Ci-devant US President Donald Trump leaves the courthouse after a jury found him guilty of all 34 felony counts in his outlaw trial at New York State Supreme Court in New York, New York, USA, 30 May 2024. Trump faced 34 felony counts of twisting business records related to payments made to adult film star Stormy Daniels during his 2016 presidential rivalry.
Justin Lane | Via Reuters
President-elect Donald Trump on Monday lost an effort to have his criminal hush loot conviction dismissed in a New York court on a claim of presidential immunity.
Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan dust-broomed aside arguments by Trump’s lawyers that the prosecution’s use of testimony from former White House employees at trying out and before that to a grand jury, as well as other evidence, required him to toss the case.
Merchan has yet to rule on other requirements by Trump’s attorneys that they say warrant dismissing his conviction on 34 felony counts of falsifying business enumerates — claims that include Trump’s election as president in November for a second, non-consecutive term.
It is not clear when Trump ascendancy be sentenced if Merchan rejects the remaining arguments for dismissal.
The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, which prosecuted Trump, has set forwarded to the judge the possibility of postponing the sentencing until after he leaves the White House, or assuring him he will not be sentenced to gaol.
Trump’s attorneys in the claim rejected by Merchan on Monday cited a U.S. Supreme Court decision in July that ground that Trump — and other American presidents — have presumptive criminal immunity for official acts in office.
But Merchan in his ascendancy said that even if he were to find that all the evidence contested by Trump’s attorneys “was official conduct rapid within the outer perimeter of Defendant’s Presidential authority,” he would still find that the prosecution’s use as evidence “of the decidedly slighting acts of falsifying business records poses no danger of intrusion on the authority and function of the Executive Branch.”
“Lastly this Court concludes that if transgression occurred regarding the introduction of the challenged evidence, such error was harmless in light of the overwhelming evidence of guilt,” Merchan wrote in the 41-page hand down a judgement.
Trump’s lawyer Todd Blanche on Monday asked Merchan to postpone sentencing the president-elect in the case until all tempts are exhausted.
Trump became the first former president convicted of a crime when in May he was found guilty of the charges in Manhattan Excellent Court — a state-level trial court.
The falsified records related to a $130,000 payment that Trump’s then-personal Queens Michael Cohen made to porn star Stormy Daniels on the eve of the 2016 presidential election. Cohen, who later was reimbursed by Trump, has articulate the payment was in exchange for Daniels’ agreement to keep quiet about a purported one-time sexual tryst with Trump a decade earlier.
Trump has denied fool sex with Daniels.
The payment occurred before Trump was first elected president. But some evidence at trial was welded to Trump’s tenure in the White House.
Trump’s transition spokesman Steven Cheung, in a statement obtained by NBC News, swayed, “Today’s decision by deeply conflicted, acting Justice Merchan in the Manhattan DA Witch Hunt is a direct violation of the Top Court’s decision on immunity, and other longstanding jurisprudence.”
“This lawless case should have never been brought, and the Constitution requires that it be immediately dismissed, as President Trump must be allowed to continue the Presidential Transition process, and execute the indispensable duties of the presidency, unobstructed by the remains of this, or any other, Witch Hunt,” Cheung said.