A defiant Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis testified before a GOP-led state Senate committee Wednesday, defending her office and her decision to pursue a criminal case against President Donald Trump and 18 allies in a now-dismissed election fraud case.
“I brought this case because they came in this jurisdiction and broke the law,” Willis said. “And they didn’t only break the law here, they broke it in other places.”
The case, which Willis brought in 2023, included a number of alleged acts in furtherance of a conspiracy, including a plot to send false electoral votes to Washington claiming Trump had won in Georgia in 2020 when he lost, the breach of elections systems in Coffee County and an intimidation campaign designed to pressure Ruby Freeman, a Fulton County election worker, to falsely claim she had witnessed election tampering.
“How dare somebody threaten them?” Willis said to members of the Senate Special Committee on Investigations. “And how dare you all not take that to be important? Is it not important because it was an older, Black female? It ought to be important to everybody. That’s who you all are here to protect, those that cannot protect themselves, and I’m willing to stand on the line, so y’all can keep threatening me, keep bringing me into the committees, keep auditing me, and I’m going to keep doing my job with excellence.”
Willis was removed from the historic case in 2024 amid allegations of a conflict of interest stemming from a romantic relationship with Nathan Wade, a special prosecutor she hired for the case. A Fulton County judge officially dismissed the case last month after a special prosecutor said trying Trump while he was president was unlikely to happen and pursuing charges against the other defendants was not in the county’s interest.
The case could leave Fulton County taxpayers on the hook for millions in attorney’s fees and other litigation costs.
During Wednesday’s hearing, Cumming Republican Sen. Greg Dolezal attempted to press Willis for answers on Wade’s professional experience, compensation and a trip that records show he made to Washington in April 2022.
“We know that there was coordination between Mr. Wade, a representative of the DA’s office and the White House,” Dolezal told reporters after the hearing. “We know that they communicated both in person and via telephone communication. We know they had an eight hour phone call with the White House on the very same day that (former U.S. Attorney General) Merrick Garland appointed Jack Smith the special prosecutor. We don’t know why.”
Dolezal is vice chair of the committee but presided over the hearing because Chairman Bill Cowsert, an Athens Republican, was recovering from a medical procedure.
In many cases during the three hours of testimony, Willis said she did not remember many of the details Dolezal asked her about in his questioning.
Dolezal also sought to produce evidence that Willis had planned to indict Trump before she took office in early 2021.
A combative Willis said she didn’t begin looking into prosecuting the then-former president until evidence he had committed crimes came to light in the form of the phone call with Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in which Trump instructed him to “find” enough missing votes to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia in Trump’s favor.
“That’s really an ignorant question,” Willis said. “And if you understand what the word ignorant means, it means the lack of knowledge. If you recall the facts, I was already district attorney when this all came to light, so it’s factually impossible.”
Speaking after the meeting, Willis’ attorney, former Democratic Georgia Gov. Roy Barnes, called the hearing and the investigation into Willis a partisan witch hunt. Most of the GOP members of the committee – including Dolezal – are running for higher office next year, and Barnes pointed to political advertisements on their behalf touting their commitment to go after Willis.
“It’s very apparent that all of what they’re trying to do is raise money, you know, ‘(I) hit on Fani, and send me $100 because I’ll hit on her again,’ and I can run for statewide office on some type of un-supported conspiracy theory that a bunch of folks got together (and overthrew) the election in Georgia,” Barnes said to reporters after the hearing.
Dolezal rejected Barnes’ and Willis’ characterization and called the initial investigation into Trump and the other defendants the real witch hunt.
The hearing was long-awaited. Willis had resisted previous attempts to appear before the committee.
Dolezal said the committee will consider a number of factors that could guide recommendations for crafting legislation, including the use of state funds, open records laws and the composition of grand juries in Georgia. Lawmakers will return to Atlanta for the 2026 legislative session in January.
“We will come back,” he said. “Chairman Cowsert obviously will take everything under advisement.”
“There’s a lot to unpack here,” he added.
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