TRUMP SURRENDERS AT FULTON COUNTY JAIL IN ATLANTA

 Donald Trump surrenders in Atlanta in fourth criminal case brought against ex-president this year

Donald Trump surrendered Thursday at the Fulton County jail on more than a dozen charges stemming from his efforts to reverse Georgia’s 2020 election results, the fourth time this year the former president has faced criminal charges.

Trump spent a little more than 20 minutes at the Fulton County jail, where he was processed and released on bond. Jail records showed him at 6 foot 3 inches tall and weighing 215 pounds, with blue eyes and blond or strawberry hair. His booking number was P01135809.

A mug shot of Trump was released soon after he left the jail.

Trump’s surrender in Georgia marks the fourth time this year the former president has turned himself in to local or federal officials after criminal charges were brought against him – episodes that had never been seen in the US before 2023.

The scene of Trump traveling to be arrested while denouncing the charges against him as politically motivated repeated itself again Thursday, but that still didn’t shake the remarkable and unprecedented scene of a former president – and the leading GOP candidate for the White House in 2024 – facing a criminal indictment.

Trump called being at the jail a “terrible” and “very sad” experience in an interview later Thursday with Newsmax, adding: “In my whole life I didn’t know anything about indictments and now I’ve been indicted like four times.”

In April, Trump was booked in New York on state charges related to a hush money scheme. In June, he surrendered at a Miami federal courthouse to face charges in special counsel Jack Smith’s probe into the mishandling of classified documents. And earlier this month, Trump was placed under arrest in Washington, DC, and arraigned on charges brought by Smith in his investigation into attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

All of those cases could come to a head next year at the same time that Trump is running for president.

Here are the key developments in a historic day in Georgia:

Willis has asked for the 19 defendants to be arraigned next month.

Former WH chief of staff and DOJ official surrender

Two of the defendants, former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and former Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark, had their bids to block their pending arrests rejected by a federal court on Wednesday.

Both Meadows and Clark reached $100,000 bond agreements with prosecutors on Thursday. Meadows surrendered and was released on bond.

Also on Thursday, Trevian Kutti, who was charged in the Georgia case in connection with the intimidation of an Atlanta election worker, reached a $75,000 bond agreement with prosecutors ahead of her surrender.

Harrison Floyd, a leader of the organization Black Voices for Trump, also surrendered to the Fulton County jail, according to jail records. He did not reach a bond agreement ahead of time and was “in custody” at the jail, according to the Fulton County sheriff’s statement, until he appeared before a judge, which was expected within 24 hours.

Georgia State Sen. Shawn Still, who served as a fake elector in 2020, has surrendered at the jail as well, according to county inmate records. After the charges were announced, Still’s lawyer Tom Bever said, “the evidence at trial will show that Sen. Still is innocent as the day is long” and that “we look forward to our day in court to clear his good name.”

Trump 2020 campaign official Mike Roman turned himself in early Friday morning, according to county inmate records.

Raffensperger subpoenaed for major hearing Monday

Meadows has a hearing Monday on his attempt to move the Fulton County prosecution against him to federal court that’s shaping up to be a major test for Willis.

On Thursday, the Fulton County district attorney’s office subpoenaed Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger  and Frances Watson, who served as chief investigator for the secretary of state during the 2020 election, to testify.

The subpoena is one of several indications that Fulton County prosecutors plan to make Trump’s January 2021 call – in which Trump urged Raffensperger to “find” the votes that would reverse his electoral loss in the state – a focus of a Monday morning court hearing on Meadows’ efforts to get the district attorney’s charges thrown out.

Meadows was on the call and now faces charges in the Georgia election subversion case, in part, because of his participation in it.

A federal judge scheduled a September 18 hearing on Clark’s request that the Fulton County election subversion case against him be moved to federal court.

Trump charged with 13 counts in Georgia

Trump falsely claimed victory after the 2020 election, and then yried to overturn the results in Georgia and other states.

In a series of phone calls, he pressured Georgia election officials to help his efforts, including Raffensperger. The former president’s campaign filed meritless lawsuit that tried to nullify the results in Georgia and tried to convince state legislators there to toss Joe Biden’s legitimate electoral votes and replace them with GOP electors.

In the indictment handed up last week, Willis charged Trump with 13 counts, including racketeering, conspiracy charges and soliciting a public official to violate their oath of office.

The racketeering charge in the Georgia case, which Willis brought against all 19 defendants, accuses them of being part of a broad “criminal enterprise” that attempted to overturn the 2020 election result in the Peach State.

When that plan didn’t work, his campaign tried to put forward a slate of fake, pro-Trump electors. And Trump pressured then-Vice President Mike Pence to recognize those illegitimate GOP electors while presiding over the Electoral College certification in Congress on January 6, 2021.