Fani Willis Takes Stand In Hearing To Disqualify Her From Trump Case

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis took to the witness stand during a hearing over whether to disqualify her from her sprawling election interference case against former President Donald Trump and over a dozen co-conspirators.

Willis is accused of being in a romantic relationship with Nathan Wade, the prosecutor she handpicked to lead the investigation, and financially benefitting from that relationship.

Willis said she was anxious to take the stand so she could refute some of the lies told by defense attorney Ashleigh Merchant.

"It seems today that a lawyer writes a lie, and then it's printed for all of the world to see," Willis said.

"I think in one of your motions you tried to implicate that I slept with [Wade] at that conference, which I find to be extremely offensive," she added later in her testimony. "Ms. Merchant's interests are contrary to democracy."

Willis also blasted the defense attorneys for trying to make the entire case about her.

"You've been intrusive into people's personal lives. You're confused," she said. "You think I'm on trial. These people are on trial for trying to steal an election in 2020," she said, pointing to the lawyers representing the defendants in the case.

"I'm not on trial, no matter how hard you try to put me on trial."

Willis also pushed back against claims that she financially benefitted because Wade paid for vacations to several places, including Aruba, the Bahamas, Belize, and Napa Valley. She said that while he booked and paid for the vacations using a travel agent, she reimbursed him for the expenses in cash.

When asked where the cash came from, Willis said, "The source of the money is always the work, sweat, and tears of me."

"And so when you got cash to pay him back on these trips, did you go to the ATM?" asked Merchant.

"No," said Willis.

"So the cash that you would pay him, you wouldn't get it out of the bank?" Merchant asked.

"I have money in my house," Willis replied. “For many, many years, I have kept money in my house."

"I just have cash in my house," Willis continued. "I don't have as much today as I would normally have, but I'm building back up now."

She then explained she always kept cash at home, based on advice from her father, who said she should always have six months' worth of cash on hand.

Earlier in the hearing, Wade was questioned about being paid back by Willis in cash.

"The whole time that she was paying you in cash, you never said, 'Hey, why do you have this amount of cash?'" Trump's attorney, Steve Sadow, asked him.

Wade said he never questioned where the cash came from, noting that "people come into my law firm all the time with cash," and he "never questioned where they got it."

The hearing ended around 5 p.m. and is set to resume on Friday at 9 a.m. with additional testimony from Willis.