House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi, pleaded guilty Tuesday to DUI causing injury in connection to a May car crash, prosecutors said.
Based on Paul Pelosi’s guilty plea, the second charge — driving with a .08% blood alcohol level or higher causing injury — was dismissed, the Napa County District Attorney’s Office said.
Among the requirements of Judge Joseph Solga’s sentence are: serving five days in jail; paying victim restitution and a court fine; completing a three-month DUI program; and completing three years of probation.
He received credit for four days served: two for the two days he served in jail following his arrest and two days’ time for good conduct. The fifth day of the sentence will be served on a court work program, so the 82-year-old will not serve any more time in jail.
Paul Pelosi was not present in court for Tuesday’s plea; his attorney appeared on his behalf.
The House Speaker’s husband had a 0.082% blood alcohol content when he was arrested on May 28 in Napa County, California, prosecutors said. He was trying to cross State Route 29 when his Porsche was hit by a driver heading north, the California Highway Patrol in Napa said at the time.
(WASHINGTON) — Former President Donald Trump allegedly had more than 700 pages of classified material in his possession, according to a May 10 letter from the National Archives to a lawyer representing Trump.
The purported text of the letter was posted by conservative journalist John Solomon on Monday evening
The 700 pages of classified material referenced were found in the 15 boxes that the Archives retrieved from Mar-a-Lago in January, according to the letter.
Trump had authorized Solomon as one of his liaisons to the National Archives to review documents from his presidency.
The posted version of the letter confirms ABC News’ previous reporting that documents with the highest levels of classification, including some labeled “Special Access Program” were found.
“As the Department of Justice’s National Security Division explained to you on April 29, 2022: There are important national security interests in the FBI and others in the Intelligence Community getting access to these materials. According to NARA, among the materials in the boxes are over 100 documents with classification markings, comprising more than 700 pages,” the letter reads.
“Some include the highest levels of classification, including Special Access Program (SAP) materials. Access to the materials is not only necessary for purposes of our ongoing criminal investigation, but the Executive Branch must also conduct an assessment of the potential damage resulting from the apparent manner in which these materials were stored and transported and take any necessary remedial steps.”
While Solomon framed this as President Joe Biden taking a more direct role than previously known in Justice Department’s investigation of classified materials at Mar-a-Lago, the letter actually shows how Biden deferred all decisions regarding executive privilege assertions entirely to top DOJ lawyers.
The Archives did not respond to ABC’s request for comment on the letters’ authenticity. A lawyer for Trump also did not respond. The White House did not immediately return ABC’s request for comment.
The letter provides insight into the back and forth between Trump’s team and the National Archives and shows that even though the original 15 boxes were retrieved from Mar-a-Lago in January, federal investigators did not ultimately gain access to them until months later because of negotiations with Trump’s lawyers.
The letter also reveals that DOJ and National Archives determined that there is no basis to assert privilege over the 15 boxes of records obtained.
The letter also makes clear that Trump’s representatives for the Archives must have the proper level of security clearance to review documents they request to review.
(NEW YORK) — Democrats are trying to keep control of a House remade by the once-a-decade redistricting process.
Tuesday will offer perhaps the most visible display of the impact that post-census redistricting has had — especially on their party and their chances of maintaining a mere five-seat majority.
Democrats initially saw New York state as an opportunity to wipe out GOP gains elsewhere in the country. But the courts said that they went too far, ruling their maps were unconstitutional and demanding the districts be redrawn.
As a result, the New York House races were pushed back two months, putting the primaries on the same date as Florida’s, where Gov. Ron DeSantis also inserted himself into his state’s redistricting process, proposing a congressional map that experts say was designed to elect as few Democrats to Congress as possible and guarantee a victory for Republicans. (Florida’s redistricting had legal drama of its own.)
The new map in New York forced perhaps the most highly anticipated matchup of the primary season. Veteran Reps. Jerry Nadler and Carolyn Maloney are going head-to-head for the chance to represent the new 12th Congressional District, with a young progressive challenger, attorney and former Obama staffer Suraj Patel, also in the mix.
Nadler and Maloney have largely similar voting records. Nadler has highlighted his work as Judiciary Committee chairman, leading the committee during Trump’s impeachments, while Maloney has chaired the Oversight Committee since 2019.
Maloney found herself in hot water earlier this month when she pooh-poohed President Joe Biden’s stated plan to run for reelection. Maloney eventually walked back the comment, tweeting that she would support Biden if he decides to run again.
“Biden’s leadership securing historic investments for healthcare, climate & economic justice prove once again why he is the strong and effective leader we need right now,” she wrote.
Meanwhile Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, the head of the Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee, upset progressives with his decision to run in the new 17th District, causing a chain reaction that has other incumbents imperiled, such as freshman Rep. Mondaire Jones, who is seeking reelection in the 10th District in what is expected to be a bitter proxy fight between moderate and progressives and has already drawn grievances from other Democratic members of Congress.
In Florida, DeSantis will find out which Democrat he will face on his road to possible reelection, which could then lead straight to a 2024 presidential run. Rep. Charlie Crist is seen as the favored candidate to challenge DeSantis for the office Crist himself once held as a Republican. But to make it to November, Crist must defeat progressive Agricultural Commissioner Nikki Fried, his biggest competitor.
In the Seventh Congressional District, Democratic Rep. Stephanie Murphy decided not to seek reelection — which would have been a challenge: A few months after Murphy’s announcement, the state legislature tilted her seat bright red, according to FiveThirtyEight. Even though several candidates are running in the GOP primary there, the race comes down to two candidates: Army combat veteran Cory Mills, endorsed by Sen. Ted Cruz, and state Rep. Anthony Sabatini.
And the Senate primary is setting up a battle between GOP incumbent Marco Rubio and Democratic Rep. Val Demings. Demings is expected to win her primary and go head-to-head with Rubio (unopposed in his primary) in the general election. Currently, FiveThirtyEight’s Senate Forecast has Rubio favored to win the seat, keeping it in Republican control.
(NEW YORK) — The Democratic primary battle between Reps. Carolyn Maloney and Jerrold Nadler in New York City is heading to a bitterly personal finish that’ll see one of the senior House members leave Congress.
Nadler, who chairs the judiciary committee, and Maloney, who helms the committee on oversight and reform, were drawn into the same seat, the 12th, in an unexpected twist in the redistricting process that now leaves New York voters deciding between two city titans with established power bases.
Attorney and former Obama staffer Suraj Patel, a 38-year-old progressive, is also running on a generational argument against the two septuagenarians.
Nadler has emerged as the front-runner of the trio in the lead-up to Tuesday’s primary, but Election Day will cap off a frustrating and nasty stretch of the race for city residents, observers say.
“The loser in this is New York. New York voters have been forced into this messy situation of being forced to make a choice that they never planned to and never intended. These are two members in good standing with the electorate,” said New York City-based Democratic strategist Jon Reinish. “If you’re a New York City voter, it really sucks to have to make this choice.”
Nadler and Maloney, both elected in 1992, have longstanding ties to different parts of Manhattan.
Nadler for years represented a district anchored in the Upper West Side and Maloney’s old seat covered the Upper East Side, two wealthy enclaves in New York City.
Patel hasn’t held public office but came within 4% of beating Maloney in a primary in 2020.
Nadler and Maloney have long been allies in the House and lamented the circumstances they were handed when a Democratic-drawn House map for New York, after the last census, was tossed in favor of one lumping their districts together. Yet once the race got underway, barbs started to fly.
Nadler has torn into Maloney’s long voting record on high-profile issues, including her past support for the Iraq War and Bush-era Patriot Act and opposition to the Iran nuclear deal during the Obama administration. Nadler also sought to characterize Maloney as a COVID-19 vaccine skeptic, a particularly sharp elbow to be thrown during the pandemic. (Her website states that she believes “vaccines are safe, effective, and absolutely essential for public health.”)
Maloney, meanwhile, has seemingly gone after Nadler’s age. While Nadler, 75, is one year Maloney’s junior, she appeared to pour jet fuel on chatter about his stamina, particularly after he sat at a primary debate while Maloney and Patel stood.
Earlier this month she expressed concerns about “if for some reason someone will not serve their term,” citing “tons of rumors out there.” She later reportedly said she thinks Nadler would finish another term.
Patel has argued that it’s time for a change in Congress while also hitting Nadler and Maloney for wishy-washy answers over whether President Joe Biden should run for reelection in 2024.
“This is not 1992 anymore,” Patel said in a press conference on Monday. “From abortion rights to gun control to climate change, we need energetic, new leaders, optimists with hope and ideas and energy, and we are incredibly proud of the way we have conducted this campaign.”
Early in the race, it was speculated that Nadler and Maloney would split the so-called establishment vote and that Patel could win on his fresh-faced message.
“My thought was that Patel could benefit from that being from a new and younger generation. However, maybe it has benefited Nadler and to an extent Maloney that Washington Democrats over the past couple of weeks have some wind at their backs, seem to have opened up their eyes, realized that they’re in the majority and have delivered. And maybe that has benefited these two institutionalists,” Reinish said, referring to recent major legislation congressional Democrats have sent to Biden’s desk.
Nadler has enjoyed a burst of momentum in the final stretch, winning the coveted endorsements of The New York Times‘ editorial board and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer — support that led Maloney to decry the influence of the “old boys’ network that sticks together.”
Regardless of the outcome Tuesday, New York City will be losing a senior member of Congress who’s built up a career’s worth of chits in the Capitol.
Democrats lament that as a self-inflicted loss after their heavily gerrymandered House map was challenged by Republicans and ultimately scrapped by a state court, handing the map-drawling process to an outside special master who did not take Democratic priorities into account.
“I think that they naively thought that there would never be a lawsuit that could effectively overturn their maps and render their process moot,” said Reinish, the strategist. “And I think that they did not plan at all well for that. And I think it was very easy for the Republicans to find a judge to do it. They did it very successfully.”
(NEW YORK) — Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy, the most senior and longest-serving member of the U.S. Senate, will retire at the end of this year.
His new memoir, The Road Taken, describes his political career that spans more than four decades, including his recounting of the post-Watergate period in politics, the aftermath of 9/11 and the presidency of Donald Trump.
He spoke with ABC News’ Linsey Davis about his early memories, the changes he has seen in the culture of politics and his love of “Batman” comics.
PRIME: Senator Leahy, we thank you so much for joining us, sir.
LEAHY: I’m delighted to be here.
PRIME: So let’s start back in your youth. Growing up in Vermont, your family lived so close to the state capitol that the story goes that your rode your tricycle through the statehouse halls and right into the governor’s office when you were just 6 years old. How did growing up so close to politics help ultimately inspire you to become a politician yourself?
LEAHY: Well, of course, it was a lot different. I mean, you walk into the statehouse, there’s no security back there. You could just walk out. We took it for granted. We kids would play there. We’d have a good time there. But then I started meeting everybody and started hearing about it. My father was a self-taught historian and he would talk about the history of the statehouse of Congress. And you kind of grew up feeling, well, we’re part of all this. And certainly that’s the way I felt.
PRIME: And looking back at the start of your career, when you began serving in the Senate at 34, how did entering that body at such a young age shape how you approached your work and priorities in the Senate?
LEAHY: Well, I do know that on my first day there, a very senior senator asked me how old I was, and I said 34. He said, ‘You ever think you’re too young to be in this place?’ I said, ‘Well, that’s what my opponent said, but I still got elected.’ I think he liked the fact that I actually stood up to him and we got along fine. But, you know, I was intrigued because when I was in law school, at Georgetown, I’d walk up the hill [and] just watch the Senate, watch the different people. And back then, you had a lot of debate, you had some of the best minds in both the Republican and the Democratic Party.
PRIME: And you’ve worked through several significant moments in our nation’s history, from post-Watergate to 9/11 and its aftermath, to the pandemic. Or now, of course, in another crucial moment after the Jan. 6 insurrection and its fallout. What concerns you most about where we are right now as a nation?
LEAHY: When I first came to the Senate, people with different political priorities respected the government, respected our laws, respected the fact that we have a future, which puts basic parameters on how you behave. What I worry about now is more and more people could care less about that interaction. And so people coming in, they came into the Senate chamber and demanded to know where the House members were and they didn’t even know where they were, they were misstating what the Constitution said… I never thought I’d see anything like this ever.
PRIME: And you said just a few moments ago that when you first joined, you had such a respect for your fellow senators, that they were some of the sharpest minds, that you looked forward to the debate and the discourse that was going to take place. Do you feel that we’ve lost something from that time?
LEAHY: I do. I feel one of the things we’ve lost is we don’t actually debate, people come in and make a statement that they’re hoping might get on the evening news. They don’t stay there and they actually don’t debate things. And are you going to have a partisan position one way or the other? That’s not the way it should be. I like to see senators actually come and debate, make sure everybody’s voices are heard, and then vote one way or the other.
PRIME: And lastly, sir, we can’t let you go without asking about one of your biggest passions, ‘Batman.’ You write about how you, quote, became a voracious consumer of ‘The Dark Knight’ comics. You said that you would take them home and read them under the covers, flashlight in hand, a reward for sweeping the floors of the printing shops. And you famously made cameos in five ‘Batman’ films. What’s drawn you so much to Batman? And what has it been like to be able to live out that childhood fantasy on the big screen?
LEAHY: I never thought I would. You know, I started reading. I had my first library card at 4 years old. I love reading ‘Batman.’ I love writing stories about it. And every single cent I’ve earned from the ‘Batman’ books I’ve written, the movies I’ve been in, go to the children’s library in Montpelier, Vermont. I had my first library card [there, and the library] at that time was in the basement of the adult library. Now it’s a whole separate wing. It’s for helping to encourage young people to read no matter what level they’re in.
PRIME: Thank you so much, Senator Leahy. Really appreciate your time and joining us. And to our viewers, you can purchase The Road Taken, A Memoir, wherever books are sold.
(WASHINGTON) –The U.S. government on Monday strongly discouraged former NBA player Dennis Rodman from traveling to Russia to help secure the release of detained WNBA star Brittney Griner — a trip that Rodman himself separately clarified isn’t in the works, reversing an earlier comment.
The back-and-forth stems from Rodman, a five-time NBA champion, initially announcing last weekend that he planned to travel to Russia according to comments he made to NBC News while dining at a restaurant in Washington, D.C.
“I got permission to go to Russia to help that girl,” Rodman told NBC News on Saturday. “I’m trying to go this week.”
Griner, who has been detained in Russia since Feb. 17, was found guilty on drug charges earlier this month and was sentenced to nine years in prison after vape cartridges containing hashish oil — an illegal substance in Russia — were discovered in her luggage at the airport.
A State Department spokesperson, Ned Price, told ABC News during a press briefing on Monday that if Rodman did travel to Russia, “He would not be traveling on behalf of the U.S. government.”
“We believe that anything other than negotiating further through the established channel is likely to complicate and hinder those release efforts,” Price added.
Amid the scrutiny over his comments, Rodman told ABC News on Monday that he doesn’t currently have plans to travel to Russia.
Rodman previously sought to make an impact on U.S. foreign policy as an informal diplomat of sorts amid heated U.S. relations with North Korea.
Rodman traveled to Singapore in June 2018 ahead of then-President Donald Trump’s historic summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, who is a big Chicago Bulls fan.
Although Rodman did not meet with the dictator, whom he said he considers a “friend,” he was one of a few westerners who had met with him in Pyongyang in the past.
Rodman doesn’t need permission from the U.S. to travel to Russia but requires a visa from Moscow to travel to the country.
However, the State Department is strongly discouraging American citizens from traveling to Russia amid the war in Ukraine, issuing a “Level 4-Do Not Travel” advisory that was most recently updated on Aug. 15.
“We’ve also provided very clear guidance to American citizens — owing to a number of threats, not the least of which is the threat of wrongful detention — that Americans should not travel to Russia,” Price said on Monday. “That has been our message to private Americans across the board.”
Price’s warning came after a senior Biden administration official discouraged Rodman from traveling to Russia in a statement provided to ABC News on Sunday, referencing the U.S. travel advisory.
At her trial, which began in July, Griner said she was guilty of drug charges and said that she didn’t intend to break Russian law, but that the cartridges were left in her bag by accident.
The U.S. classified Griner’s case as “wrongfully detained” in Russia on May and the Biden administration has been working to negotiate the WNBA star’s release, as well as the release of U.S. citizen Paul Whelan, who has been detained in Russia since 2019.
On July 29, Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters that he had a “frank and direct conversation” with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov about a U.S. proposal to exchange convicted arms dealer Viktor Bout in return for Griner and Whelan.
Earlier this month, Russian officials confirmed that those talks have taken place.
Asked about the status of the negotiations, Price said that U.S. interests are “best served if these discussions take place in private,” but stressed that this “something we continue to work with the utmost urgency.”
“I said last week that we had engaged in discussions with Russian counterparts on this. Those discussions are ongoing,” Price added. “We’ve made very clear, as we have publicly, that we proposed a substantial proposal, we called it, for the release of Paul Whelan and Brittney Griner.”
ABC News’ Katie Conway and Tanya Stukalova contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. government on Monday strongly discouraged former NBA player Dennis Rodman from traveling to Russia to help secure the release of detained WNBA star Brittney Griner.
Rodman, a five-time NBA champion, announced that he plans to travel to Russia in comments he made to NBC News while dining at a restaurant in Washington, D.C.
“I got permission to go to Russia to help that girl,” Rodman reportedly told NBC News. “I’m trying to go this week.”
Griner, who has been detained in Russia since Feb. 17, was found guilty on drug charges earlier this month and was sentenced to nine years in prison after vape cartridges containing hashish oil — an illegal substance in Russia — were discovered in her luggage at the airport.
A State Department spokesperson told ABC News during a press briefing on Monday that if Rodman does travel to Russia, “he would not be traveling on behalf of the U.S. government.”
“We believe that anything other than negotiating further through the established channel is likely to complicate and hinder those release efforts,” Price added.
ABC News has reached out to representatives of Rodman for comment.
Rodman has previously sought to make an impact on U.S. foreign policy as an informal diplomat of sorts amid heated U.S. relations with North Korea.
Rodman traveled to Singapore in June 2018 ahead of then-President Donald Trump’s historic summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, who is a big Chicago Bulls fan.
Although Rodman did not meet with the dictator, whom he said he considers a “friend,” he was one of a few westerners who had met with him in Pyongyang in the past.
Rodman doesn’t need permission from the U.S. to travel to Russia but requires a visa from Moscow to travel to the country.
However, the State Department is strongly discouraging American citizens from traveling to Russia amid the war in Ukraine, issuing a “Level 4-Do Not Travel” advisory that was most recently updated on Aug. 15.
“We’ve also provided very clear guidance to American citizens — owing to a number of threats, not the least of which is the threat of wrongful detention — that Americans should not travel to Russia,” Price said on Monday. “That has been our message to private Americans across the board.”
Price’s warning came after a senior Biden administration official discouraged Rodman from traveling to Russia in a statement provided to ABC News on Sunday, referencing the U.S. travel advisory.
At her trial, which began in July, Griner said she was guilty of drug charges and said that she didn’t intend to break Russian law, but that the cartridges were left in her bag by accident.
The U.S. classified Griner’s case as “wrongfully detained” in Russia on May and the Biden administration has been working to negotiate the WNBA star’s release, as well as the release of U.S. citizen Paul Whelan, who has been detained in Russia since 2019.
On July 29, Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters that he had a “frank and direct conversation” with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov about a U.S. proposal to exchange convicted arms dealer Viktor Bout in return for Griner and Whelan.
Earlier this month, Russian officials confirmed that those talks have taken place.
Asked about the status of the negotiations, Price said that U.S. interests are “best served if these discussions take place in private,” but stressed that this “something we continue to work with the utmost urgency.”
“I said last week that we had engaged in discussions with Russian counterparts on this. Those discussions are ongoing,” Price added. “We’ve made very clear, as we have publicly, that we proposed a substantial proposal, we called it, for the release of Paul Whelan and Brittney Griner.”
ABC News’ Tanya Stukalova contributed to this report.
(WEST PALM BEACH, Fla.) — Former President Donald Trump filed a motion in federal court in Florida on Monday seeking the appointment of a special master to review materials seized by the Justice Department from his Mar-a-Lago estate in a raid earlier this month.
The motion from Trump seeks an injunction that would bar the government from any further review of the seized materials until the appointment of a special master, and also requests a “more detailed” receipt from the government of items that were seized.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(WASHINGTON) — Dr. Anthony Fauci will step down from his roles of director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and chief medical adviser to President Joe Biden this December, he announced Monday.
“While I am moving on from my current positions, I am not retiring,” Fauci said in a statement. “After more than 50 years of government service, I plan to pursue the next phase of my career while I still have so much energy and passion for my field.”
Fauci, who turns 82 in December, has said for months that he plans to step away from his public role as a national leader on the pandemic once COVID-19 reaches a “steady state.”
Biden, commending Fauci’s work not just on the current pandemic, but for the six presidents before him, said in a statement Monday that Fauci’s “commitment to the work is unwavering, and he does it with an unparalleled spirit, energy, and scientific integrity.”
“As he leaves his position in the U.S. Government, I know the American people and the entire world will continue to benefit from Dr. Fauci’s expertise in whatever he does next,” Biden said. “The United States of America is stronger, more resilient, and healthier because of him.”
Fauci has been director of the NIAID for 38 years, beginning his tenure under President Ronald Reagan.
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, Fauci was famous for his work on HIV and AIDS, as well as Ebola and Zika, among other threats like West Nile Virus and the anthrax attacks in 2001.
“It has been the honor of a lifetime to have led the NIAID, an extraordinary institution, for so many years and through so many scientific and public health challenges. I am very proud of our many accomplishments,” Fauci said in a statement.
Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, who oversees Fauci’s department, said Fauci’s decision is one “we all knew would eventually come but hoped never would.”
“When I arrived at HHS, the world was one year into the COVID-19 pandemic. I quickly came to rely on Dr. Fauci’s wisdom and counsel in our response, and along with his scientific acumen, I treasure his ability to break down complex science in simple terms to the American people to save lives,” Becerra said.
Back in July, Fauci explained that he didn’t intend to leave the public health field for a while, but that he wanted to conserve his remaining years to work on personal projects, teaching and writing.
“Obviously, you can’t go on forever. I do want to do other things in my career. Even though I’m at a rather advanced age, I have the energy and the passion to continue to want to pursue other aspects of my professional career. And I’m going to do that sometime. I’m not exactly sure when, but I don’t see myself being in this job to the point where I can’t do anything else after that,” Fauci said on CNN at the time.
“So that’s the reason. It has nothing to do with pressures, nothing to do with all the other nonsense that you hear about, that has no influence on me,” Fauci said in the same interview.
In a Washington Post interview published on Monday, shortly after Fauci announced his imminent role change, Fauci said he was interested in teaching higher education and lecturing about the lessons he’s learned throughout his career. In the past, he’s also mentioned an interest in writing a memoir about growing up in Brooklyn in the 1940s and ’50s.
“I love everything about this place. … But even with that, I said I’m going to have to leave some time,” Fauci told The Washington Post. “I don’t want to be here so long that I get to the point where I lose a step.”
ABC News’ Emily Shapiro contributed to this report.
(ATLANTA) — A federal appeals court on Sunday temporarily halted a lower court’s ruling mandating that Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., testify before a grand jury in Georgia that is investigating pro-Trump efforts to sway the state’s 2020 presidential election results.
In a brief order, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sent the ruling back down to the district court, instructing the judge there to weigh any potential changes to Fulton County’s grand jury subpoena to Graham in alignment with the Constitution’s speech and debate clause.
The clause, which offers lawmakers certain legal protections when they are acting in their official capacities, is at the heart of Graham’s challenge to the subpoena for his testimony.
Graham had been scheduled to testify Tuesday.
The appellate circuit ruled that the district court should “determine whether [Graham] is entitled to a partial quashal [rejection] or modification of the subpoena to appear before the special purpose grand jury based on any protections afforded by the Speech or Debate Clause of the United States Constitution.”
“Following resolution of the partial-quashal issue on limited remand, the matter will be returned to this Court for further consideration,” the appellate judges wrote.
The ruling is the latest development in Fulton County’s investigation of efforts to overturn the 2020 race — a probe that turned into a pitched legal battle with Graham after Georgia prosecutors sought his testimony earlier this year.
District Court Judge Leigh Martin May had ruled on Friday that “further delay of … Graham’s testimony would greatly compound the overall delay in carrying out the grand jury’s investigation” and “thus poses a significant risk of overall hindrance to the grand jury’s investigation.”
“The Court therefore finds that granting a stay would almost certainly result in material injury to the grand jury and its investigation,” May wrote.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, a Democrat leading the investigation, first sought Graham’s testimony in July.
The South Carolina legislator, a staunch ally of former President Donald Trump, became embroiled in the case over two calls he made to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger shortly after the last presidential race.
Graham has since insisted that he was inquiring over how signatures on Georgia mail-in ballots were verified and was not pushing for any votes to be tossed in support of Trump. Graham’s legal team says his calls should be protected under the speech and debate clause, arguing they were related to legislative work under his role as chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee at the time.
The Georgia grand jury probe was launched after Raffensperger, a Republican and the state’s top elections overseer, was lobbied by Trump to “find 11,780 votes” — the number the then-president needed to win the state over Joe Biden, who won Georgia (which was later re-confirmed by a full manual recount).
In seeking a grand jury earlier this year, Willis wrote to the court that she had reason to believe there was “a reasonable probability that the State of Georgia’s administration of elections in 2020 … was subject to possible criminal disruptions.”
The Fulton County grand jury can make recommendations but does not have the power to indict, which would be up to another grand jury to weigh after the investigation.
Trump has insisted his pressure campaign in Georgia was appropriate and he did nothing wrong, claiming Willis is politically persecuting him.
ABC News’ Alexander Mallin and Will Steakin contributed to this report.
