Tense exchange on racism among lawyers in Ga. case

ATLANTA — An exchange between the lawyers in the Georgia criminal case against former president Donald Trump grew testy last week, with Fani T. Willis, the district attorney leading the prosecution, telling the defense lawyers in an email that “some people will never be able to respect African Americans.”

The email exchange, portions of which were obtained by The New York Times, unfolded in the days before and after a codefendant of Trump’s accused Willis of being in a romantic relationship with the outside lawyer she hired as a special prosecutor to manage the case. The emails suggest that even before the explosive allegations emerged, conversations between the two sides were becoming strained.

On Thursday, a judge in Atlanta scheduled a hearing for Feb. 15 on the allegations, which were made in a court motion seeking to have the special prosecutor, Nathan Wade, thrown off the case along with Willis and her entire office. The judge, Scott McAfee of Fulton County Superior Court, ordered Willis to file a written response to the motion by Feb. 2 and to appear at the hearing, which will be televised.

The recent tense exchange unfolded in a group email thread that includes prosecutors and defense lawyers in the case. It began when the lead lawyer for Trump in Georgia, Steven H. Sadow, expressed annoyance with prosecutors for ignoring a request he had made.

Five days later, Daysha Young, an executive district attorney who, like Willis, is Black, wrote that she and Willis “are both aware, especially as an African American woman some find it difficult to treat us respectfully.”

Sadow, who is white, responded with an email in which he said that it was “offensive, uncalled for and untrue” to suggest that racism was at play. He also said that Young’s lack of response to some emails from the defense “suggests a degree of haughtiness.”

Then Willis weighed in.

“In the legal community (and the world at large) some people will never be able to respect African Americans and/or women as their equal and counterpart,” she wrote in a note addressed to Sadow but sent to all of the defense lawyers, most of whom are white men. “That is a burden you do not experience. Further, some are so used to doing it they are not even aware they are doing it while others are intentional in their continued disrespect.”

Sadow declined to comment when asked about the exchange Thursday, as did Willis’s office.