Donald Trump’s bond is set at $200,000 in Georgia case over efforts to overturn 2020 election

Donald Trump’s bond has been set at $200,000 in the Georgia case accusing the former president of illegally scheming to overturn his 2020 election loss, according to court papers filed Monday.

Trump is also barred from intimidating co-defendants, witnesses or victims in the case — including on social media — according to the bond agreement signed by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, Trump’s defense attorneys and the judge. It explicitly includes “posts on social media or reposts of posts made by another individual on social media.”

The order says the former president cannot make any “direct or indirect threat of any nature” against witnesses or co-defendants. He is also prohibited from communicating in any way about the facts of the case with any co-defendant or witness, except through attorneys.

The order sets Trump’s bond for the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations — or RICO — charge at $80,000, and adds $10,000 for each of the 12 other counts he is facing. Bond is the amount defendants must pay as a form of collateral to ensure they show up in court ahead of trial.

Willis has set a deadline of noon Friday for Trump and his 18 co-defendants to turn themselves in at the Fulton County Jail to be booked. The prosecutor has proposed that arraignments for the defendants follow during the week of Sept. 5. She has said she wants to try the defendants collectively, and bring the case to trial in March of next year, which would put it in the heat of the presidential nominating season.

A Trump spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A phone message seeking comment was also left for an attorney for the former president.

Trump was charged last week in the case alongside a slew of allies, who prosecutors say conspired to subvert the will of voters in a desperate bid to keep the Republican in the White House after he lost to Democrat Joe Biden.

Trump has denied any wrongdoing, and he characterizes the case — and three others he is facing — as efforts to hurt his 2024 presidential campaign.

Trump has been railing against the Fulton County D.A. since before he was indicted, and he singled out Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican who rebuffed his efforts to overturn the election, by name in a social media post Monday morning.

Bond was also set Monday for three lawyers who were indicted along with Trump. For each of them, the bond for the RICO charge was set at $20,000, with varying amounts for the other charges they face. John Eastman and Kenneth Chesebro each had a bond set at $100,000, while Ray Smith’s bond is $50,000.

Bail bondsman Scott Hall, who was accused of participating in a breach of election equipment in rural Coffee County, had his bond set at $10,000.

Other defendants include former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows; Trump attorney and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and a Trump administration Justice Department official, Jeffrey Clark, who aided the then-president’s efforts to undo his election loss in Georgia.

The Georgia indictment comes just two weeks after the Justice Department special counsel charged Trump in a separate case in a vast conspiracy to overturn the election. Besides the two election-related cases, Trump faces a federal indictment accusing him of illegally hoarding classified documents as well as a New York state case charging him with falsifying business records.

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