Trump Election Lawyer Facing Disbarment Decides to Go Ahead and Just Retire

Lin Wood, a former member of Donald Trump’s legal team and one of the foremost pushers of the lie that the 2020 election was rigged, has permanently retired from practicing law.

Wood isn’t exactly riding into the sunset after an esteemed career. He’s faced a slew of legal action since his effort to overturn President Joe Biden’s win failed, which the The Daily Beast recounted last month. Wood and some of his colleagues have been accused of misconduct in Michigan for filing bogus election lawsuits; he’s feuded with various other right-wing conspiracists and three of his former colleagues have sued him for defamation; and the state of Georgia held a disciplinary trail in May and is currently deciding whether to disbar him. His permanent retirement would prevent the state from doing so.

“I hereby request that I be permitted to transfer to Retired Status effectively immediately,” he wrote in a letter filed to the State Bar of Georgia on Tuesday. “I further understand and acknowledge that if granted Retired Status I am prohibited from practicing law in this State and in any other state or jurisdiction and that I may not apply for readmission.” Wood added that he is aware that he can’t retire without permission from the state bar, given that “there are two disciplinary proceedings pending against me.”

Wood is certainly not the first former Trump lawyer to come under legal fire following the effort to overturn the 2020 election. Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell have both been sued for defamation for pushing lies about rigged voting machines. John Eastman, the mastermind of the fake electors scheme that supposedly would have allowed Trump to stay in office, is facing nearly a dozen disciplinary charges the State Bar Court of California and could be disbarred himself. The home of Jeffrey Clark, the former Justice Department official Trump wanted to elevate to attorney general, was raided by the FBI last year as part of the DOJ’s investigation into the effort to overturn the election. Giuliani, Powell, Eastman, and Clark have all been in the crosshairs of federal prosecutors, and Wood was called to testify in Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ investigation into election meddling in Georgia.

Wood is may be the most caustic and conspiratorial character of the lot, though. He’s waged war against several prominent right-wing figures, accusing Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn of being Deep State operatives. He even told The Daily Beast that Greene was “under the influence of the devil.”

“I look at the people who have come out and attacked me, the commentators in the media: Tucker Carlson; Dan Bongino; this guy with the fake accent, Sebastian Gorka; the guy that runs Turning Point USA, Charlie Kirk,” he told far-right podcaster Stew Peters in 2021. “Not one of those people ever picked up the phone and tried to reach me to get my side of the story. They’re all in it together. If you want to start identifying Deep State members of the media, start looking at the people — including Sean Hannity — that set this up to attack Lin Wood.”

It stands to reason that it’s probably not a good idea for Wood to continuing practicing law, one way or another.

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