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Trump tries again to get Friday’s hush money sentencing called off
7 January 2025, 18:04
Mr Trump is again seeking an immediate stay that would delay him from being sentenced.
US President-elect Donald Trump tried again on Tuesday to delay this week’s sentencing in his hush money case, asking a New York appeals court to intervene as he fights to avoid the finality of his conviction before he returns to the White House.
Mr Trump turned to the Appellate Division of the state’s trial court a day after the trial judge, Judge Juan M Merchan, rebuffed his bid to indefinitely postpone sentencing and ordered it to go ahead as scheduled on Friday.
Mr Trump is seeking an immediate stay that would spare him from being sentenced while he appeals against Judge Merchan’s decision last week to uphold the historic verdict.
Oral arguments were expected before a single judge later on Tuesday, with a decision likely soon thereafter.
The scheduling drama is playing out less than two weeks before Mr Trump’s inauguration. He is poised to be the first president to take office convicted of crimes.
If Mr Trump’s sentencing does not happen before his second term starts on January 20, it may have to wait until he leaves office in 2029 because of the widely held belief, endorsed by Judge Merchan, that a sitting president is immune from criminal proceedings.
Judge Merchan has signalled that he is not likely to punish Mr Trump for his conviction on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records and will accommodate his transition by allowing him to appear at sentencing by video, rather than in person at a Manhattan court.
Still, the Republican and his lawyers contend that his sentencing should not go forward because the conviction and indictment should be dismissed. They have previously suggested taking the case all the way to the US Supreme Court.
Judge Merchan “is without authority under the law to proceed to sentencing while President Trump exercises his federal constitutional right to challenge these rulings,” Mr Trump’s lawyers Todd Blanche and Emil Bove wrote in a filing with the Appellate Division.
Last Friday, Judge Merchan denied Mr Trump’s bid to throw out his conviction and dismiss the case because of his impending return to the White House. He previously refused to toss the case on presidential immunity grounds.
Mr Trump’s lawyers are challenging both rulings.
Judge Merchan wrote that the interests of justice would be served only by “bringing finality to this matter” through sentencing. He said giving Mr Trump what is known as an unconditional discharge — closing the case without jail time, a fine or probation — “appears to be the most viable solution”.
Manhattan prosecutors have pushed for sentencing to proceed as scheduled, “given the strong public interest in prompt prosecution and the finality of criminal proceedings”.
The charges involved an alleged scheme to hide a hush money payment to adult film actress Stormy Daniels in the last weeks of Mr Trump’s 2016 campaign to keep her from publicising claims she had had sex with him years earlier. He says that her story is false and that he did nothing wrong.
The case centred on how Mr Trump accounted for reimbursing his then-personal lawyer Michael Cohen, who had made the payment to Ms Daniels.
The conviction carried the possibility of punishment ranging from a fine or probation to up to four years in prison.
Mr Trump’s sentencing was initially set for July 11 last year, then postponed twice at the defence’s request.
After Mr Trump’s November 5 election victory, Judge Merchan delayed the sentencing again so the defence and prosecution could contribute on the future of the case.
Elsewhere on Tuesday, a federal judge temporarily blocked the public release of special counsel Jack Smith’s report on investigations into Mr Trump as an appeals court considers a challenge.
US District Judge Aileen Cannon made the ruling on Tuesday, the morning after an emergency request by defence lawyers to stop the Justice Department from making the report public — a step that Mr Smith had said could come as early as Friday.
The matter is being considered by the Atlanta-based 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals.