He and 18 others have been indicted on counts that include racketeering in a 41-charge document issued by a Fulton County grand jury.

The indictment marks the fourth time Mr Trump has been criminally charged this year.

He has denied the accusations in all cases.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis launched an investigation in February 2021 into allegations of election meddling against Mr. Trump and his associates.

The list of defendants indicted late on Monday night includes former Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani, former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, former White House lawyer John Eastman and a former justice department official, Jeffrey Clark.

The indictment says the alleged co-conspirators “knowingly and willfully joined a conspiracy to unlawfully change the outcome of the election in favour of Trump”.

The charge sheet also refers to the defendants as a “criminal organization”, accusing them of a number of crimes, including:

False statements and writings

Impersonating a public officer

Forgery

Filing false documents

Influencing witnesses

Computer trespass

Conspiracy to defraud the state

Theft and perjury.

The most serious charge, violating the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (Rico) Act, is punishable by a maximum of 20 years in prison.

The act – designed to help take down organised criminal syndicates like the mafia – helps prosecutors connect the dots between underlings who broke laws and those who gave them marching orders.

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Mr Trump, currently the frontrunner in the Republican Party’s race to pick its next candidate for the White House, said the investigation by Ms Willis, a Democrat, was politically motivated.

In a statement, the Trump campaign described the district attorney as a “rabid partisan” who had filed “these bogus indictments” to interfere with the 2024 presidential race and “damage the dominant Trump campaign”.

“This latest co-ordinated strike by a biased prosecutor in an overwhelmingly Democrat jurisdiction not only betrays the trust of the American people, but also exposes the true motivation driving their fabricated accusations,” said the statement.

There was confusion earlier on Monday when a list of a criminal charges against Mr Trump appeared on a Fulton County website before the grand jury had even voted to return an indictment.

The filing said Mr Trump had been charged with racketeering, conspiracy to commit fraud and making false statements.

A spokesperson for Ms Willis said the document was “fictitious” but did not explain how it ended up on the court’s website.

Mr Trump and his allies seized on the apparent clerical error to claim the process was rigged.

Mr Trump has already been charged by federal prosecutors in Washington DC with conspiring to overturn the 2020 election, which he lost to President Joe Biden, a Democrat.

That charge sheet devoted significant time to the Trump team’s activities in Georgia.

Ms Willis’ investigation focuses specifically on Georgia, a key battleground state for the US presidency that Mr Trump narrowly lost.

In January 2021, Mr Trump was recorded on a phone call asking Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” 11,780 votes, the number he would have required to beat Mr Biden in that state.

At least eight “fake electors”, who signed a bogus certificate claiming Mr Trump won the election in that state, have reached immunity deals in the case after agreeing to interviews with Fulton County prosecutors.

Source: BBC

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Mr Trump, a Republican, and Mr Biden, a Democrat, said the vote would shape America for years to come.

More than three million Georgians have already cast ballots – nearly 40% of the state’s registered voters.

If the Democrats win, they will control all of Congress and the White House.

With the Senate on a knife-edge, Asian shares plunged early on Tuesday amid the political uncertainty in the world’s biggest economy.

The Republican Senate incumbents in Georgia, Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue, are fighting for their political lives against two Democratic challengers, Jon Ossoff and Reverend Raphael Warnock.

“Georgia, the whole nation is looking to you,” Mr Biden said at a drive-in rally in Atlanta on Monday, emphasising that control of the Senate would mould prospects for his incoming administration.

“Unlike any time in my career, one state – one state – can chart the course, not just for the four years but for the next generation,” he said, flanked by Mr Ossoff and Mr Warnock.

The Senate has the power to approve or reject Mr Biden’s nominees for cabinet and judicial posts, as well as the bulk of his policy wish-list.

On Monday evening, President Trump told voters in Dalton, Georgia, that the Georgia runoff was the “last line of defence” against the Democrats.

In what may have been the last rally of his presidency, he said: “If the liberal Democrats take the Senate and the White House – and they’re not taking this White House – we’re going to fight like hell, I’ll tell you right now.”

But the president also repeated unproven allegations that he was only declared the loser in Georgia after November’s White House election because of fraud, claims that Republican officials are worried could now depress turnout among the party faithful in Tuesday’s vote.

Mr Trump – who is due to leave office on 20 January – also hinted that he wanted Vice-President Mike Pence, in his role as president of the Senate, to reject Mr Biden’s win when Congress meets on Wednesday to certify the election results.

“I hope that Mike Pence comes through for us,” Mr Trump said. “Of course, if he doesn’t come through, I won’t like him quite as much.”

Nearly 3 million Georgia voters – around half of those that voted in the November general election – have already cast their ballots.

The eve-of-poll rallies came on the heels of a controversial phone call between the president and Georgia’s top election official, secretary of state Brad Raffensperger.

In a recording of the call, first published by the Washington Post newspaper on Sunday, Mr Trump pressured Mr Raffensperger to “find” votes that would reverse his defeat in the state.

Mr Biden won 306 votes to Mr Trump’s 232 in the US electoral college, which confirms the US president.

Mr Biden also won at least 7 million more Americans’ votes than the president.

At his rally on Monday, Mr Biden did not make direct reference to the call, but alluded to Mr Trump’s persistent challenges to the election results, saying that “politicians cannot assert, take or seize power”.

The president-elect also joked that he had won Georgia “three times” because of two state-wide recounts.

Republicans currently control the 100-seat Senate by 52 to 48. If both Democrats win on Tuesday, the Senate will be evenly split.

US vice-presidents can cast tie-breaking votes in the Senate, meaning that Vice-President-elect Kamala Harris could decide hotly contested legislation in favour of the Democrats.

It would also bring the White House, Senate and the House of Representatives under Democratic control for the first time since President Barack Obama’s election in 2008.

The high-stakes political contest has sucked a huge amount of money into the state for all four candidates, and record-breaking numbers for the Democrats.

The election is widely seen as an uphill battle for the challengers, given that a Democrat has not won a Senate race in Georgia in 20 years.

Source: BBC

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