'Political prosecutions': Republican AGs demand end to 'lawfare' prosecutions of President-elect Trump

Republican attorneys general are putting President-elect Donald Trump’s prosecutors on notice, urging them to halt “political prosecutions of the incoming president.”

“The cases brought against President Trump, particularly the criminal prosecutions, had nothing to do with crime,” Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird told Fox News Digital in an interview this week.

“They had everything to do with the fact that he was running for president again. He is innocent. He didn’t do anything wrong, and those cases never should have been brought in the first place. That was another way they were trying to wage campaign lawfare.”

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Bird, alongside more than 20 other attorneys general, sent a letter to Special Counsel Jack Smith, New York Attorney General Letitia James, and Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, calling on them to drop their cases to avoid the risk of a “constitutional crisis.”

Attorneys general from Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia and West Virginia signed onto the letter.

“Mr. Smith, a federal court has already dismissed your claims in one case due to your improper appointment,” the AGs wrote in the letter. “That appointment flouts both the Appointments Clause and Article II of the U.S. Constitution. Not only that, your prosecutions of President Trump—President Biden and Vice President Harris’s political rival—violated multiple Department of Justice policies.”

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Then-Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks during a campaign event, Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024, in Mint Hill, N.C.  (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)

“President of the United States is the most important job in the world,” they wrote. “The President leads the free world. And America just gave President Trump a mandate to lead the United States to a brighter future. Prosecutions aimed at “self-promotion” are at no time appropriate.”

The Department of Justice announced on Wednesday that it is seeking to wind down two federal criminal cases against President-elect Donald Trump ahead of his second term. 

Trump was indicted on 37 federal counts in June 2023 on charges stemming from Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021. He pleaded not guilty to all charges.

Trump was indicted in Georgia in August 2023 after a yearslong criminal investigation led by state prosecutors into his alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election in the state.

Trump pleaded not guilty to all counts.

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Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis holds a press conference in the Fulton County Government Center after a grand jury voted to indict former President Donald Trump and 18 others in Atlanta, Georgia on August 14, 2023.  (Christian Monterrosa/AFP via Getty Images)

In early 2023, Fulton County Judge Scott McAfee dismissed six of the charges against Trump, saying that District Attorney Fani Willis had failed to allege sufficient detail. The situation was then thrown into disarray when it was revealed that Willis had reportedly had an “improper affair” with Nathan Wade, a prosecutor she had hired to help bring the case against Trump. Wade was later removed.

About three months into taking office, James announced an investigation into the Trump Organization, claiming there was evidence indicating that the president and his company had falsely valued assets to obtain loans, insurance coverage and tax deductions. The investigation was launched after Trump’s former personal attorney, Michael Cohen, who had previously served federal prison time for violating campaign finance laws, testified before Congress that the Trump Organization had exaggerated the value of assets. 

Fox News Digital’s Haley Chi-Sing and Emma Colton contributed to this report.