What Sidney Powell’s guilty plea means for Trump in his Georgia election subversion case

Amna Nawaz:

The wide-ranging racketeering case against former President Donald Trump took a new turn in a Georgia courtroom today, as a second co-defendant pleaded guilty to charges in the alleged scheme to overturn the 2020 election.

This time, it was one of Trump's former attorneys, Sidney Powell.

Woman:

How do you plead to the sixth council of conspiracy to commit intentional interference with the performance of election duties?

Sidney Powell, Former Attorney For President Trump:

Guilty.

Amna Nawaz:

Following all of this closely for Georgia Public Broadcasting is Stephen Fowler, who joins me now.

Stephen, welcome back.

And let's start with Sidney Powell, a former member of Donald Trump's legal team. But just remind us what role prosecutors say she played in this sprawling election interference case.

Stephen Fowler, Georgia Public Broadcasting:

Well, Amna, Powell is accused of orchestrating a plan that saw a forensic data firm travel down to a rural Georgia county, Coffee County, and copy sensitive election data, ballots, machines, everything like that, in efforts to find alleged fraud with the election.

Now, let's be clear. There was no fraud in Georgia's election. And Coffee County was an overwhelmingly Republican county. But, still, prosecutors say that she helped orchestrate this plan to steal election data from Georgia.

Amna Nawaz:

Tell us about the plea deal. We know she's the second co-defendant, as we said, to plead guilty in this case. But what does her plea deal entail?

Stephen Fowler:

Well, instead of starting a trial process tomorrow that has jury selection beginning, she pled guilty to six months — or six years of probation — excuse me — $6,000 fine.

She has to pay additional restitution to the state to cover the cost of replacing election equipment, write a letter of apology, and agree to testify in future trials of other co-defendants, including former President Donald Trump.

Notably, Amna, she also has to turn over documents. It doesn't specify what type of documents, but there are documents in her possession that prosecutors say that is important to them. So that's the scope of what we're looking at.

Amna Nawaz:

So, Sidney Powell, let me just underscore, was a key adviser to President Trump in those weeks in which he was working to overturn the 2020 election results.

What could her cooperation with prosecutors mean for the case against Mr. Trump and for others, like Rudy Giuliani?

Stephen Fowler:

Well, even though she's only accused of a small part of this massive racketeering conspiracy in Georgia, her tendrils leaked into several other co-defendants and other aspects of this.

Sidney Powell was there when Rudy Giuliani held a press conference talking about fraud in the election. She had communications with Donald Trump that she could testify if she was called to the stand. So the more defendants that testify in this case, the more locked down, prosecutors have potential avenues to show that former President Donald Trump committed a racketeering violation by trying and failing to overturn Georgia's presidential race.

Amna Nawaz:

So this is related, of course, to this Georgia state case.

Mr. Trump also faces federal cases brought by the special counsel, Jack Smith. Do we know if her cooperation or testimony here in any way impacts those cases?

Stephen Fowler:

Well, we don't exactly know what overlap there is, other than both of these cases are looking at election interference.

Georgia's state case is a different set of laws, a different prosecutor, a different scope and scale, even though there are several key players. Now, former President Trump's attorney in Georgia said that he welcomes this, because he believes that Sidney Powell's testimony will exonerate Donald Trump. That remains to be seen.

Also, Powell might not be the most reliable witness to be used in the federal case and the state case. So it doesn't help Donald Trump, but it doesn't necessarily hurt him at this juncture.

Amna Nawaz:

That is Stephen Fowler from Georgia Public Broadcasting joining us tonight.

Stephen, thank you. Always good to see you.

Stephen Fowler:

Thank you.