BizPac Review columnist Kevin Haggarty was monitoring the CNN network on Friday and caught a surprise analysis from a usually reliable Democratic party mouthpiece: Legal analyst Elie Honig. It was harsh criticism of statements by Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams.
The BizPac Review writer watched onig join CNN’s “New Day” for a discussion about the special Fulton County grand jury probe spearheaded by democratic District Attorney Fani Willis, who has subpoenaed Gov. Brian Kemp.
Some background. The governor is fighting the subpoena, and Abrams jumped in to criticize him. “If you look at the emails that have been released about the back-and-forth, and having dealt with the Kemp administration, I would actually put my faith more in the Fulton County DA’s office,” Abrams said in a Thursday interview. “I know that this has been a meticulous and very thoughtful investigation and that he is not the only Republican who’s tried to skirt his responsibility to provide information.”
Enter CNN analyst Honig, who was baffled by Abrams’s ability to make such an assertion. “So, I did a double take when I heard that last night on Erin Burnett’s show,” he said. “And Abrams said it twice: ‘this is a meticulous investigation by the DA’s office.’”
“How on earth would Stacy Abrams know that?” the legal analyst asked.
“Stacey Abrams is a civilian, no different than any of us. She’s not a public official, she’s not part of the prosecutor’s office. So, there’s two possibilities here,” he continued. “One, which I hope it’s not– it better not be– is she’s being briefed on this behind the scenes by the prosecutor’s office. That would be wildly inappropriate, all sorts of crossed wires, politics and prosecution.”
“The other is, she made it up!” Honig asserted.
“There’s sort of a middle ground here, where she’s rooting for this investigation. And let’s keep in mind: Brian Kemp, her upcoming opponent in the gubernatorial race, has received a subpoena. He’s now in a battle with Fani Willis.”
The governor is pleased these questions are being raised by Honig and many others in the legal community. Kemp filed a motion to dismiss the subpoena, as reported by Newsweek, stating Willis’ office “engineered the governor’s interaction with the investigation to reach a crescendo in the middle of an election cycle.”
“What began as an investigation into election interference has itself devolved into its own mechanism of election interference,” the court filing went on to say.
“And to me, this sort of underscores it,” Honig added to the panel. “There are real political problems going on here. And we’re starting to see politics infect this (Willis) investigation.”
Honig concluded:
“She had done a fundraiser for the political opponent of someone who she had subpoenaed. And now when it comes to Brian Kemp, Kemp’s argument is, you the DA have politicized this by waiting so long. And the fact is…the reality is the DA took a year and a half, from January–this tape, the Raffensperger tape came out in January of 2021–until this summer to seat a grand jury.”
