4 Trump co-conspirators have pleaded guilty. What does that mean for Trump?

Three of former President Donald Trump’s lawyers and advisers decided to take plea deals just in the last week. The chain reaction began with Scott Hall, a bail bondsman, who pleaded guilty a month ago to conspiracy to unlawfully access ballot-counting machines.

The other defendants taking plea deals include:

• Lawyer Sidney Powell, who was charged with interfering with election duties. She pleaded guilty to six misdemeanor charges related to her interference in the presidential election in Georgia last week and was sentenced to six years of probation, $6,000 in fines, $2,700 in restitution to the state of Georgia, and a public apology, as the Deseret News reported.

• A day after Powell’s hearing, Kenneth Chesebro, another lawyer on Trump’s legal team who devised a plan to use “alternate electors” to undermine the result of the 2020 election, pleaded guilty to a felony charge, a conspiracy to file false documents. He is required to serve five years of probation, 100 hours of community service and pay $5,000 in restitution.

• On Monday, Jenna Ellis joined Chesebro and Powell, also pleading guilty to one count related to falsifying documents in an unscheduled hearing, as CNN reported.

“If I knew then what I knew now, I would have declined to represent Donald Trump in these post-election challenges. I look back on this experience with deep remorse,” Ellis said in a tearful apology in court.

“As an attorney who is also a Christian, I take my responsibilities as a lawyer very seriously and I endeavor to be a person of sound moral and ethical character in all of my dealings,” Ellis said, adding that she failed to do her “due diligence” in matters related to the 2020 election.

Ellis will also serve probation and pay restitution, in a plea deal similar to those of Powell and Chesebro.

What is DA Fani Willis’ strategy, according to Team Trump?

The three lawyers and the bail bondsman aren’t facing prison time and were not charged with a violation of Georgia’s racketeering law, called the RICO Act. But they are all required to testify in future court hearings related to the case.

Trump’s lawyer Steven Sadow, who stepped in as lead counsel for the case in Georgia, said the plea deals represented a tactic deployed by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis.

“For the fourth time, Fani Willis and her prosecution team have dismissed the RICO charge in return for a plea to probation,” Sadow said, per CNN. “What that shows is this so-called RICO case is nothing more than a bargaining chip for DA Willis.”

Still, it’s hard to say whether the testimonies from the three lawyers will implicate Trump. As The Associated Press reported, Powell has a “history of outlandish, ill-supported claims of fraud” that could possibly affect her credibility.

Anthony Michael Kreis, a Georgia State University law professor, told AP that the district attorney’s office is “trying to shake as many of these codefendants loose as they can and focus on the people they want to focus on.”

Could Trump’s legal troubles take a turn for the worse?

Amid his growing legal troubles, Trump, who pleaded not guilty in the Georgia case, acknowledged the potential of facing prison time at a rally in Clive, Iowa.

“What they don’t understand is that I am willing to go to jail if that’s what it takes for our country to win and become a democracy again,” Trump said at the rally on Oct. 16.

Apart from the Georgia 2020 election court proceedings, Trump and his team are juggling three other cases related to his alleged involvement in the Jan. 6 insurrection, his handling of classified documents, and his efforts to falsify business records.

The case related to Jan. 6, 2021, led by Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith, could potentially benefit from Trump’s lawyers cooperating with Willis.