Politics
JUST IN: Judge Merchan Considers Throwing Out Trump Convictions
New York Judge Juan Merchan has admitted he is giving serious consideration to dismissing the Trump case under his purview, citing both the president-elect’s decisive victory and the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling earlier this year.
Trump was originally set to be sentenced in July, one month after being found guilty on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records to obscure a payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels. The charges, resurrected by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, and subsequent conviction carried the possibility of prison time. At the request of President Trump’s lawyers and as a result of the election, Judge Merchan begrudgingly agreed to delay the sentencing hearing until November 26th, one which is now all but certain to never see the light of day according to CNN’s chief legal affairs correspondent Paula Reid.
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“I’m told that his legal team is going to try to make sure that sentencing never happens,” she told anchor Jake Tapper, the New York Post reported. “As we know, their usual strategy is always to just try to get things delayed. But here they’re going to argue to the judge that the sentencing should never happen because now that Trump is president-elect, they will say that he is entitled to the same constitutional protections as a sitting president and should be protected from state actors and in this case, state prosecutors and the judge overseeing that case.”
“He’s giving himself a deadline of November 12th to decide if the conviction against Trump should be tossed based on the Supreme Court’s recent ruling on immunity. If he tosses the conviction, there’ll be no sentencing. But if that sentencing continues to go forward, this is the argument that the Trump team is going to make.”
Trump, 78, was already appealing the conviction in light of the Supreme Court’s decision on presidential immunity. Other legal experts told the Post that all hopes of seeing the president-elect in a striped jumpsuit are now dead and dashed. “Merchan doesn’t have the stomach to imprison a former president or president-elect,” former prosecutor Neama Rahmani said. “Now that Trump has won, his criminal problems go away.”
In August, a federal judge dismissed the classified documents case against Trump brought by Biden Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith, citing the immunity ruling. President-elect Trump is expected to move swiftly to dismiss Smith’s second case alleging election interference resulting from the January 6th, 2021 riots at the Capitol, but the federal prosecutor has more immediate concerns. Shortly before the election, the Republican has promised to fire Smith “within two seconds” of taking office, the BBC previously reported, as he flexes his grip over the Justice Department and installs a trustworthy U.S. attorney general. He has long called the criminal and civil cases against him as part of a “political witch hunt” intended to kill his campaign.
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