By Blayne Alexander, Zoë Richards and Rebecca Shabad —
NBC News
Fulton County (Georgia) District Attorney Fani Willis
He admitted this Friday that he has a personal relationship with special prosecutor Nathan Wade, after former President Donald Trump and another defendant tried to have them removed from the court case of interference in the 2020 presidential elections in that state.
In a 176-page court filing, Willis appeared to respond to allegations that he had a personal relationship with Wade by stating that “any personal relationship between members of the Prosecutor's team does not amount to a disqualifying conflict of interest or otherwise prejudice to an accused in a criminal proceeding.”
Willis and his office argued that the relationship has not tainted their ability to oversee the case.
“Defendants have done nothing to establish an actual conflict of interest nor have they proven that, in their handling of the case, Willis or Wade acted out of any personal or financial motivation,” he argued.
Willis in December 2023 in New York. Natalie Keyssar for NBC News
The brief states that the other defendant besides Trump, Michael Roman — who was the first to denounce the relationship between Willis and Wade so that the charges were dropped — “wildly speculates” that Willis “benefited financially from the investigation and the prosecution of this criminal case, but does not provide any support to justify that conclusion.”
“To be absolutely clear, the personal relationship between Wade and Willis has never involved any direct or indirect financial benefit to her,” the document reads.
“We developed a personal relationship”
In an affidavit included in the court filing, Wade directly acknowledged his personal relationship with Willis, which he said did not exist, he said, at the time of his hiring.
“In 2022, Willis and I developed a personal relationship in addition to our professional partnership and friendship,” he noted.
Addressing the personal trips they took together, he stated that they more or less split the cost of them.
Sometimes he booked the flights, she asserted, and sometimes she did it
, she explained.
Friday's court filing mentioned that the allegations raised by Roman and other motions to disqualify Willis and Wade "are dishonest and garnered media attention as they were designed to do."
But, he rejected the allegations made by Trump and the other co-defendant.
“Willis has no financial conflict of interest that would constitute a legal basis for disqualification,” he insisted, “he has no personal conflict of interest that would justify his personal disqualification or that of the Fulton District Attorney's Office.”
Additionally, he argued that the attacks on Wade's qualifications "are factually inaccurate, baseless and malicious, and provide no basis for dismissing the charge or disqualifying him."
Fulton County, Georgia, prosecutor Fani Willis in New York on December 5, 2023. Natalie Keyssar for NBC News
Willis, the court filing added, has also “not made any public statements justifying his disqualification or judicial investigation.”
That filing sets the stage for a hearing on the allegations scheduled for Feb. 15 by Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee, who is presiding over the election case.
Roman has issued subpoenas to Willis and Wade to testify at the hearing, but Friday's court filing noted that there is an intention to file motions to quash them.
In a court filing last month seeking dismissal of charges in the case, Roman's attorneys accused Willis of having a "clandestine and inappropriate personal relationship" with Wade.
The former president has also cited the allegations of this romantic relationship in his own efforts to get the charges against him dropped.
Both Roman and Trump, who faces 13 criminal charges, have pleaded not guilty in the case.
Four other co-defendants accepted their guilt.
Last month, Wade's estranged wife presented in court a credit card statement that appeared to show he had purchased plane tickets to travel with Willis.
On Tuesday, Wade reached a temporary settlement with his wife, Jocelyn Wade, in their divorce proceedings, canceling a hearing in which he was expected to testify about the allegations.
The same day, an attorney for Roman subpoenaed Willis and Wade to testify at a Feb. 15 hearing in connection with motions to disqualify them from prosecuting the election case, according to a lawsuit Roman's attorney Ashleigh Merchant filed against the Prosecutor's Office.
Merchant's lawsuit alleges that Willis has refused to provide many requested materials, in violation of the Georgia Open Records Act.
The complaint also claimed that the prosecutor “used taxpayer money to pay Wade, with whom she had a romantic relationship at the time,” and as a result has received “financial benefits from such payments,” including vacations, hotel stays and gifts.
Willis
has faced increasing scrutiny
over the relationship in recent weeks.
Last week, the Republican-controlled Georgia Senate passed a resolution to establish a committee to investigate Willis, and Republican state Rep. Charlie Byrd introduced articles of impeachment against the prosecutor in the Georgia House.
Bob Ellis, a member of the Fulton County Board of Commissioners, also said in a statement in January that he would conduct a “full investigation” amid the allegations.