A Georgia prosecutor is prepared to testify that Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis asked her not to speak about the alleged affair between Willis and a senior prosecutor in her office, according to a new court filing that could upend the messy legal fight over Willis' role in the election interference case against Donald Trump.
The explosive allegation comes from Cindi Lee Yeager, a deputy district attorney in neighboring Cobb County. In a notice filed by Trump co-defendant David Shafer, Yeager says she is willing to take the stand and corroborate testimony from Willis' former colleague Terrence Bradley about the timeline of Willis' romantic relationship with special prosecutor Nathan Wade.
According to the filing, Yeager claims to have had "numerous" conversations with Bradley from August 2023 through January 2024 in which he discussed allegations that Willis began an affair with Wade years earlier than they both testified - soon after meeting at a 2019 legal conference.
"Mr. Wade had definitively begun a romantic relationship with Ms. Willis during the time that Ms. Willis was running for District Attorney in 2019 through 2020," a summary of Yeager's proposed testimony states.
Yeager alleges that in September 2023, amid media reports about how much Wade had earned on the Trump case, she overheard a phone conversation in which Willis warned Bradley: "They are coming after us. You don't need to talk to them about anything about us."
This alleged attempt by Willis to discourage Bradley from speaking about their relationship could prove pivotal. Shafer's legal team is seeking to have Willis removed from the probe over claims she hired Wade while romantically involved with him and benefited from his government salary through lavish trips he funded.
Willis has insisted under oath that she reimbursed Wade for travel expenses with cash and that their relationship did not begin until November 2021, after he was hired. However, Bradley testified he could not conclusively recall key details or timelines about what he knew of their affair.
The Cobb County prosecutor's filing states Yeager "agreed to come forward" after watching how Bradley's sworn testimony contradicted what he had previously told her about the start of the Willis-Wade relationship.
"Therefore, in the event that the Court re-opens the hearing to receive additional evidence...Mr. Shafer requests that the defense be permitted to subpoena Ms. Yeager and present Ms. Yeager's testimony," the motion states.
It remains unclear if Judge Robert McAfee will agree to reopen the evidentiary process in the disqualification proceedings. McAfee heard closing arguments Friday and said he would issue a decision within two weeks on whether Willis should be barred from the Trump case over the alleged conflict of interest.
Prosecutors have decried the disqualification push as a delay tactic by Trump's team. Willis has forcefully denied any professional misconduct and accused her Republican critics of making "gaseous allegations" to undermine her investigation into potential criminal interference in Georgia's 2020 election.
The judge may also elect to review potential testimony from Georgia lawyer Manny Arora, who says Bradley told him the Willis-Wade affair started while she was running for DA in 2019-2020. Arora previously represented Trump-allied attorney Kenneth Chesebro, who has pleaded guilty in the sprawling racketeering case.
Bradley took the stand last month after being ordered to testify, saying he could not claim attorney-client privilege over certain conversations due to the crime-fraud exception. But his purported lapses in memory left observers underwhelmed.
If the new witnesses are permitted to testify as proposed, it could deliver a bombshell new perspective on the allegations that have roiled the high-profile prosecution. It may also shed more light on whether Willis crossed ethical lines as she brought the historic racketeering case against Trump and 18 co-defendants over their efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss in Georgia.
