Former U.S. President Donald Trump feedback as he leaves the courthouse after a jury discovered him responsible of all 34 felony counts in his felony trial at New York State Supreme Court docket on Might 30, 2024.
Justin Lane | Through Reuters
A New York decide on Tuesday delayed Donald Trump‘s sentencing date in his felony hush cash case by greater than two months, following a request by the previous president’s attorneys to problem his conviction.
Trump’s felony sentencing, if it nonetheless occurs, will now happen Sept. 18, about seven weeks earlier than the Nov. 5 presidential election.
Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, was beforehand set to be sentenced July 11. However Manhattan Supreme Court docket Decide Juan Merchan in Tuesday’s order canceled that date, whereas granting a request by Trump’s attorneys to file a movement looking for to overturn his responsible verdict.
That request got here in mild of Monday’s bombshell Supreme Court ruling that former presidents are entitled to “presumptive immunity” for all official acts they carried out in workplace.
Trump’s legal professionals now have till July 10 to file a movement to put aside the hush cash verdict. Prosecutors, who didn’t oppose Trump’s bid to delay the sentencing date, should file their response by July 24.
Merchan mentioned he’ll attain a choice on the matter by Sept. 6. Trump’s sentencing will happen Sept. 18 at 10 a.m. ET, “if such continues to be vital,” Merchan dominated.
The Supreme Court docket’s 6-3 determination immediately threatened to undermine a number of the quite a few energetic felony instances in opposition to Trump.
The hush money case, which is able to possible be the one one in opposition to Trump to go to trial earlier than the Nov. 5 presidential election, ended on Might 30 with Trump’s conviction on 34 counts of falsifying enterprise data.
The case centered on a $130,000 payment made shortly earlier than the 2016 election to porn star Stormy Daniels, who says she had intercourse with Trump whereas he was married years earlier. Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen, who made the cost, was reimbursed by Trump after he turned president.
In a letter to Merchan on Monday, Trump’s attorneys requested for a July 10 deadline to submit a authorized memo in help of their bid to put aside the responsible verdict.
And “due to the complexity of the problems offered,” they added, “President Trump doesn’t object to an adjournment of the July 11, 2024 sentencing date as a way to permit sufficient time for full briefing, oral argument, and a choice.”
The attorneys argued within the letter that, beneath the Supreme Court docket’s newest ruling, sure proof prosecutors launched at trial “ought to by no means have been put earlier than the jury” as a result of it pertained to official presidential acts. Their letter referenced the then-president’s social media posts and public statements.
“The verdicts on this case violate the presidential immunity doctrine and create grave dangers of ‘an Government Department that cannibalizes itself,’” they wrote, quoting the bulk opinion from Chief Justice John Roberts.
“After additional briefing on these points starting on July 10, 2024, will probably be manifest that the trial end result can not stand,” Trump’s legal professionals wrote.
Prosecutors from the Manhattan District Legal professional’s workplace, in their very own letter to Merchan on Tuesday, mentioned they consider Trump’s arguments are meritless.
However “we don’t oppose his request for depart to file and his putative request to adjourn sentencing pending dedication of his movement,” the prosecutors wrote.
The Supreme Court docket’s ruling got here as a part of a separate felony case charging Trump with illegally conspiring to overturn his loss to President Joe Biden within the 2020 election.
That case was placed on ice for months whereas Trump and particular counsel Jack Smith grappled over whether or not former presidents are immune from prosecution for his or her official acts.
Judges in federal district courtroom and the federal appellate circuit in Washington, D.C., had rejected Trump’s declare of “absolute immunity” for all official acts.
However the Supreme Court docket’s six-member conservative majority vacated these choices, ruling Monday that ex-presidents have “at the very least presumptive immunity from prosecution” for these acts.
That immunity holds “until the Authorities can present that making use of a felony prohibition to that act would pose no ‘risks of intrusion on the authority and capabilities of the Government Department,’” Roberts wrote.
The bulk additionally appeared to restrict the proof that can be utilized in a felony prosecution of a former president, even when they’re solely accused of unofficial conduct.
Utilizing proof of official conduct in such a prosecution would defeat the meant impact of the president’s immunity, Roberts wrote. Doing so “would thereby heighten the prospect that the President’s official decisionmaking shall be distorted.”
The choice drew a vehement response from the courtroom’s three liberal justices, together with Sonia Sotomayor, who expressed “worry for our democracy” in a scathing dissent.
