Republican-led Georgia state Senate committee plans to question Fani Willis next month

ATLANTA (AP) — After previous attempts to bring Fani Willis before a special state Senate committee formed to investigate her failed, the committee chairman said Friday that he expects the Fulton County district attorney to appear for questioning next month.

State senators in January 2024 created the committee to look into allegations of “various forms of misconduct” against Willis with regard to her prosecution against President Donald Trump and others over efforts to overturn Trump’s 2020 election loss in Georgia. Even before Trump embarked on a retribution campaign against his enemies, Republicans on the Georgia committee were eager to bring Willis in for questioning.

Chairman Bill Cowsert said the committee plans to issue a new subpoena for Willis, an elected Democrat, to testify on Nov. 13 and that she has agreed to appear. Neither a Willis spokesperson nor her lawyer, former Gov. Roy Barnes, immediately responded to messages seeking confirmation of that agreement.

Five of the six Republicans on the committee are running for statewide office in 2026. Cowsert is running for attorney general, while four other GOP committee members — Sens. Greg Dolezal, John Kennedy, Blake Tillery and Steve Gooch — are vying against each other for the Republican nomination for lieutenant governor.

While each of them would probably relish the chance to face off in person with Willis to curry favor with the Republican base, committee rules say only Cowsert and Senate Minority Leader Harold Jones II, the ranking Democrat, will be able to question her.

The resolution creating the committee focused on Willis’ hiring of special prosecutor Nathan Wade to lead the election interference case. It said a romantic relationship between the two amounted to a “clear conflict of interest and a fraud upon the taxpayers” of the county and state. The courts ultimately removed Willis from the case over an “appearance of impropriety.”

Cowsert on Friday repeated an assertion he has made from the committee’s earliest days, saying, “We’re not on some witch hunt against Fani Willis here.” Democrats, for their part, have decried the committee as political theater.

While the committee has met multiple times to hear from witnesses, it has revealed little that wasn’t already known.

Amid a court battle over whether the committee had the power to order her to appear, Willis didn’t show up last year when subpoenaed. A judge agreed Willis did have to appear, and the state Supreme Court has scheduled arguments next month on Willis’ appeal of that ruling.

When Willis announced the indictment against Trump and 18 others in August 2023, she used the state’s anti-racketeering law to allege a wide-ranging conspiracy to try to illegally overturn Trump’s narrow loss to Democrat Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election in Georgia.

Things began to unravel in January 2024 when a defense attorney in the case alleged in a court filing that Willis was involved in an improper romantic relationship with Wade.

That led to an extraordinary hearing the during which both Willis and Wade testified about the intimate details of their personal relationship. They both vehemently denied allegations that it constituted a conflict of interest.

The trial judge chided Willis for actions that showed a “tremendous lapse in judgment,” ultimately ruling that Willis could remain on the case if Wade resigned, which he did hours later.

But after defense attorneys appealed, the Georgia Court of Appeals cited an “appearance of impropriety” and removed Willis from the case in December. The state Supreme Court last month declined to hear Willis’ appeal.

Cowsert said the state Senate committee is seeking to provide “a clear guideline” for prosecutors of what constitutes an “appearance of impropriety” and that his questioning of Willis will be about expectations of prosecutor behavior.

“I’ll be asking her how would you recommend that we more specifically identify inappropriate, improper, unethical conduct so that other prosecutors don’t engage in that behavior” and that the public can have confidence in the judicial system, he said.

Jones said he thinks it will be good for Willis to appear before the committee: “She’s been the center of attention so much, so it will be good for her to actually come and give her side, so to speak.”