Dem
51
GOP
49
Late Friday, Donald Trump's lawyers filed a petition with the state Supreme Court of Georgia, asking the justices to quash the investigation being conducted by Fulton County DA Fani Willis. You can read the document for yourself at the link, if you wish, but it's basically an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink mishmash of arguments: Willis abused her powers, public statements by members of the grand jury have hopelessly tainted the case, this is a violation of the Constitution, this case is only being brought because Willis is biased against Trump, yada, yada, yada.
It could be a coincidence that the document was posted to the court's website after midnight on Friday (in other words, early Saturday morning), but thanks to Richard Nixon, we are always suspicious of this sort of timing. And it's entirely possible that Trump's attorneys were trying to sneak the document under the radar, so as to minimize the amount of commentary from anyone and everyone who knows anything at all about the law. Because the complaint—if our opinion is not already clear—is dumb. We would think the correct strategy would be to focus on your best angle (or your two best angles), and really hammer that. Because when you toss everything in there, it's the equivalent of saying "OK, we don't really have an argument. We're just grasping at straws."
It would seem the Georgia Supreme Court feels the same way. Certainly, the justices are not buying what Trump is selling (which means that Friday's petition has something in common with Trump Steaks, Trump Vodka, Trump Ice, Trump: The Game, etc.). On Monday afternoon, the nine justices, all but one of them Republican appointees, issued a unanimous order rejecting the petition. That means that, if we consider things in terms of time when the Court was actually open for business, Trump's arguments didn't even stand up for 4 hours.
Needless to say, Trump has made a career of exploring every possible legal avenue, whether the case is civil or criminal. That said, the filing suggests pretty clearly that: (1) He and his team are nervous about a Willis indictment; (2) He and his team suspect that indictment is coming soon, and (3) He does not have much of a defense to the charges that everyone thinks are coming. (Z)