New York’s highest appeals court declines to block Trump’s hush money sentencing
9 January 2025, 15:24
A judge at the New York Court of Appeals issued a brief order declining to grant a hearing to the US president-elect’s legal team.
New York’s highest court has declined to block Donald Trump’s upcoming sentencing in his hush money case, leaving the country’s supreme court as the president-elect’s likely last option to prevent the hearing from taking place on Friday.
One judge at the New York Court of Appeals issued a brief order declining to grant a hearing to Mr Trump’s legal team.
Mr Trump has asked the Supreme Court to call off Friday’s sentencing in the hush money case.
His lawyers turned to the nation’s highest court on Wednesday after New York courts refused to postpone the sentencing by Judge Juan M Merchan, who presided over Mr Trump’s trial and conviction last May on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records.
Mr Trump has denied wrongdoing.
In a filing to the top New York court, Mr Trump’s lawyers had said Judge Merchan and the state’s mid-level appellate court both “erroneously failed” to stop the sentencing, arguing that the Constitution required an automatic pause as they appealed the judge’s ruling upholding the verdict.
While Judge Merchan has indicated he will not impose jail time, fines or probation, Mr Trump’s lawyers argued a felony conviction would still have intolerable side effects, including distracting him as he prepared to take office.
Mr Trump’s lawyers have argued that the Manhattan trial violated last summer’s supreme court ruling giving him broad immunity from prosecution over acts he took as president. At the least, they have said, the sentencing should be delayed while their appeals play out on the immunity issue.
Judges in New York have found that Mr Trump’s convictions related to personal matters rather than official acts.
His lawyers called the case politically motivated, and said that the sentencing threatened to disrupt the Republican’s presidential transition as he prepared to return to the presidency on January 20.
Sentencing Mr Trump now would be a “grave injustice”, his lawyer D John Sauer wrote.
Mr Sauer is also Mr Trump’s pick to be solicitor general, who represents the government before the high court.
The emergency motion to the US supreme court was submitted to Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who hears emergency appeals from New York.
