journalists convention in Chicago on July 31, 2024.
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one Arizona Grand Jury Prosecution of 18 allies of former president Donald Trump Criminal charges related to attempts to overturn his conviction 2020 election failure The state is also interested in prosecuting Trump, but the state attorney general’s office asked not to do so, according to a new court filing.
Attorney General Christine MeyersThe office disclosed the grand jury’s interest in charging Trump in a filing that disputed claims by many of the defendants that the office was “politically biased” in prosecuting them in the charges. fake voters case.
Trump was mentioned, though not named, in an indictment filed in April against his former lawyer Rudy Giuliani, his White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and other defendants in Maricopa County Superior Court. He is the “unindicted co-conspirator”. Trump is Republican presidential candidate.
“What matters is the facts, not the defendant’s statements,” Mace’s office wrote in a court filing Tuesday. The document was first reported as New York Times.
“The Attorney General’s Office has repeatedly told state grand juries that it has the authority to prosecute anyone at its discretion,” the office wrote.
“Despite the grand jury’s interest in doing so, the Attorney General’s Office has absolutely no political bias and is instead asking the grand jury to consider not indicting Donald Trump, Republican lawmakers and elected members of the Arizona Legislature,” they said in a filing signed a false document claiming to be “a joint resolution of the 54th Arizona Legislature to the 116th Congress” on December 14, 2020; as well as the Arizona Republican Party and other attorneys associated with the defendants;
The document said a prosecutor’s request not to prosecute Trump was based on a U.S. Department of Justice policy that prohibits federal prosecutors and state prosecutors from separately charging the same person with the same alleged conduct.
Trump was charged last year in federal court in Washington, D.C., with crimes related to his efforts to overturn his 2020 loss to the president Joe Biden. He was also charged last year in state court in Atlanta with trying to overturn Biden’s victory in Georgia that year.
“I think you should weigh this policy carefully,” the Arizona prosecutor told grand jurors, according to a transcript cited in the document filed Tuesday. “That’s why I didn’t recommend it in the draft indictment, even though you all There has been a clear interest in bringing charges against him.”
“I know this may be disappointing to some of you. I understand,” the prosecutor said, according to the transcript.
Prosecutors told grand jurors that considering indicting someone “even the president” is “a big deal,” according to the transcript.
CNBC has asked a Trump spokesperson to comment on the document.
On Monday, Mace’s office announced it was dropping felony charges in the case against Jenna Ellis, an attorney who worked closely with Giuliani in the nationwide effort to invalidate Biden’s victory after the 2020 election.
On Tuesday, Republican activists Lorraine PellegrinoOne of the defendants in the case, who claimed to be a valid representative of the Electoral College, the entity that elects the president of the United States, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of filing a false instrument.
