Trump co-defendants in Fulton County case begin surrendering ahead of Friday deadline

Washington — Two of the 19 people charged in Georgia for alleged efforts to reverse the outcome of the 2020 election turned themselves in to authorities on Thursday, becoming the first of former President Donald Trump's co-defendants to surrender.

Scott Hall, a Georgia bail bondsman, and John Eastman, a conservative attorney, were booked on Tuesday, Fulton County inmate records show. Both men were eligible for bond. Eastman spoke to reporters shortly after being released from the Fulton County jail and said he still believes the 2020 election was stolen.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis gave those charged until noon Friday to surrender to authorities. Trump, who has yet to enter a plea but has denied all wrongdoing, said Monday night that he will turn himself in on Thursday.

A Fulton County grand jury returned a 41-count indictment last week. The charging document accuses Trump and 18 others of participating in a "criminal enterprise" that aimed to reverse the former president's electoral loss in Georgia. 

Hall is accused of participating in a scheme to access election equipment and voter data in Coffee County, Georgia. He is charged with seven counts, and his bond was set at $10,000 — a $4,000 bond for Georgia's Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO, and a $1,000 bond for each of the remaining six conspiracy counts, according to a consent bond order.

The indictment claims Eastman played a key role in the alleged plot to send a fake slate of electors to Congress, which the indictment says was intended to "disrupt and delay the joint session of Congress" on Jan. 6, 2021, in order to alter the outcome of the 2020 election. The indictment claims Eastman sent an email suggesting "that the Trump presidential elector nominees in Georgia needed to meet on December 14, 2020, sign six sets of certificates of vote, and mail them 'to the President of the Senate and to other officials.'"

Eastman also allegedly participated in an Oval Office meeting on Jan. 4, 2021, with Trump, then-Vice President Mike Pence, and two of Pence's top aides. During the meeting, Trump and Eastman argued that the vice president could unilaterally reject electoral votes from some states or delay Congress' counting of the votes on Jan. 6, 2021, to allow state legislatures to appoint electors in favor of Trump, according to the indictment. 

Eastman, who has been charged with nine counts, had his bond set at $100,000, which included a $20,000 bond for violation of Georgia's RICO statute and $10,000 each for the other eight counts. Eastman said in a statement that he and his legal team plan to contest the charges and said he is confident he will be "fully vindicated." 

"Each Defendant in this indictment, no less than any other American citizen, is entitled to rely upon the advice of counsel and the benefit of past legal precedent in challenging what former Vice President Pence described as, 'serious allegations of voting irregularities and numerous instances of officials setting aside state election law' in the 2020 election," he said. "The attempt to criminalize our rights to such redress with this indictment will have – and is already having — profound consequences for our system of justice."

Other defendants want their cases moved to federal court

Two other defendants, former Justice Department lawyer Jeffrey Clark and ex-Georgia Republican Party chairman David Shafer, are seeking to move their prosecutions from Fulton County Superior Court to federal district court in Atlanta.

In a filing with the U.S. district court on Monday, lawyers for Clark wrote that the allegations contained in the indictment relate to his work at the Justice Department and with the former president. Given his status at the time as a "federal officer," Clark is entitled to have any case against him related to his tenure in the executive branch be resolved in a federal court, they said.

"The State's assertions that Mr. Clark participated in a non-existent, multi-state criminal conspiracy are scurrilous," Clark's lawyers argued. They claimed his prosecution is a "naked attempt to destroy Clark" that will cost him millions of dollars in legal fees, harm his work in the conservative legal community and damage his reputation.

Clark is also asking the federal court to temporarily pause the proceedings in Fulton County so he would "not need to be put the choice of making rushed travel arrangements to fly into Atlanta or instead risking being labeled a fugitive."

The indictment returned in Fulton County charges Clark with two counts and claims an email he sent to then-Acting U.S. Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen seeking to send "false" information to Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp was a "substantial step" in the racketeering case. 

In a separate filing to the U.S. district court, Shafer said the indictment charges him with conduct that stems from his role as a Republican nominee as a presidential elector acting under the authority of the Constitution and federal law.

"The Supremacy Clause plainly bars the State's attempt here to criminalize the actions of persons acting pursuant to federal authority to achieve the purposes of the national government," Shafer's lawyers argued. "Neither the State of Georgia nor any of its localities has the authority to prosecute Mr. Shafer for these actions, and this Court should exercise its clear authority to correct this injustice and halt this unlawful and unconstitutional attempted prosecution now."

Shafer, a former state senator and chairman emeritus of the Georgia GOP, been charged with eight counts, some of which relate to the scheme to appoint the fake slate of electors.

Their attempts come as Mark Meadows, Trump's former White House chief of staff, is also seeking to have his prosecution moved to federal court because the conduct alleged in the indictment involved his work as a federal employee. Meadows' attorneys also asked the district court to prevent Willis from arresting Meadows if he doesn't meet with Friday deadline to surrender in a motion on Tuesday.