On Thursday, lawyer Sidney Powell pleaded guilty to reduced charges, thereby acknowledging she participated in the alleged “efforts to overturn Donald Trump’s loss in the 2020 election in Georgia.” Powell is the second defendant to reach a deal with prosecutors in what has been described as a “sprawling case.”
Powell is among those charged alongside Trump and 17 others with violating the state’s anti-racketeering law. Powell reached a plea deal and entered the plea “just a day before jury selection was set to start in her trial.” As reported, Powell pleaded guilty to “six misdemeanor charges” which alleged that she “conspired to intentionally interfere with the performance of election duties.”
News reporting discloses the terms of the plea bargain to be imposed on Powell. Powell “will serve six years of probation, will be fined $6,000 and will have to write an apology letter to Georgia and its residents.” Reporting further discloses that Powell made a recorded statement for prosecutors, presumably admitting the details of her alleged criminal conduct, and that she also agreed to “testify truthfully against her co-defendants at future trials.”
A brief summary of the proceeding against Powell informs that she was initially charged with “racketeering and six other counts as part of a wide-ranging scheme to keep the Republican president in power after he lost the 2020 election to Democrat Joe Biden.” The allegation is also made against Powell by the prosecutors that “she also participated in an unauthorized breach of elections equipment in a rural Georgia county elections office.”
Some news coverage asserts that Powell is “the most prominent known person to be working with prosecutors investigating Trump’s efforts to overturn the election.” News reporting opines that Powell’s “cooperation in the case and participation in strategy talks threaten to expose the former president and offer insight on what he was saying and doing in the critical period after the election.”
Some reporting asserts that Powell’s plea of guilty is a stunning reversal of her advocacy of what has been described as “baseless conspiracy theories about a stolen election in the face of extensive evidence to the contrary.” Also alleged is that Powell has “important knowledge about high-profile events, including a news conference she participated in on behalf of Trump and his campaign shortly after the election and on a White House meeting she attended in mid-December of 2020 in which prosecutors say ways (sic) to influence the outcome of the election were discussed.”
State prosecutor Young asked Powell: “How do you plead to the six counts of conspiracy to commit intentional interference with performance of election duties?” With a response described as “solemn and succinct,” Powell said “guilty.”