Fani Willis made a big mistake. Willis is the Fulton Country, Georgia District Attorney prosecuting the sprawling RICO election-interference case against former president Donald Trump and 14 remaining co-defendants.

One of those co-defendants is career Republican activist Mike Roman. He was a Trump campaign staffer in both 2016 and 2020 and served in the White House as Trump’s “Director of Special Projects and Research” until 2018.

Mike Roman Alleges Improper Relationship

On Monday, January 8, Roman filed a motion alleging a conflict of interest because of “an improper, clandestine personal relationship” between DA Willis and the special prosecutor she hired to run the case. That special prosecutor, Nathan Wade, has thus far billed hundreds of thousands of dollars in the bombshell case.

… moves this Honorable Court for an order striking the special purpose grand jury report and dismissing the criminal indictment in its entirety against Mr. Roman on the grounds that the entire prosecution is invalid and unconstitutional because the Fulton County district attorney never had legal authority to appoint the special prosecutor, who assisted in obtaining both grand jury indictments.

… (Willis and Wade) have been engaged in an improper, clandestine personal relationship during the pendency of this case, which has resulted in the special prosecutor, and, in turn, the district attorney, profiting significantly from this prosecution at the expense of the taxpayers.

Roman filing re: Fulton County, GA Indictment number 23SC188947 – January 8, 2024

Willis’ spokespeople have stated she will respond via court filings. Fulton Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee said in a hearing today he would wait prosecutors responded to the allegations in writing before setting a hearing. He added he’d expect such responses prior to a likely mid-February schedule opening.

MAGA Spin Machine ENGAGE!

Assuming this filing hasn’t been run up the food chain to Defendantus Prime prior to being filed is foolish. Trump ran with the opportunity to reduce the impact of his culpability in the election-interference conspiracy the next day outside a D.C. courtroom where another one of his felony indictments is being adjudicated.

The district attorney is totally compromised, the case has to be dropped.
She was out of her mind. It turns out that that case is totally compromised. In fact, they say she’s in far more criminal liability than any of the people she’s looking at.
You look at what happened where they pay a lawyer with absolutely no experience $700,000 who happens to be her lover or her boyfriend and then they go on vacations together very expensive vacations together.
The reason they paid him so much is because he was after ME because this way they could afford to pay him a lot more.
It turns out she profited temendously on that case. It’s illegal, what she did was illegal.

Donald Trump fires up the MAGA machine – Comments to reporters – January 9, 2024

Misinformation is the lifeblood of MAGAworld. Because of this, dismissing any allegation from someone reaping an advantage from it is a solid choice even if it is produced via a court filing. It’s important to note that, despite it’s 39 (127 with exhibits) page length, Roman’s filing is devoid of concrete evidence. That’s another common characteristic in MAGA world misinformation campaigns.

All the necessary talking points necessary for a concerted misinformation campaign on social media is contained in Trump’s words. There are nuggets of provable facts, and complete easily disproven lies. Enter a search on “X” or “Truth Social” for “Fani Willis lover” and see how many thousands of results there are today, less than three days later.

The Republican-led House Judiciary Committee, doing their part in assisting their leader, today (Fri. Jan. 7, 2024) launched a probe into the county attorney general.

Even with all the usual MAGA misinformation campaign markers, this allegation appears to have some basis in fact regardless of how it might legally affect the underlying case.

Willis And Wade Backstory

Nathan Wade graduated from John Marshall law school in 1998. He served as an assistant solicitor for Cobb County, GA in 1999 until he became Marietta, Georgia’s first black male judge in 2011. He served as judge for ten years until he went into private practice. The “absolutely no experience” remark about Wade from Trump is now repeated ad nauseum by the MAGA faithful online.

Is a decade as a judge what passes for “no experience” in MAGAworld?

Fani Willis Emory University law school in 1996. She spent 16 years as a prosecutor in the Fulton County district attorney’s office and went into private practice in 2018. A year later in 2019 she became the chief municipal judge for South Fulton, GA.

Willis and Wade Relationship

Wade, in his role as judge, was assigned to mentor Willis in her position as chief municipal judge.

Wade was hired by DA Willis to run the election-interference case. He spent eight months with the grand jury and continues to work on the case after indictments were brought. He has billed over $750,000 and his partner has billed about $150,000 making the case very lucrative for their law practice.

Willis and Wade Alleged Relationship

The personal relationship between Fani Willis and Nathan Wade may become more clear as answers to the Roman filing roll in. For now, all that’s available to the public is conjecture and salacious allegation. Even if all the allegations are true, the legality of impropriety will have to be litigated and that’s a big win for Trump and his indicted co-conspirators.

Wade’s Divorce Case

Wade has an ongoing divorce case and Roman’s lawyer Ashleigh Merchant examined documents of the case and copied pieces she felt relevant. She also alleges that case has since been sealed improperly. For now, she is not releasing any of those documents because of the sealing and nobody else can research what cards she may be holding.

The Washington Post reported Willis was issued a subpoena Monday by Wade’s wife. The affidavit of service shows the subpoena was left with Willis’s executive assistant just hours before the Roman filing appeared. 

While the filings in the divorce case are sealed by Court order (the legality of which is open to question), information obtained outside of court filings indicates that the district attorney and special prosecutor have traveled personally together to such places as Napa Valley, Florida and the Caribbean and the special prosecutor has purchased tickets for both of them to travel on both the Norweigan (sic) and Royal Carribean (sic) cruise lines. Traveling together to such places as Washington, D.C. or New York City might make sense for work purposes in light of other pending litigation, but what work purpose could only be served by travel to this traditional vacation destinations?

Roman filing re: Fulton County, GA Indictment number 23SC188947 – January 8, 2024

We should assume there is proof of such specific allegations, although it’s notable to this non-attorney that a timeframe is missing from the section where the specific travel is claimed.

Now What?

Now we wait for the response to the Roman filing from the prosecution side of the bench. The judge has telegraphed a hearing couldn’t be scheduled until mid-February.

It’s not a good look and has all the earmarks of an inappropriate relationship in prosecuting this case. It seems entirely predictable this would happen. Because of that, it should have been easily avoided. At best, Willis and Wade have handed an advantage to the co-defendants in the Georgia case.

The largest advantages go to Donald Trump. The former president has been employing his usual delay tactics in each of the four major cases he’s defending. Handing him more potential delays:

• Replacement of Willis as prosecutor.
• Replacement of Wade as special prosecutor.
• Adjudicate the allegations in the Roman filing.

Legal opinions on the end result of this matter are mixed but generally agree the case will not be thrown out.

For Trump, it doesn’t have to be if he ends up president again before the case is resolved. He would certainly find a way to have the case disappear even though it’s not in the federal purview.

Still, he shouldn’t even have that chance. Bad move, Ms. Willis.

Research and Supporting Information

• Michael Roman’s January 8, 2024 Filing – DocumentCloud
• Donald Trump fires up the MAGA machine – CSPAN – NV video clip
• How could Willis allegations affect the Georgia election interference case? – WABE