The two highest-ranking officials in Georgia’s state legislature said that calls to defund or impeach District Attorney Fani Willis are impossible to accomplish and simply “theatrics.”
As reported, in an email sent to the Republican caucus Wednesday afternoon, House Speaker Jon Burns “decried the attempts by a handful of state lawmakers” to call for a special session. The alleged purpose of the special session was “to strip away funding or power from Willis’ office as she investigates former President Donald Trump and 18 others over an alleged attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election.”
Burns’ statement is curious, in that Willis is no longer “investigating” Trump and 18 others. Willis is prosecuting them. Burns elaborated: “Unfortunately, we continue to have a few members of the General Assembly making misleading or false claims about the General Assembly’s lawful powers regarding an ongoing case before our Judiciary.” Burns philosophized: “It is an unfortunate reality of today’s politics that theatrics sometimes garner more attention than genuine human needs like those that will unfold today in south and coastal Georgia.”
Burns sought to provide a practical veneer to the reasoning supporting his statement. Burns added that defunding or impeaching Willis would also “obviously be harmful to the public safety” as it would cause delays in the prosecutions of rape, murder, and other charges.
Additionally, affirming aspects of Burns’ reasoning, “State Senate Majority Leader Steve Gooch told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that there’s no realistic pathway right now for the legislature to even call in a special session and that some lawmakers are now receiving threats from pro-Trump supporters for not being on board with the idea.”
Gooch provided more detailed information regarding the assessment of defunding Willis. “We simply do not have those votes” for a special session. Gooch added that Democrat support would be required, and that such support would not be forthcoming. Gooch noted that “there would never be enough votes in the state Senate to impeach her.”
As reported, the pushback from Gooch and Burns is the result of state Senator Colton Moore warning of a “violent uprising akin to civil war by Trump’s supporters if the prosecution continues.”
Moore spoke with aggressive language. “We need to be taking action right now, because if we don’t, our constituencies are gonna be fighting it in the streets. Do you want a civil war? I don’t want a civil war. I don’t want to have to draw my rifle. I want to make this problem go away with my legislative means of doing so.”
Reporting discloses that on the federal side, House Rep. Jim Jordan, Rep. Andy Biggs, and a smattering of other GOP representatives “are also allegedly looking into ways they can try and halt any of the four major ongoing cases against Trump in Georgia, Florida, Washington, DC, or New York.”
