Judge in Trump election interference case, opponents speak to Channel 2 about race for seat

ATLANTA — Former President Donald Trump is facing close to a dozen criminal charges here in Georgia tied to election interference allegations from the 2020 election.

The judge overseeing the election indictment proceedings will fight this year to keep his job.

Channel 2 investigative reporter Mark Winne spoke one-on-one with Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee and his opponents.

“Any doubt in your mind there’s much more attention focused on this race because of the election interference case?” Winne asked McAfee.

“I don’t think there’s any doubt about that. I think I’m sitting with you here today in large part because of that,” McAfee said.

“Your decision to run have anything to do with Judge McAfee’s handling of the Fani Willis and then-special prosecutor Nathan Wade matters?” Winne asked Robert Patillo, who is running against McAfee.

“Not at all. Contrary to popular opinion, outside of Fulton County, we have a lot of issues in the judicial system that far perceived Fani Willis and Donald Trump, and it will exist long after Fani Willis and Donald Trump,” Patillo said.

“I’ve committed my career to public service. I think now I have a track record to show that I can be fair to both sides. That I can give everyone their timely day in court,” McAfee said.

“The most important thing is that we ensure that every single person, whether you are a pauper or president, that you are treated exactly the same by our criminal justice system,” Patillo said.

McAfee is perhaps best known as the judge on the election interference case against Trump and others.

But it’s about a verdict from the voters. The election coming up for the spot on the bench and McAfee said whoever will sit there, if the election interference case is still active the person in that seat will handle it.

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“In social media, in public comment, you’ve gotten it from both sides in connection with the election interference case. How do you handle that?” Winne asked McAfee.

“I think any good lawyer knows how to compartmentalize how to stay focused. I think both sides at some points have had a reason maybe not to be fully satisfied with me but that comes with the work. The job is not to focus on how you’re going to be perceived and just call it as best you can,” McAfee said.

“I think he’s an outstanding young jurist, but he’s been put under a tremendous amount of pressure. But this is the people’s seat, not any individual seat. And when you look at many of the issues that exist in Fulton County, we have to start tackling these,” Patillo said.

Tiffani Johnson, who is also trying to run for McAfee’s seat, said on Tuesday that she will appeal a decision to disqualify as residency challenge against her.

“I’m running for the woman who’s afraid to go to her parking garage for fear of being victimized. I’m running for the young woman who is sexually abused. I’m running for the senior citizen who has been scammed out of their life savings,” Johnson told Winne.

“I consider the length of time it takes for your case to get through the judicial system in Fulton County to be an 8th Amendment violation of the constitutional rights of individuals. A person should have the right to know, when their case will go to trial, how to function, and how to structure life around that. We have people spending years at a time in the Fulton County Jail. We have to have a priority. Those priorities have to be set by judges,” Patillo said.

“When I started out I was given a backlog of cases from the COVID pause. I had 100 defendants waiting in jail for their day in court. We’ve cut that down to 40. I had one person who’d been there nine years waiting for trial. We’ve moved that case. We have 300 others, and I’ve gone from second-to-last to being in the top third,” McAfee said.

“The people of Fulton County know me. Ever since my time as being a student activist at Clark Atlanta University. I’ve been a criminal defense attorney, a civil rights attorney. I’ve been a civil litigation attorney. I’ve been a family law attorney,” Patillo said.

“I have been a public defender and a prosecutor. I’ve also been a civil attorney,” Johnson said.

McAfee said he served as an assistant DA, eventually trying mostly murder cases, then a federal prosecutor, then Georgia’s inspector general.

“Would the Fani Willis/Nathan Wade matter be an example in your mind of being fair to both sides?” Winne asked McAfee.

“So, I can’t publicly comment on any pending case. The judicial rules prevent me, but I think the full body of my work shows the approach I’ve taken,” McAfee said.

Winne reported Tuesday on a ruling from Georgia’s Secretary of State pertaining to Ms. Johnson. An official said the decision effectively disqualifies her as a candidate because of the residency issue.

Because of that, we did not give her the same amount of coverage as other candidates for this story.

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