MAGA conspiracy theorist Kari Lake has reacted to Donald Trump’s latest criminal indictment – by bizarrely hinting at a conspiracy theory about the death of paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
“It’s been 3 years, almost to the day, since Jeffrey Epstein ‘killed himself.’ Not a single one of his client’s has been indicted for heinous crimes against children,” tweeted Ms Lake, who failed to win the Arizona gubernatorial race in the November midterms.
“Yet, President Trump was just indicted for the 4th time. Justice is dead in America.”
Epstein – a billionaire financier who mingled with the rich and famous – was found dead in his prison cell at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan, New York, on 10 August 2019.
At the time of his death, he was awaiting trial on a string of sex-trafficking charges.
The New York medical examiner determined that he had died by suicide.
His death has long been a source of widespread speculation and conspiracy theories.
Investigations by both the FBI and the Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General found that there was evidence of any criminality in his death.
Ms Lake is a staunch Mr Trump ally who has long pushed conspiracy theories – including his false claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him.
She has also continued to falsely claim – despite being repeatedly proven wrong in multiple courts – that she lost the governor’s race to Democrat Katie Hobbs due to cheating.
Several other Mr Trump allies and the former president himself have also railed against the sweeping 98-page indictment which was handed down in Georgia on Monday.
The former president and 18 of his allies were hit with a total of 41 criminal counts under Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) statute, over their efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election in the state.
In the sweeping indictment, returned by the state grand jury late on Monday, Mr Trump was charged with 13 criminal counts of: violating RICO’s statute, conspiracy to impersonate a public officer, two counts of conspiracy to commit forgery, two counts of conspiracy to make false statements under oath, two counts of conspiracy to file false documents, two counts of solicitation of a public officer, filing false documents, conspiracy to solicit false statements, and making false statements.
As well as Mr Trump, 18 of his closest associates were also indicted, including former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani who was hit with the most charges – 13, the same as Mr Trump.
The other co-defendants are: former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, “Kraken” lawyer Sidney Powell, attorneys John Eastman, Kenneth Cheseboro, Jenna Ellis, Ray Smith III, and Robert Cheeley, former US Department of Justice official Jeffrey Clark, former Trump campaign official Michael Roman, former state senator and the former chair of the Georgia Republican Party David Schafer, Georgia state senator Shawn Still, Lutheran pastor Stephen Lee, mixed martial artist Harrison Floyd, Kanye West’s former PR Trevian Kutti, former head of the Republican Party in Coffee County Cathleen Latham, Atlanta-area bail bondsman Scott Hall, and former election supervisor of Coffee County Misty Hampton.
According to the indictment, “Trump and the other defendants charged in this indictment refused to accept that Trump lost, and they knowingly and willfully joined a conspiracy to unlawfully change the outcome of the election in favor of Trump”.
DA Willis announced the charges and arrest warrants for the defendants at a late-night press conference outside the courthouse on Monday, where she ordered each of the 19 defendants to surrender to Georgia authorities by 12pm ET on Friday 25 August.
“Specifically, the participants ... took various actions in Georgia and elsewhere to block the counting of the votes of the presidential electors who were certified as the winners of Georgia’s 2020 general election,” she said.
“As you examine the indictment, you will see acts that are identified as overt acts and those that are identified as predicate acts, sometimes called acts of racketeering activity. overt acts are not necessarily crimes under Georgia law in isolation, but are alleged to be acts taken in furtherance of the conspiracy.
DA Fani Willis announces charges against Trump and 18 allies— (Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)
“Many occurred in Georgia, and some occurred in other jurisdictions and are included, because the grand jury believes they were part of the illegal effort to overturn the results of Georgia’s 2020 presidential election.”
She added: “The indictment alleges that rather than abide by Georgia’s legal process for election challenges the defendants engaged in a criminal racketeering enterprise to overturn Georgia’s presidential election result.”
All of the 19 defendants were charged with violating the state’s RICO statute – a Nixon-era federal law originally passed to prosecute organised crime groups and Mafia crime syndicates.
The indictment accuses Mr Trump and his allies of orchestrating and running a criminal enterprise in Fulton County, Georgia, and elsewhere, to “accomplish the illegal goal of allowing Donald J. Trump to seize the presidential term of office, beginning on January 20, 2021”.
Mr Trump railed against “out of control” Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis – and spelled “indicted” wrong – as he hit out at the indictment on Truth Social in the early hours of the morning on Tuesday.
“So, the Witch Hunt continues! 19 people Indicated tonight, including the former President of the United States, me, by an out of control and very corrupt District Attorney who campaigned and raised money on, ‘I will get Trump’,” he fumed.
“And what about those Indictment Documents put out today, long before the Grand Jury even voted, and then quickly withdrawn? Sounds Rigged to me!
“Why didn’t they Indict 2.5 years ago? Because they wanted to do it right in the middle of my political campaign. Witch Hunt!”
DA Willis has spent more than two years investigating efforts by Mr Trump and his allies to overturn the 2020 presidential election result in the crucial swing state.
Donald Trump in the White House— (AP)
The investigation came following the release of a 2 January 2021 phone call Mr Trump made to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger where he told him to “find” enough votes to change the outcome of the election in the state.
“All I want to do is this: I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have,” Mr Trump is heard saying in the leaked phone call. “Because we won the state.”
Mr Biden won the state by less than 12,000 votes.
The investigation then expanded from that phone call to include a scheme whereby a group of fake Republican electors planned to falsely certify the results in Mr Trump’s favour instead of Mr Biden’s. The plot failed and the fake electors have since reached immunity deals with DA Willis’ office.
Ms Willis said she would like to try the defendants altogether and within the next six months.
In total, the former president is now facing 91 charges from four separate criminal cases.
On 1 August, he was hit with a federal indictment charging him with four counts over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election and the events leading up to the January 6 Capitol riot, following an investigation led by special counsel Jack Smith’s office.
This came after Mr Smith’s office charged Mr Trump in a separate indictment over his alleged mishandling of classified documents on leaving office.
Back in April, Mr Trump was charged for the first time with New York state charges following an investigation into hush money payments made prior to the 2016 election.
