Former US President Donald Trump has now been charged in the state of Georgia with his attempts to overturn the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.
The 77-year-old Republican was on Monday indicted on 13 countsaccording to the indictment published late in the evening (local time) in Atlanta.
A basis of 98-page indictment is, among other things, a law to fight organized crime. It is already the fourth indictment against the ex-president – and the second charge, which revolves around the 2020 presidential election.
18 other suspects were also chargedincluding Trump’s former White House chief of staff, Mark Meadowsand Trump’s former attorney Rudy Giuliani.
Trump and the other defendants formed a “conspiracy to unlawfully alter the outcome of an election in Trump’s favour,” the indictment said. “The conspiracy had a common plan and purpose.”
Returning Officer should “find” 11,780 votes
Trump was only indicted by the federal judiciary in early August for his attempts to overturn the outcome of the election after his defeat by Democrat Joe Biden and thus stay in the White House.
The Fulton County Attorney’s Office, which includes much of Atlanta, is investigating the post-election actions of Trump and his allies in parallel with the federal judiciary, focusing on Georgia.
In a famous phone call on January 2, 2021 – about two months after the election – the president who had been voted out asked Georgia’s election officer Brad Raffensperger to “find” the 11,780 votes needed for a victory in the southern state.
In addition, the confirmation of Biden’s election victory should be prevented by false electoral votes in favor of Trump. Trump supporters also broke into an election office after the election and obtained sensitive data.
Georgia had played an important role in the 2020 presidential election. The state in the south-east of the USA is a so-called swing state, in which Democrats and Republicans often have very close races.
Biden’s narrow win in Georgia, along with victories in other swing states like Arizona and Pennsylvania, was crucial to the outcome of the entire election.
However, Trump did not acknowledge his defeat and raised allegations of massive election fraud – unsubstantiated allegations that were rejected by numerous judges and authorities and refuted by independent fact-checkers.
The right-wing populist’s actions in the fight against the outcome of the election culminated in the attack by radical Trump supporters on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, when Biden’s election victory was to be finally certified. (AFP)
