Donald Trump news today: Georgia DA says Trump 2020 election probe is ‘ready to go’ in hint at looming indictment

Former Georgia lieutenant governor Geoff Duncan likened picking Donald Trump to be the 2024 GOP nominee to “peeing in your pants” during an appearance on CNN over the weekend.

The former Republican official attacked the ex-president, who is facing the possibility of more criminal charges at the hands of a prosecutor in the state, over his electability in a contest against Joe Biden.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has said that the investigation into Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia is “ready to go” – in a hint suggesting a potential indictment could be imminent.

“The work is accomplished,” she told WXIA over the weekend. “We’ve been working for two and half years. We’re ready to go.”

DA Willis said that there will be people unhappy with the outcome of the probe and praised the actions of local officials who ramped up security around the courthouse in Georgia last week.

“I think that the sheriff is doing something smart in making sure that the courthouse stays safe,” she said.

“I’m not willing to put any of the employees or the constituents that come to the courthouse in harm’s way.”

The DA previously indicated that any charging decisions would likely come in August.

Andrew Feinberg dives deep into the professional background of the newest Trumpworld bogeyman for The Independent:

At 24, Alberto Rodriguez has grandparents younger than Joe Biden. But he’s more interested in the 80-year-old president’s accomplishments than his age.

“People as young as me, we’re all focusing on our day-to-day lives and he has done things to help us through that,” Rodriguez, a cook at Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino in Las Vegas, said of Biden’s support among young voters. Rodriguez pointed specifically to federal COVID-19 relief payments and government spending increases on infrastructure and other social programs.

Voters like him were a key piece of Biden’s winning 2020 coalition, which included majorities of young people as well as college graduates, women, urban and suburban voters and Black Americans. Maintaining their support will be critical in closely contested states such as Nevada, where even small declines could prove consequential to Biden’s reelection bid.

His 2024 campaign plans to emphasize messages that could especially resonate with young people in the coming weeks as the anniversary of the sweeping Inflation Reduction Act approaches in mid-August. That legislation includes provisions that the White House will embrace to argue that Biden has done more than any other president to combat climate change.

Such efforts, however, could collide with Biden’s personal reality — like when he recalled that, while attending a St. Patrick’s Day parade at age 14, he appeared in a photo with President Harry S. Truman.

Former president Donald Trump floated his potential defence for the charges he may face for promoting lies about the election during a rally over the weekend in Erie, Pennsylvania.

The already-twice-impeached and twice-indicted former president now faces a potential third indictment for spreading lies about the 2020 presidential election and the attack on the Capitol that was fuelled by them.

But speaking to the crowd in Pennsylvania, a state where he lost 43 lawsuits as he tried to dispute the 2020 presidential election results, Mr Trump pushed back on the potential accusations.

“Why didn’t the corrupt Marxist prosecutors bring these radical and unjustified charges against me two and a half years ago,” Mr Trump asked the crowd. “They had two and a half years. Two and a half years. Nobody even knew they were looking at it. I don’t think they were.”

Donald Trump tore into GOP governor and frequent cable news guest Chris Sununu on Monday, attacking the centrist politician in an early-afternoon Truth Social rant.

“RINO Chris Sununu recently stated that, “I’m not running for president in 2024. Beating Trump is more important.” No, he’s not running for President because he’s polling at Zero, and has no chance of winning. The people of New Hampshire have gotten wise to Chris Sununu, and they no longer like or respect him. I never liked him, but always did whatever he asked for the State, because I wanted to help New Hampshire, and I did!” Mr Trump wrote.

Donald Trump’s team is reportedly creating a legal defence fund that will assist in paying for his allies’ legal fees as the number of investigations and indictments against the ex-president increases.

The fund, supposedly set to be led by longtime Trump advisor Michael Glassner, is thought to be called the Patriort Legal Defense Fund Inc, two people familiar with the matter told The New York Times and CNN.

Since leaving office, Mr Trump has been subject to several investigations and is currently facing two indictments, one at the federal level and one in New York City.

Since January, Mr Trump’s political action committee (PAC), Save America, has reportedly spent more than $40m on legal fees for him and his former staffers or allies who have served as witnesses or provided testimony.

It is unclear what, or who, the new fund will cover, though one witness told The New York Times it will not cover Mr Trump’s own legal bills.

Only four out of dozens of former Trump cabinet members say he should be re-elected in 2024.

NBC News contacted 44 of those who served in then-President Donald Trump’s cabinet between 2017 and 2021. While many declined to comment or didn’t answer, only four have publicly endorsed Mr Trump for the office he once held.

Several of them have been trying to remain as neutral as possible as the Republican primary plays out. There are those who oppose Mr Trump’s return to the presidency. Former Attorney General Bill Barr told NBC, “I have made clear that I strongly oppose Trump for the nomination and will not endorse Trump”.

Mr Barr was asked how he would cast his vote if the 2024 general election ended up being a rematch between Mr Trump and President Joe Biden.

“I’ll jump off that bridge when I get to it,” he said.

The Mar-a-Lago IT supervisor identified as “Trump Employee 4” in the latest indictment against former president Donald Trump and his alleged co-conspirators was reportedly informed that he’s a target of the ongoing Justice Department probe into alleged mishandling of classified records by the ex-president.

According to CNN, the employee in question is named Yuscil Taveras. The outlet said Mr Taveras, who is not charged with any crime at this point, subsequently met with Special Counsel Jack Smith’s team of prosecutors and gave evidence that was used to obtain the superseding indictment against Mr Trump, co-defendant Walt Nauta and a newly-added third co-defendant: Mar-a-Lago maintenance supervisor Carlos De Oliveira.

Donald Trump returned to the roots of his first impeachment when he suggested that aid to Ukraine should be conditioned on congressional investigations of President Joe Biden.

The Saturday night tirade at a rally in Erie, Pennsylvania echoed the conduct that led to Mr Trump’s first of his two impeachments when he used military aid to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to open an investigation into then-candidate Biden in 2019.

“Congress should refuse to authorize a single additional shipment of our depleted weapons stockpiles … to Ukraine until the FBI, DOJ and IRS hand over every scrap of evidence they have on the Biden Crime Family’s corrupt business dealings,” Mr Trump said on Saturday.

He argued that all Republicans who don’t join the efforts should be challenged in their primaries – Mr Trump endorsed challengers in the 2022 midterms of the Republicans who voted for his impeachment after the January 6, 2021 insurrection.