Georgia judge rejects Trump effort to quash Fulton County investigation

A Georgia judge has rejected former President Trump’s efforts to quash an investigation into his efforts to overturn the state’s 2020 election results. 

“The movants’ asserted ‘injuries’ that would open the doors of the courthouse to their claims are either insufficient or else speculative and unrealized,” Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney wrote in the nine-page ruling. 

“They are insufficient because, while being the subject (or even target) of a highly publicized criminal investigation is likely an unwelcome and unpleasant experience, no court ever has held that that status alone provides a basis for the courts to interfere with or halt the investigation.”

The ruling is the second roadblock for Trump in his efforts to dismiss the probe, after the state’s Supreme Court earlier this month rejected another suit seeking to block it. 

That court had in part rejected Trump’s arguments while noting the matter before McBurney.

McBurney presided over the grand jury who were presented evidence by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis (D) who has advised court officials she could bring charges in the high-profile case the second or third week of August. 

Trump has also sued Willis and McBurney in another third suit filed alongside his petition to the state supreme court — an additional attempt to nix the investigation beyond the matter McBurney addressed Monday.

“Petitioner’s every attempt to seek redress in the normal course have been ignored, and the District Attorney has given every indication that the injury is imminent,” Trump wrote in the petition earlier this month.

McBurney also determined that Trump didn’t have standing to sue to quash the investigation, noting that the former president can only “theorize” that he will be named in an indictment.

“The professed injuries are also speculative and unrealized because there is, as of yet, no indictment that creates the genuine controversy required to confer standing,” McBurney wrote.

—Updated at 12:04 p.m.