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الوسم: challenger

  • Georgia Democratic prosecutor pursuing election case against Trump faces Republican challenger

    Georgia Democratic prosecutor pursuing election case against Trump faces Republican challenger

    ATLANTA (AP) — A Republican lawyer who interned in the White House under Donald Trump is challenging Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, the Georgia prosecutor who brought charges against the former president over efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

    Courtney Kramer worked in the White House counsel’s office during the Trump presidency and is active in GOP organizations. She’s the first Republican to run for district attorney in Fulton County since 2000.

    Fulton County, which is home to 11% of the state’s electorate and includes most of the city of Atlanta, is a Democratic stronghold.

    Willis took office in January 2021 after beating her predecessor — and former boss — longtime District Attorney Paul Howard in a bitter Democratic primary fight in 2020.

    She made headlines just a month into her tenure when she announced in February 2021 that she was investigating whether Trump and others broke any laws while trying to overturn his narrow loss in the state to Democrat Joe Biden. Two and a half years later, after an investigation that included calling dozens of witnesses before a special grand jury, she obtained a sprawling racketeering indictment against Trump and 18 others in August 2023.

    Four people have pleaded guilty after reaching deals with prosecutors. Trump and the remaining defendants have all pleaded not guilty to the charges against them.

    When she entered the district attorney’s race in March, Kramer said the Trump prosecution was a politically motivated case and a waste of resources. But she said if she becomes district attorney she will recuse herself from that case because she worked with two of the defendants.

    Kramer, 31, said one of her top priorities will be to focus on “front-end prosecution,” which she said involves reviewing cases quickly when they come in so decisions can be made about the bond, discovery can be provided to defense lawyers and a decision can be made about whether an early plea offer can be used to resolve the case.

    Willis, 53, said she is proud of a pre-indictment diversion program she started and a program in schools to encourage students to choose alternatives to gangs and crime, as well as reductions in homicides and the backlog of unindicted cases during her tenure. She said she would focus on creating more county resources for domestic violence victims during a second term.

  • GOP senator from North Dakota faces Democratic challenger making her 2nd US Senate bid

    GOP senator from North Dakota faces Democratic challenger making her 2nd US Senate bid

    BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — A Republican U.S. senator from North Dakota who wrested the seat away from a Democrat in 2018 is facing a challenge Tuesday from another Democrat making her second Senate run.

    U.S. Sen. Kevin Cramer is confronting Democrat Katrina Christiansen in his bid for reelection in the conservative Great Plains state with a majority of Republican voters.

    A former U.S. House member and public utilities regulator, Cramer, 63, captured the seat from Democrat Heidi Heitkamp in 2018 in one of the most closely watched Senate races that year.

    Christiansen, who ran unsuccessfully against U.S. Sen. John Hoeven in 2022, cast herself as a problem solver and highlighted her rural and impoverished upbringing amid the nation’s farm crisis in challenging Cramer. The 43-year-old opponent has a doctorate in agricultural engineering and had worked as an engineer at an ethanol plant before taking a position as an assistant engineering professor at the University of Jamestown.

    Cramer is a longtime supporter of former President Donald Trump. He’s known for his approachable but blunt manner. He has been a player for decades in state GOP politics, including as a young state party chairman in the early 1990s when Republicans began turning the tables on North Dakota’s then-dominant Democrats.

    Christiansen argued that since heading to Washington, Cramer has lost touch with North Dakota issues. She raised those claims in one television ad featuring rancher Frank Tomac, who supports Trump and says, “When they go to Washington like Kevin Cramer, folks back home suffer.”

    Cramer served in the U.S. House from 2013 to 2019, and on the state’s Public Service Commission from 2003 to 2012. He also has served as state tourism director and economic development and finance director under then-Gov. Ed Schafer.

    Cramer has been campaigning while his son Ian Cramer faces charges in connection with a December 2023 vehicle pursuit and crash that killed a sheriff’s deputy, Paul Martin, in Mercer County northwest of the state capital of Bismarck. Ian Cramer pleaded guilty to all the charges, including a homicide offense, in September and has yet to be sentenced.