In a major reprieve for former President Donald Trump, sentencing on his hush-money conviction was delayed Tuesday until at least September after the judge agreed to consider the impact of any new sentence. Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity.
Trump was convicted in New York of a felony count of falsifying business records and was scheduled to be sentenced on July 11, just before the Republican nominating convention. He denies any wrongdoing.
The delay means the earliest a verdict — if one is handed down — can be expected is September 18, as Trump’s legal team argues that the Supreme Court’s decision should not just postpone the verdict, but overturn the conviction.
“The impact of the immunity ruling is a loud and clear signal to the judiciary of the United States,” President Trump boasted on his Truth Social media site after the ruling was postponed.
He argued in capital letters that the Supreme Court ruling gave him a “total exoneration” in this case and other criminal cases he faces.
Manhattan prosecutors who filed the hush money lawsuit had no immediate comment on the postponement.
Sept. 18 is well after this month’s Republican National Convention, where Trump is scheduled to formally accept the party’s nomination for this year’s presidential election, but it’s so close to Election Day that the issue could be top of mind for voters paying close attention to the race. Some states have deadlines for absentee ballots, so some voters may have already cast their ballots before anyone knows whether the former president faces prison or house arrest.
The postponement caps a series of political and legal victories for Trump in recent days, including a Supreme Court immunity ruling and debates. Widely regarded as a disaster For Democratic President Joe Biden.
The immunity decision all but eliminates the possibility that Trump will face trial in Washington on his 2020 election interference case before the November vote. The timeline itself is a victory for the former president, who has sought to delay his four criminal cases until after the vote.
Ann The Court of Appeals recently suspended A separate election interference lawsuit against Trump in Georgia has no trial date set, while a federal classified documents lawsuit in Florida has been stalled by pretrial disputes and a trial date has been postponed indefinitely.
While Monday’s Supreme Court ruling granted the president broad immunity, it also restricted prosecutors from citing any official acts as evidence to prove that the president’s unofficial actions violated the law.
The Supreme Court held that former presidents have absolute immunity from prosecution for conduct that falls within their core constitutional duties, such as their interactions with the Department of Justice, and at least a constructive immunity for all other official conduct. The justices maintained the long-standing principle that there is no immunity for purely personal conduct.
It is unclear what impact the ruling will have on the New York hush money lawsuit.
At its core were allegations that Trump, before taking office, was involved in a scheme to stifle reports of his sexuality for fear that it would hurt his 2016 campaign. But the real allegations concerned money paid in 2017 to his then-lawyer, Michael Cohen, who made hush money payments on Trump’s behalf. Trump signed checks linked to Cohen while he was president.
Before the trial, Trump’s defense team unsuccessfully tried to suppress certain evidence that they said related to his official duties, including social media posts he made as president.
“It’s hard to convince me that something he spontaneously tweeted to millions of people can’t be used in court unless it’s presented as a crime. It’s simply being used as something he did,” Marchan said in April.
Last year, when Trump tried unsuccessfully to move the hush-money lawsuit from state court to federal court; U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein dismissed the former president’s arguments. The allegations in the hush money indictment related to official business.
“The overwhelming evidence suggests that this matter was entirely personal to the president and a cover-up of embarrassing events,” Hellerstein wrote last year.
Hours after the Supreme Court’s decision on Monday, Trump’s lawyers request New York Judge Juan M. Marchand vacated the jury’s guilty verdict and postponed sentencing to consider how the Supreme Court’s decision would affect the hush money lawsuit.
Judge Marchan wrote that sentencing is scheduled for September 6th, with the next hearing in the case being September 18th “if still necessary”.
Trump’s lawyers argued in defense filings Monday that Manhattan prosecutors “placed an excessively biased emphasis on evidence of official conduct,” including Trump’s social media posts and witness testimony about an Oval Office meeting.
The prosecution responded that they believed the allegations were “baseless” but would not oppose a two-week postponement of sentencing while the judge considered the matter.
On May 30, Trump was convicted of 34 counts of falsifying business records in an attempt to conceal $130,000 in hush money paid to porn star Stormy Daniels just before the 2016 presidential election.
Daniels claims she met Trump at a celebrity golf tournament in Lake Tahoe in 2006 and had a sexual relationship with him. Trump has repeatedly denied the allegations, and during a debate with Biden on June 27 he said he had “never had sex with a porn star.”
Associated Press correspondent Julie Walker reports that the Manhattan district attorney will not oppose a stay of sentencing in Trump’s hush money case.
Prosecutors said the payment to Daniels was part of a broader scheme to buy the silence of people who might have gone public with embarrassing stories about Trump having extramarital affairs during the campaign, all of which Trump has maintained were false.
Cohen made the payment to Daniels and was later reimbursed by Trump, whose companies recorded the payment as a legal expense.
Trump’s defense argued that the payments were indeed for legal services and were properly classified.
Falsifying business records is punishable by up to four years in prison. Other penalties include probation, fines and conditional release, in which Trump must stay out of trouble to avoid further penalties. Trump is the first former president to be convicted of a crime.
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Contributing were Associated Press writers Michael R. Sisak in Fort Pierce, Florida, Jill Colvin in New York and Eric Tucker in Washington.
