At this point, it doesn't really matter if the Fulton County district. Lawyer. Fani Willis benefited financially from her relationship with Nathan Wade, the outside prosecutor she hired to help oversee the election interference racketeering case against former President Trump and 18 others, several of whom have already pleaded guilty.
After watching her testify for nearly two hours on Thursday, I think she made a compelling case that she didn't. If anything, she spent more money on him than he spent on her.
But by entering into a romantic relationship with Wade (and believing she had no obligation to reveal it), she handed her opponents, on a golden platter, an opportunity to challenge her integrity, an excuse to accuse her of a conflict of interest. a clandestine way of hindering the strong criminal case against Trump and his supporters that took many months and years to build under him.
It's amazing. And so, so disappointing. Two mature adults (court officials, seasoned attorneys) couldn't find a way to put their romantic inclinations on hold while working on the biggest case of their careers, and one of the biggest criminal cases in American history? They should have known that any hint of irregularity would be exploited to ruin the case. You can't travel together to places like Belize and Aruba and expect to keep it a secret. Good sir.
It's impossible to predict whether Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee will rule that Willis should be disqualified from the case, which would throw him into disarray and potentially kill him, but he did absolutely the right thing by allowing both sides to air the issue. on television, in real time.
The drama in her living room was as fascinating as any daytime soap opera.
Willis' lawyers were arguing that there was no compelling need for her to testify when she surprised everyone by entering the courtroom looking for her close-up. She was wearing a hot pink dress and, it would soon become clear, she had a temperament to match.
“I've been really looking forward to having this conversation today,” she said. “I ran to the courtroom. …I am not a hostile witness. “I really want to be here.”
His testimony was captivating, if maddening. Oh, and she was quite hostile, although not in the legal sense. When she wasn't being combative, she was folksy, personal, and even philosophical. We learn that she prefers Gray Goose vodka to wine, had a “great time” on Wade's 50th birthday trip to Belize, and once visited Tennessee with him, although “it's kind of hard to call Tennessee a vacation.” Willis refused to give yes or no answers to simple questions, prompting at least two warnings from the judge. He insisted that his answers had to be long and in context because she was rejecting many lies.
He accused defense attorney Ashleigh Merchant, who represents one of the defendants in the election interference case and was the first to raise the conflict of interest issue, of repeatedly lying about when her relationship with Wade began, of wrongly accusing the couple to live together. and receive free trips.
Merchant has alleged that Willis hired Wade to help prosecute Trump because prosecutors were romantically involved, and has accused Willis of benefiting financially because Wade paid for several vacations while they were lovers.
But both Wade and Willis testified that their romance began in early 2022, long after he was hired, and ended in the summer of 2023, just as Trump was impeached in Georgia.
To be more exact about when they broke up, Willis offered a lesson in gender differences worthy of the relationship classic “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus.”
“He is a man; “He would probably say June or July,” he said. “I would say we had a difficult conversation in August. Men end relationships at the end of physical intimacy; “Women end relationships when that difficult conversation takes place.”
What exactly was that difficult conversation about? No one asked, but Willis had every reason to explain it. They ended their relationship, she said, because she was too independent for him.
“We would have brutal arguments about the fact that I'm his equal,” he said. “I don't need anything from a man; A man is not a plan, a man is a partner. There was always tension in our relationship, which is why I would pay him back. “I don’t need anyone to pay my bills.”
Sounds like someone is looking for a free trip to Aruba?
Once, he testified, Wade told him, “The only thing a woman can do for him is make him a sandwich.” Yuck.
Willis has no receipts showing he paid Wade, he said, because he always has a lot of cash on hand, sometimes up to $15,000. His father taught him that, he said. For example, if you go on a date, bring $200 cash in case things go wrong.
In court Friday, her father, John Floyd III, backed her up. “Your Honor,” she said, “I'm not trying to be racist, okay? But it's a black thing, okay? I was trained and most black people hide cash or keep it.”
I remember an exchange between Willis and Trump's lawyer, Steve Sadow. He illuminated a kind of racial or class divide. Sadow seemed steeped in privilege as he toyed with the idea that she might have a lot of cash on hand.
Floyd testified that he taught his daughter to always have enough cash at home to cover six months of expenses. And so, Willis said, he took $4,000 with her on Wade's birthday trip to Belize in March 2023. Of that, he reimbursed her $2,500 for her hotel, flights and food.
“Is that $4,000 part of your, in my words, hoard of cash that you have accumulated over time?” Sadow asked.
“Money that?” Willis said.
“Hoarding,” he said, but then spelled it “horde.”
“Oh, I thought you said something different, sir.”
His well-deserved resentment at the time can't hide the fact that he screwed up here, or that the entire country could end up paying for his unforgivable mistake.
