In an interview with NBC News, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis says she will not rule out subpoenaing former President Donald J. Trump over his phone call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in December 2020 asking for 11,780 votes. When asked if Trump will be compelled to testify, Willis said, “anything’s possible.”
“We’ll just have to see where the investigation leads us,” Willis said. “I think that people thought that we came into this as some kind of game. This is not a game at all. What I am doing is very serious. It’s very important work. And we’re going to do our due diligence and making sure that we look at all aspects of the case.”
The news comes one day after Willis named U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, among seven members of Trump’s inner circle in subpoenas which claim, “a multi-state, coordinated plan by the Trump Campaign to influence the results of the November 2020 election in Georgia and elsewhere.”
Graham says he’ll fight the petition. Additionally, Graham’s attorneys, Bart Daniel and Matt Austin, described Willis’s petitions as a politically motivated probe.
“This is all politics. Fulton County is engaged in a fishing expedition and working in concert with the January 6 Committee in Washington,” Daniel and Austin wrote. “As Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Graham was well within his rights to discuss with state officials the processes and procedures around administering elections.”
“Should it stand, the subpoena issued today would erode the constitutional balance of power and the ability of a Member of Congress to do their job,” they went on. They also said they had been informed by Fulton County investigators that Graham “is neither a subject nor target of the investigation.”
However, Willis says if the investigation has not been completed prior to this November’s midterm elections, she will pause out of respect and deference. But, Willis bristled at Graham’s claims that the grand jury is seeking a smear campaign.
“What do I have to gain from these politics?” Willis said. “It’s someone that doesn’t understand the seriousness of what we’re doing.”