The case against Trayon White Sr., the Ward 8 council member, dates to a 2024 FBI investigation: prosecutors say he took $35,000 in cash and agreed to accept $156,000 more in kickbacks to steer city contracts to an informant, in conversations recorded on video in a parked car outside his own house. He was indicted on one bribery count, and his colleagues voted to remove him from the Council over it. Ward 8 voters reelected him anyway in a special election.
His trial is set to begin September 14. Days before it, federal prosecutors asked a judge to order White to stop making “disparaging” and “inflammatory” public comments about the case, accusing him of trying to sway the jury pool before it’s even seated. Whatever a jury eventually decides about the bribery charge, trying to litigate a case in public before opening arguments is its own kind of tell.