Judge denies Trump’s request to postpone hush money sentencing

President-elect Donald Trump was thwarted in his bid to indefinitely postpone this week’s sentencing in his hush-money case while he appeals against a ruling that upheld the verdict and put him on course to be the first president to take office convicted of crimes.

Manhattan Judge Juan M Merchan ordered Friday’s sentencing to proceed as scheduled, rejecting arguments from Mr Trump’s lawyers who said it should be halted while they ask a state appeals court to reverse his decision to let the conviction stand.

Mr Trump can still ask the appeals court to intervene and order a stay or pause. Otherwise, he’ll be sentenced a little more than a week before he is inaugurated to a second term.

Mr Trump’s lawyers have told Mr Merchan that if his sentencing happens, he will appear by video rather than in person.

The judge had given him the option in light of the demands of the presidential transition process.

Mr Merchan denied Mr Trump’s bid to throw out the verdict because of his impending return to the White House last Friday but signalled that he is not likely to sentence the Republican to any punishment for his conviction on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records.

Mr Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform that it “would be the end of the Presidency as we know it” if it is allowed to stand.

Lawyers for Mr Trump, who are also challenging Mr Merchan’s prior refusal to dismiss the case on presidential immunity grounds, filed appeal paperwork on Monday afternoon in the appellate division of the state’s trial court. No arguments have been scheduled.

They did not ask the court to halt Mr Trump’s sentencing.

Separately, they argued to Mr Merchan that the appeal should trigger an automatic stay of proceedings and, if it doesn’t, that he should step in and do it himself — an idea he rejected.

The Manhattan district attorney’s office had urged Mr Merchan to proceed as scheduled, “given the strong public interest in prompt prosecution and the finality of criminal proceedings”.

Prosecutors blamed Mr Trump for pushing his sentencing to the brink of his second term by repeatedly seeking to postpone his sentencing, which was originally scheduled for July.

“He should not now be heard to complain of harm from delays he caused,” they wrote in a court filing on Monday afternoon.

A spokesperson for Mr Trump, Steven Cheung, said: “Today, President Trump’s legal team moved to stop the unlawful sentencing in the Manhattan DA’s Witch Hunt.

“The Supreme Court’s historic decision on immunity, the state constitution of New York and other established legal precedent mandate that this meritless hoax be immediately dismissed.”

Any delay in sentencing could run out the clock on closing the case before Mr Trump’s second term begins on January 20.

The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, which provides legal advice and guidance to federal agencies, has maintained that a sitting president is immune from criminal proceedings.

If sentencing doesn’t happen before Mr Trump is sworn in, waiting until he leaves office in 2029 “may become the only viable option,” Mr Merchan said in his ruling.

If sentencing proceeds on Friday as scheduled, Mr Trump’s lawyers argued, he will be appealing the verdict while in office and will be “forced to deal with criminal proceedings for years to come”.

They raised an improbable scenario in which, if Mr Trump wins his appeal, he could be then subjected to another criminal trial while in office.

In upholding the verdict and rejecting Mr Trump’s bids for dismissal, Mr Merchan wrote that the interests of justice would only be served by “bringing finality to this matter” through sentencing.

He said sentencing Mr Trump to what is known as an unconditional discharge — closing the case without jail time, a fine or probation — “appears to be the most viable solution”.

However, Mr Trump’s lawyers were unmoved, arguing that the “meritless case” was fostered by “numerous legal errors,” including rulings by Mr Merchan they say flew in the face of the US Supreme Court’s decision last July that granted presidents broad immunity from prosecution.

“The Court’s non-binding preview of its current thinking regarding a hypothetical sentencing does not mitigate these bedrock federal constitutional violations,” defence lawyers Todd Blanche and Emil Bove wrote.

Mr Trump has selected both lawyers for high-ranking Justice Department positions.

Whenever he is sentenced, Mr Trump will have an opportunity to speak, as will his lawyers and prosecutors.

He can only appeal against the verdict after he is sentenced.

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’d 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 Daniels.

The conviction carried the possibility of punishment ranging from a fine or probation to up to four years in prison.

Mr Cohen, a key prosecution witness who had previously called for Mr Trump to be put in prison, said that “based upon all of the intervening circumstances”, Mr Merchan’s decision to sentence Mr Trump without punishment “is both judicious and appropriate”.

Mr Trump’s sentencing initially was set for last July 11, then postponed twice at the defence’s request.

After his November 5 election victory, the judge delayed the sentencing again so the defence and prosecution could weigh in on the future of the case.