JUST IN: Fani Willis’ Office Flagged For ‘High-Risk’ Practices

The walls are closing in on Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis who earlier this month was cited for leading an office filled with “high-risk” practices related to her use of federal and state dollars.

Newsweek highlighted the completion of a report on the Fulton County Procurement Review produced by North Carolina-based accounting firm Cherry Bekaert which concluded that the prosecutor’s office has lacked accountability compared to her elected peers when it comes to making purchases with taxpayer dollars without going through the proper channels.“We were informed that the use of prosecutorial discretion has sometimes moved past securing services such as expert witness testimony during the course of a trial, to items such as gun holsters for agents and office supplies and other items that likely could have been planned for and obtained through the Department of Purchasing,” the report reads.

“Prosecutorial discretion,” it seems, is a hallmark of Willis’ leadership where she recently saw ex-lover Nathan Wade tender his resignation after collecting about $700,000 in taxpayer dollars for his work on the office’s case against former President Donald Trump. A state judge recently allowed Willis to continue leading the case, a decision Trump’s lawyers are appealing.Even if Willis were to claim, as others occasionally do, that the needs of her office fell outside the scope of the purchasing overseer, she could still “seek alternative procurement methods without established procurement policies and procedures or oversight and lacking in transparency…This lack of accountability could damage the County’s reputation and erode public trust if perceived as mismanagement or inadequate oversight of public funds.”

The result is more notable because the county’s overall risk level for purchasing is low, setting Willis’ office as an outlier surrounded by more compliant departments.The report comes following a statement by the Department of Justice stating it had found “inconsistencies” in Willis’ reporting on the use of federal dollars, something the U.S. House of Representatives is investigating as well. Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), who is leading a probe by the Oversight Committee, has cited testimony from a whistleblower in alleging that Willis may be redirecting anti-gang funds to support her continued racketeering case against former President Donald Trump.The DA’s office did not respond to a request for comment by the outlet. However, her previous letter to Jordan sheds light on her lack of appreciation for oversight.

“[W]e have already provided you with substantial information about our programs that are funded via federal grants,” she wrote to the Republican leader in March.“Your primary complaint appears to be that we did not complete the production of your extension document demands (including five categories of documents over a four-year period) in less than two months. That demand is unreasonable and uncustomary and would require this government office to divert resources from our primary purpose of prosecuting crime,” she continued.

“We will not shut down this office’s efforts to prosecute crimes — including gang activity, acts of violence and public corruption — to meet unreasonable deadlines in your politically motivated ‘investigation’ of this office.”Toward the end, Willis goes toe-to-toe with Jordan, warning him that any probe meant to interfere with her investigation of Trump is similar to violent and racist threats she claims to have received as a result of her own probe.

“[L]et me state this clearly: nothing that you do will derail the efforts of my staff and I to bring the election interference prosecution to trial so that a jury of Fulton County citizens can determine the guilt or innocence of the defendants,” she concludes in her letter. “My family, my staff and I have been threatened repeatedly by people making violent, often racist, attacks.”