Willis disqualification only the latest win for Trump against Democratic lawfare

A Georgia appeals court decision to disqualify the anti-Donald Trump Fulton County district attorney from prosecuting an election interference case against the once and future president marks only the latest victory for Trump in a hard-fought battle against lawfare since the 2020 election. 

Early on in the Republican primary, Trump had to grapple with five cases brought by state and federal prosecutors against the former president. 

Now, with Trump still standing as the president-elect for the second time, the state-level cases appear to be embroiled in death throes and delays while the Justice Department’s special prosecutor moved last month to dismiss the two pending federal cases. 

Here are Trump’s major wins against Democratic lawfare:

• DOJ special counsel Jack Smith moved to dismiss both an election interference case in Washington, D.C., and a classified documents case against Trump over the Thanksgiving holiday, hamstrung by Trump’s pending return to office and a Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity. 
• Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’s election interference case against Trump suffered delays as she battled accusations of financial mismanagement and an improper relationship with her chief prosecutor. Now, the Georgia Court of Appeals ruled that she should have been disqualified from prosecuting the case. 
• While New York Attorney General Letitia James vowed not to drop the judgment in Trump’s civil fraud case after he won the election, a New York appeals court has expressed skepticism about the size of the judgment and merits of the case. After Judge Arthur Engoron found Trump liable for civil fraud in 2023, he imposed a $450 million civil judgment, which Trump’s legal team challenged.
• Though Trump’s efforts to have an appeals court dismiss the falsified business records charges of which he was convicted in May have been unsuccessful, sentencing has been indefinitely delayed. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg recently proposed delaying sentencing until after Trump leaves office in January 2029.