The Daily Fuckup

A Fulton County judge on March 13, 2024, knocked out six counts in the Georgia election-interference indictment, including three against Donald Trump, but left the broader racketeering case in place. The ruling did not wipe away the prosecution’s main theory. It did, however, remove specific counts that the court found were not detailed enough to stand as written.

The counts McAfee dismissed were not the RICO charge itself. They were separate allegations, including claims that certain defendants solicited public officials to violate their oaths. One of the Trump counts was tied to his Jan. 2, 2021 call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, in which Trump urged him to “find 11,780 votes.” Another concerned an alleged effort to pressure then-Georgia House Speaker David Ralston into calling a special session to appoint presidential electors. The judge said the challenged counts lacked enough detail about an essential element of the offenses.

The result leaves the case moving forward on the surviving indictment, including the racketeering count that sits at the center of Fulton County prosecutors’ case. Trump still faces 10 counts in the Georgia case, and the judge said prosecutors could try to seek a new indictment to revive the dismissed charges. For the defense, the order offers a procedural win and a fresh talking point. For prosecutors, it means the case still advances with its largest charge intact.

Politically, the ruling gives both sides something to spin and neither side a clean break. Trump can point to the dismissals as proof that parts of the case were defective. Prosecutors can point to the remaining counts, including the RICO charge, as evidence that the main case survived. What changed on March 13 was the size of the indictment, not the existence of the prosecution itself. The Georgia case remains active, and the central allegation — that Trump and allies joined a criminal enterprise to overturn the 2020 result in Georgia — is still pending.