The Georgia Indictment
The indictment is here. The defendants, including Trump, have until August 25 to surrender for arraignment.
Along with Trump, 18 other coconspirators are also charged for various sub-schemes within the overall attempt to corruptly overturn the Georgia presidential election in 2020, so I’ll take them as a few different sections.
Trump’s charges
Trump gets 13 charges in this document. Here’s what they are:
1. Violation of the Georgia RICO Act (count 1)
This is basically an umbrella charge that covers the whole corrupt scheme. Everyone charged in this indictment is also charged with this offense.
2. Solicitation of violation of oath by a public officer (count 5)
This charge is for pressuring the Speaker of the Georgia House of Representatives to call for a special session to appoint false electors on December 7, 2020.
3. Conspiracy to commit impersonating a public officer (count 9)
This is for causing various individuals to falsely represent themselves as presidential electors with the intent to misdirect the January 6 count.
4. Conspiracy to commit forgery in the first degree (count 11)
This is for the document "Certificate of the votes of the 2020 electors from Georgia" fraudulently certifying a set of Trump electors for the state, to be sent to the Electoral Count in the Joint Session of Congress.
5. Conspiracy to commit false statements and writings (count 13)
This relates to the same document, but this charge is specifically for the false attestation in it: "we the undersigned, being the duly elected and qualified Electors for President and Vice President of the United States of America from the State of Georgia, do herby certify the following".
6. Conspiracy to commit filing false documents (count 15)
For conspiring to file that false certification with the Chief Judge of the Northern District of Georgia (as required by the certification process), which is the overt act required for that charge.
7. Conspiracy to commit forgery in the first degree (count 17)
For the commissioning and creation of a document titled "RE: Notice of Filling of Electoral College Vacancy", to be submitted to the electoral count process, to falsely claim and co-opt the authority of the elected presidential electors
8. Conspiracy to commit false statements and writings (count 19)
This is for the same document, but this charge attaches to false elector David Shafer and Shawn Still’s titles as represented on that document. The document named Shafer as “Chairman of the 2020 Georgia Electoral College Meeting”, and named Still as “Secretary of the 2020 Georgia Electoral College Meeting”.
9. Filing false documents (count 27)
For causing the creation of a document by John Eastman, titled "Verified complaint for emergency injunctive and declaratory relief", which was filed in Trump v Kemp. That document contained multiple knowingly-untrue statements, including:
"as many as 2506 felons with uncompleted sentences voted"
"at least 66,247 underage people voted”.
“as many as 10,315 or more dead people voted”
10. Solicitation of violation of oath by public officer (count 28)
Pressuring Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (specifically, the Trump phone call asking him to find votes), and asking Raffensperger to send a falsely certified set of Trump electors to the Joint Session of Congress.
11. False statements and writings (count 29)
Various knowingly false statements made to Raffensperger and his staff during those calls
12. Solicitation of violation of oath by a public officer (count 38)
For sending Raffensperger a letter on 17 Sept 2021 (months after Biden was inaugurated) soliciting him to "decertify the Election, or whatever the correct legal remedy is, and announce the true winner"
13. False statements and writings (count 39)
This is for that same letter, but specifically for this false claim inside it: "As stated to you previously, the number of false and/or irregular votes is far greater than needed to change the Georgia election result".
Who else was charged?
Along with Trump, 18 other codefendants are charged. Some of these names are fairly well known. Others a bit less so.
Let’s break them down by group. (Some names appear in multiple groups):
The Core Conspirators:
Rudy Giuliani (lawyer)
John Eastman (lawyer)
Ray Smith III (lawyer)
Kenneth Chesebro (lawyer)
Jenna Ellis (lawyer)
Robert Cheeley (lawyer)
Sidney Powell (lawyer)
Corrupting the U.S. Department of Justice to falsely allege election fraud:
Jeffrey Clark (ex-assistant attorney general)
John Eastman (lawyer)
The Fake Elector schemers:
Michael Roman (GOP strategist)
David Shafer (GA Republican Party Chair)
Shawn Still (Georgia State Senator)
Cathleen Latham (former Coffee County GOP chairwoman)
The Raffensperger call:
Mark Meadows (Former White House Chief of Staff)
Attempts to corruptly influence Ruby Freeman:
Stephen Lee (Illinois pastor)
Harrison Floyd (“Black Voices for Trump” leader)
Trevian Kutti (publicist)
Stealing the ballot machines from Coffee County:
Sidney Powell (lawyer)
Cathleen Latham (former Coffee County GOP chairwoman)
Scott Graham Hall (bail bondsman)
Misty Hampton (former Coffee County elections supervisor)
The Main Events
The first charge is under Georgia’s RICO law, which acts an umbrella charge for the whole scheme. Everyone is charged with it, and it details everything. But the other charges break down by law, rather than by event, and apply only to subsets of the alleged conspirators per charge, so let's regroup them to make them a bit more understandable:
1.False testimony to the Georgia Senate (counts 2-4)
This was at the Georgia Senate Judiciary Committee on 3 Dec 2020. This intended to influence the proceeding (count 2), and was attended by Rudy Guiliani, John Eastman, Jenna Ellis, Ray Smith III. Giuliani made false claims about mail-in ballot fraud and Dominion Voting Systems (count 3). Ray Smith III made false statements about how many felons, underage people, unregistered voters, and dead people voted in the election (count 4).
2.Pressuring the Georgia Speaker of the House to call for a special session to appoint presidential electors (counts 5)
On the 7th of December, 2020, Trump placed a call to Georgia Speaker of the House of Representatives David Ralston and discussed holding a special session of the Georgia General Assembly, whose purpose would be to falsely certify a new set of electors to be submitted to the U.S. Electoral Count Joint Session in Congress.
3.False testimony to the Georgia House (counts 6-7)
There was also hearing at the Georgia House Governmental Affairs Committee (charge 6), where Giuliani made false claims that Fulton County election workers were stealing votes and passing around USB sticks (count 7)
4.The False Electors (counts 8-19)
David Shafer, Shawn Still, and Cathleen Latham are all indicted for their role in the scheme to have 16 false electors (of which Shafer, Still, and Latham were three) to falsely certify the Georgia presidential election for Donald Trump and to fraudulently submit that certification to the Electoral College. Michael Roman, a political consultant, is also indicted for his role in it.
The false electors represented themselves as real electors (count 8) and created a false election certificate (count 9, 10, 11, 12, 13) to send to be counted at the January 6 tabulation at the Joint Session of Congress (count 14, 15), as well as a document titled “RE: Notice of Filling of Electoral College Vacancy“ (count 16, 17, 18, 19).
The certificate and accompanying document can be read here.
5.The attempt to influence Ruby Freeman’s testimony (counts 20-21, counts 30-31)
Ruby Freeman, an election worker, and her daughter Wandrea ArShaye “Shaye” Moss were substantially harassed through lies spread by Donald Trump and his associates. This harassment originated with false social media claims that Freeman had stayed to count ballots on election night after observers had left, identifying Freeman. The claims were investigated by Georgia and found to be unsubstantiated.
Stephen Lee tried to influence Ruby’s witness testimony (count 20, 21). Later, Stephen Lee, Harrison Floyd, and Trevian Kutti tried again (count 30, 31)
6.The (unsent) DOJ letter claiming fraud in the Georgia election (count 22)
Between 28 Dec 2020 and 2 Jan 2021, Jeffrey Clark wrote a letter saying DOJ had “identified significant concerns that may have impacted the outcome of the election in multiple States, including the State of Georgia“. He sent this to then acting-attorney general Jeffrey Rosen (count 22), who did not allow it to be published.
This letter can be read here.
7.False Testimony to the Georgia Senate (counts 23-26)
Another hearing on 30 Dec, attended by Rudy Guiliani, Ray Smith III, and Robert Cheeley (count 23). Guiliani said false things about how many felons and dead people voted (count 24). Ray Smith said false things about how many people had voted illegally (count 25). Robert Cheeley said false things about ballots being multiple-counted, and poll workers leaving because of a watermain break at the State Farm Arena (count 26).
8.False statements in Trump v Kemp (count 27)
During the Trump v Kemp lawsuit, Eastman wrote a document titled “Verified Complaint for Emergency Injunctive and Declaratory Relief” alleging major fraud in the Georgia election. It contained a lot of false statements (count 27).
The Trump v Kemp documents can be read here.
9.The Raffensperger call (counts 28-29)
In a call on Jan 2, Trump called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to ask him to “find” 11,780 votes (count 28). The audio was later leaked. This charge is the only charge (other than the RICO charge) that applies to former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. Trump made lots of false statements on the call (count 29).
The full audio of this call can be heard here. A transcript of it can be found here.
10.The ballot machine theft from Coffee County (counts 32-37)
Sidney Powell commissioned and paid for SullivanStrickler LLC to travel to Coffee County for the purpose of tampering with the ballot machines. When they got there, Cathleen Latham (Coffee County GOP chairwoman), Scott Hall (bail bondsman), and Misty Hampton (elections supervisor) aided and abetted that effort (count 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37).
A detailed description of the charged events in Coffee County is available here.
11.Hoping to rollback the election long after Biden was inaugurated (counts 38)
On 17th September 2021, Trump wrote and published a letter to Raffensperger that claimed the number of irregular votes was enough to change the result (count 39) and that he should “decertify the Election, or whatever the correct legal remedy is, and announce the true winner“ (count 38).
This letter can be read here.
12.Perjury during investigation of the false electors
The District Attorney interviewed at least two of the false electors. David Shafer made false statements during his interview in April 2022 (count 40). Robert Cheeley made false statements during his interview in September 2022 (count 41).