DA Fani Willis blasts Georgia Republican ‘clown show,’ defends prosecution of Trump: ‘They’re stupid!’
TheGrio...
Willis has been a frequent target of Republicans since pursuing her criminal prosecution of President Donald Trump.
Fani Willis, the Fulton County district attorney, did not mince words during a recent keynote address at the Georgia State Capitol in which she called out Republicans after enduring an explosive, hours-long hearing before the Georgia State Senate last year.
“I can only describe [the hearing] to you as, and I hope they’re listening, a clown show. And as clown shows go, it was led by a clown,” Willis said of Georgia Republican senators led by Sen. Greg Dolezal.
The fiery Georgia prosecutor, who has faced political headwinds for her 2023 racketeering case against President Donald Trump and his allies, accused Dolezal, who is running for the Georgia lieutenant governor’s office, and Republicans of using her name to generate attention. In December 2025, Republicans subpoenaed Willis to testify about her prosecution of Trump and others that ended in controversy related to her romantic relationship with the case’s former special prosecutor, Nathan Wade. The four-hour hearing resulted in Willis defiantly calling out Republicans and their hearing as a “damn joke.”
“The Senate hearing was a great waste of taxpayers money and time. The Senate hearing was not about getting answers for Georgians, as they lied and told people, but rather it was a desperate attempt to get their own names in the paper,” Willis said during a speech at an event marking International Women’s Day. She added, “See they got to keep my name in their mouth for people to even know who they are.”
Willis has been a frequent target of Republicans since pursuing her criminal prosecution of Trump and his allies for their alleged coordinated attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election in Fulton County. The case was eventually tossed out after Willis was disqualified from leading it due to her relationship with Wade. However, Willis has maintained the merits of her case and her commitment to seeking justice for Fulton County voters.
“See these want-to-be leaders, they have no ideas for Georgians. No plans to make Georgians’ lives better. They want to show you that they are powerful and strong by coming after me,” said Willis. “Let me tell you what they ended up showing in December, that they’re stupid, that they’re weak, and if y’all don’t mind me saying so, they got a classic ass-kicking while they got drugged for three hours.”
While Willis’s case against Trump and his co-defendants has come to a close, legal battles and concerns about protecting Fulton County voters remain. Trump and 12 former defendants are seeking nearly $17 million in attorney’s fees under a Georgia law enacted by Republicans in 2025 that allows defendants to recover legal costs if a prosecutor is disqualified from a case.
In January, Trump’s FBI raided the Fulton County election office and seized thousands of ballots from the 2020 election as part of the administration’s broader attempt to relitigate the election and prove a long-held conspiracy that Trump lost the election as a result of mass voter fraud. Several ballot recounts and court rulings found no evidence of voter fraud.
“Donald Trump himself has never gotten over losing the 2020 election in Georgia, and in part because Georgia had been a red state for a very long time, and had voted for Republicans for president for the better half of 35 plus years,” said Democratic strategist Ameshia Cross. “And every other person on that on that ballot…won their races. [Trump] is the only one who did not. So for him to call out fraud was always questionable.”
Cross added, “But beyond that, they are using this as a precursor to the integrity of elections across the country, because they know that when midterms come [in November], they’re not going to be able to stop the bleed.”