ATLANTA — The Georgia Court of Appeals, the state's second-highest court, agreed to hear former President Donald Trump's appeal on the ruling that allowed Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis to remain on the 2020 election RICO case.
RELATED: Trump asks appeals court to review ruling allowing Fani Willis to remain on Georgia election case
The appeal effort centers on a March ruling by Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee, which resulted in former special prosecutor Nathan Wade's resignation from the election interference case after information came to light that he and Willis shared, for a time, a romantic relationship.
Mr. Trump's attorneys argue McAfee's ruling did not go far enough; in their view, it should have also disqualified Willis from the case and dismissed the charges against the former president.
On Wednesday, the appellate court granted their application to immediately appeal the lower court's ruling.
The decision by the Court of Appeals to consider the issue could effectively freeze the election interference case proceedings in Fulton County until the appellate court rules, which could be a lengthy process.
"It'll take months," predicted former Gwinnett County district attorney Danny Porter.
That delay, the former prosecutor said, will make it highly unlikely for a trial to take place before the November general election.
"Miracles do happen," said Porter. "But I wouldn't expect it."
Attorneys for the former president now have 10 days to formally file their appeal. Steve Sadow, Trump's lawyer in Georgia, posted about the development on X.
Judge McAfee, in his order on the original motion to disqualify Willis, determined the district attorney could stay on the case but on the condition that special prosecutor Nathan Wade would need to resign. The revelation of a romantic relationship between Willis and Wade was the focus of the disqualification matter, with attorneys for Trump and the other 2020 election RICO codefendants arguing it constituted an improper conflict.
McAfee did not go that far in his ruling but said it had created an “appearance of impropriety."
The allegations that Willis had improperly benefited from her romance with Wade upended the case for weeks.
Intimate details of Willis and Wade's personal lives were aired in court in mid-February, overshadowing serious allegations in one of four criminal cases against the Republican former president. Trump and 18 others were indicted in August, accused of participating in a wide-ranging scheme to illegally try to overturn his narrow 2020 presidential election loss to Democrat Joe Biden in Georgia.
Willis used Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations, or RICO, law, an expansive anti-racketeering statute, to charge Trump and the 18 others. Four people charged in the case have pleaded guilty after reaching deals with prosecutors. Trump and the others have pleaded not guilty.
Full Georgia Court of Appeals order
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