Judge denies Trump’s bid to dis­miss Geor­gia RICO case on free speech grounds

A judge on Thurs­day denied Don­ald Trump’s request to dis­miss his elec­tion inter­fer­ence case in Geor­gia on the grounds that it vio­lat­ed the for­mer president’s First Amend­ment rights.
Judge Scott McAfee issued an order say­ing that while Trump’s free speech rights per­mit­ted him to raise chal­lenges about the 2020 elec­tion, the alle­ga­tions in the indict­ment reflect­ed speech that was not pro­tect­ed by the Con­sti­tu­tion because it was alleged­ly “made in fur­ther­ance” of crimes.
“After inter­pret­ing the indictment’s lan­guage lib­er­al­ly in favor of the State as required at this pre­tri­al stage, the Court finds that the Defen­dants’ expres­sions and speech are alleged to have been made in fur­ther­ance of crim­i­nal activ­i­ty and con­sti­tute false state­ments know­ing­ly and will­ful­ly made in mat­ters with­in a gov­ern­ment agency’s juris­dic­tion which threat­en to deceive and harm the gov­ern­ment,” McAfee wrote.
A grand jury indict­ed Trump and 18 oth­ers last year on rack­e­teer …