CNN
—
Two of Donald Trump’s top campaign lawyers, Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, surrendered Wednesday in a Georgia election tampering case.
The sight of former New York City mayor and prominent former federal prosecutor Giuliani walking into the Fulton County Jail was another dramatic moment in the trial of Trump and his efforts to reverse his 2020 election loss.
Giuliani, one of Trump’s most outspoken lawyers in 2020, was charged with 13 felonies, including violating the state fraud act, engaging in various criminal conspiracies and soliciting a public official in the state to break their oath.
After flying to Atlanta earlier Wednesday, Giuliani agreed to a $150,000 bond package. Powell agreed to a $100,000 bond.
Powell and Giuliani are among the plans to change the results of the 2020 election in Georgia on Wednesday. Kenneth Chesbro, the creator of the Trump campaign’s voter fraud scheme, also surrendered.
The former president, meanwhile, will turn himself in after agreeing to a $200,000 bond on Thursday.
Trump will leave his Bedminster golf club in the afternoon and return to New Jersey following the surrender. There are no expected events at his club upon his return. Trump’s team is also making arrangements for Trump to speak to reporters traveling with him in Georgia, sources said, adding that the former president may decide not to.
Fulton County District Attorney Fannie Willis has accused Trump and 18 others of participating in schemes to interfere in Georgia’s election results. All 19 co-defendants are expected to surrender before Friday’s deadline, when Willis unsealed a grand indictment last week of his efforts to overturn Trump’s 2020 election loss to Joe Biden.
Watch Giuliani arrive at the Fulton County Jail to surrender
Willis continues to meet with the defendants to negotiate the terms of a bond agreement.
Besides Giuliani and Powell, six defendants have so far surrendered ahead of the deadline:
- Kenneth Chesbro, architect of the Trump campaign’s voter fraud plot;
- Former Trump campaign attorney Ray Smith participated in a Georgia Senate hearing where he was falsely accused of widespread fraud and voting irregularities;
- Former Georgia GOP Chairman David Shaffer led the state’s delegation of fake voters;
- Kathy Latham, former chairwoman of the Coffee County Republican Party, who was linked to both the fraudulent voter scheme and the Coffee County voter data breach scheme;
- John Eastman, the right-wing lawyer who advised Trump on plots to undermine congressional certification of the 2020 election results;
- Scott Hall, bail bondsman in Atlanta.
Meanwhile, former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and Jeffrey Clark, a former Justice Department official, have asked a federal judge to block arrests by local authorities after they tried to use their federal law enforcement powers to overturn the election. Both argued that their positions in the federal government at the time of their alleged illegal activities should have dismissed their state’s charges.
The Fulton County District Attorney’s Office on Tuesday issued subpoenas to two people who overheard Trump’s January 2021 call with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger, as prosecutors plan to counter Meadows’ bid to have the case thrown out. Prosecutors requested the two lawyers appear in federal court Monday at a hearing in the Meadows case — the subpoena did not specify why they were being called.
This story has been updated with additional information.
