Former President Donald Trump continues to face at least some criticism inside the Republican Party, even if he leads in most surveys from its 2024 primary.
Jenna Ellis, a lawyer who was involved in challenges to the 2020 presidential election’s results, appearing in states around the country to push the Trump team’s claims, has been targeting Trump on X (the platform formerly called Twitter) and elsewhere. She has indicated that she supports Florida GOP Governor Ron DeSantis.
“Has Trump defended the J6ers?” Ellis asked in one post. “Has Trump defended the indicted lawyers? Has Trump defended the pastors jailed or threatened with fines over Fauci’s failed covid policies Has he paid for anyone’s legal defense except himself (oh and Jason Miller’s child support lawyer)?” Ellis has spoken about a lack of support for her legal costs from Trump’s camp. She is among the 19 defendants charged in Georgia’s Trump case, where Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis alleged a wide-ranging conspiracy to target the state’s election results from 2020.
In another post that metrics on X claimed was viewed hundreds of thousands of times, Ellis agreed with the sentiment that Trump is now “too old” to be president. She was responding to an assertion to that effect from businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, another contender in the GOP presidential primary who has not made a huge dent against Trump’s polling lead. Though he’s surged a bit recently, Ramaswamy is still not in double digits in the average of national polling that is maintained by FiveThirtyEight, the elections data and analysis site.
The list of defendants in Georgia of which Ellis is a part is substantial, ranging from Rudy Giuliani and Mark Meadows to John Eastman and Jeffrey Clark. Though several of those targeted in the case have sought a quick trial, that’s not the approach the former president himself wants. In the federal criminal case against Trump that covers substantially similar ground, Trump’s team wanted to go to trial in 2026 — five years after the events of January 6! The judge selected March 2024.
