Fulton County taxpayers may have to pay President Donald Trump and his co-defendants in the recently killed 2020 election interference case millions of dollars in legal fees.
Under a state law signed by Gov. Brian Kemp earlier this year, defendants in dismissed cases in which the prosecutor was disqualified because of improper conduct may be reimbursed for “all reasonable attorney’s fees and costs incurred by the defendant in defending the case.”
The law was drafted by allies of the president in the Georgia Legislature with the Fulton racketeering probe in mind.
Credit: Arvin Temkar/AJC
Credit: Arvin Temkar/AJC
The money would be paid by the office of Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, who brought the prosecution.
Her office is mostly funded by the county, though it also receives some money from the state and the federal government.
According to the text of the law, the case’s defendants will each have 45 days after a case is dismissed to file motions detailing “reasonable attorney’s fees and costs” that Fulton should pay.
It will ultimately be up to Fulton Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee, who dismissed the case Wednesday, to determine what is considered “reasonable” to be reimbursed.
Little precedent
Although it’s common for legal fees to be covered by the losing side in civil cases, there’s little precedent in Georgia criminal cases.
Just how much defendants have spent on legal fees is not yet clear, though it is likely well above $10 million.
Racketeering cases are expensive to defend, according to legal experts, and some defendants have retained attorneys since 2021. Most of those attorneys likely didn’t bill hourly, so accounting for their work over the course of several years could prove to be difficult.
Willis and her office were removed from the case after a panel of Appeals Court judges determined her romantic relationship with a onetime deputy constituted an appearance of a conflict of interest.
It was not clear Wednesday afternoon whether Fulton County planned to fight the law. Fulton County spokesperson Jessica Corbitt-Dominguez said the county was aware of the ruling but could not comment on pending legal matters.
Former state Sen. Brandon Beach, R-Alpharetta, who sponsored the law shortly before Trump tapped him to be his administration’s treasurer, said in an interview Wednesday that Willis “deserves to have to pay up on this.”
“I’m happy that these people have an avenue” to recoup their legal fees, Beach said of the case defendants. “When you get indicted it costs a lot of money. And not only that, you ruin these people’s reputations. It was sad that this happened to good people that were just asking questions.”
Beach, who testified before the special grand jury that aided Willis’ investigation, said he hoped the law would act as a deterrent for prosecutors bringing politicized cases in the future.
“We don’t need political witch hunts,” he said. “We have criminals on the street that we need to take care of.”
Trump’s legal fees
Trump alone has spent upward of $5.5 million on Georgia-based attorneys who have worked on the case, according to campaign finance filings from his political action committees. That total does not include legal fees he might have paid using his private funds.
Trump’s Save America PAC paid Steve Sadow, the president’s lead Georgia attorney, more than $1.5 million since he was hired in August 2023, according to federal records.
Sadow replaced Drew Findling, whom Trump’s PAC paid nearly $1.5 million.
But the Georgia-based attorney whom Trump’s PACs have paid the most is Jennifer Little. A former DeKalb County prosecutor, Little has consulted for the Republican since 2021 and reportedly advised him as the federal government was scrutinizing Trump’s retention of classified documents after he left office.
Credit: Michael Blackshire
Credit: Michael Blackshire
Trump’s Make America Great Again PAC paid Little more than $2.2 million in legal consulting fees between March 2021 and August 2024, according to federal filings.
Three other Georgia attorneys who have worked on the election interference case for Trump were paid $326,000.
Sadow said Wednesday that “we will be seeking legal fees from the inception of the investigation until today’s dismissal!”
The development comes as Trump continues to demand that the U.S. Department of Justice pay him $230 million in compensation for the two federal investigations into him that were conducted between his two terms in office.
GOP electors and other defendants
The state Republican Party could also see its coffers replenished under the new law.
The party has spent approximately $2.3 million defending three GOP leaders who were indicted for their roles casting Electoral College votes for Trump in December 2020, according to party Chairman Josh McKoon.
Multiple law firms have been involved in defending former party Chairman David Shafer, state Sen. Shawn Still, and Cathy Latham, the former chairwoman of the Coffee County Republican Party.
McKoon said that although the party covered all of Latham’s legal bills, Shafer and Still also paid for some of their attorneys’ fees out of pocket.
Former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, meanwhile, hired several well-known Washington attorneys for his legal team, including former U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement, and George Terwilliger III, who served as the No. 2 official at the Justice Department during the George H.W. Bush administration. Their legal representation likely doesn’t come cheap.
Others took to crowdfunding to help cover their legal bills.
Former Black Voices for Trump head Harrison Floyd raised nearly $363,000 on the Christian-based fundraising site GiveSendGo.
Co-defendants John Eastman and Jeff Clark, who faced legal actions in multiple states, raised $937,000 and nearly $153,000, respectively, on the platform.
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Another financial headache
The reimbursements would come at a difficult time for Fulton County, which is already considering a hike in property taxes to make mandated improvements at its troubled jail.
A federal oversight report found jail conditions there were “abhorrent, unconstitutional” and violated the Eighth and Fourteenth amendments to the U.S. Constitution.
It is unclear what the final cost will be to bring the jail into federal compliance, but the county manager has proposed a property tax increase starting next year to help fund the improvements. The 0.39-mill hike would raise $32 million in 2026.
-AJC senior editor Dan Klepal and reporter Matt Reynolds contributed to this report.
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