NEW YORK (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump asked a judge Monday to halt this week’s sentencing in his hush money case while they appeal his recent rulings upholding the verdict.
Trump’s lawyers said they plan to ask a state appeals court to reverse Judge Juan M. Merchan’s decision last week, which set the case for sentencing on Friday — little over a week before he’s sworn in for his second term.
In a pair of rulings in recent weeks, Merchan rejected Trump’s bid to throw out the verdict and dismiss the indictment on presidential immunity grounds and because of his impending return to the White House.
In a decision last week, the judge signaled he is not likely to sentence Trump, a Republican, to any punishment for his historic conviction on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. Acknowledging the demands of the transition process, he had given Trump the option to attend in person or appear virtually by video.
Trump’s lawyers argued in court papers Monday that their planned appeal to the Appellate Division of the state’s trial court triggers what’s known as an automatic stay, or pause, in the proceedings. If that doesn’t happen, they argued, Merchan should then grant a pause and prevent sentencing from happening on Friday as scheduled.
“Today, President Trump’s legal team moved to stop the unlawful sentencing in the Manhattan D.A.’s Witch Hunt,” Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung said. “The Supreme Court’s historic decision on Immunity, the state constitution of New York, and other established legal precedent mandate that this meritless hoax be immediately dismissed.”
A message seeking comment was left for the Manhattan district attorney’s office, which prosecuted the case.
While Trump asserted that presidential immunity and his looming second term necessitated nixing the verdict, Merchan wrote in his Jan. 3 ruling that only “bringing finality to this matter” by sentencing Trump would serve the interests of justice.
The judge wrote that sentencing Trump to what’s known as an unconditional discharge — closing the case without jail time, a fine or probation — “appears to be the most viable solution.”
Trump will have an opportunity to speak at his sentencing, as will his lawyers and prosecutors. Once he is sentenced, he can appeal the verdict, as he has vowed to do.
Trump is on course to be the first president to take office convicted of felony crimes. In a social media post, he said it “would be the end of the Presidency as we know it” if the judge’s ruling upholding the May 30 verdict is allowed to stand.
The charges involved an alleged scheme to hide a hush money payment to porn actor Stormy Daniels in the last weeks of Trump’s 2016 campaign to keep her from publicizing claims she’d had sex with him years earlier. He says that her story is false and that he did nothing wrong.
The case centered on how Trump accounted for reimbursing his then-personal lawyer Michael Cohen, who had made the payment to Daniels. The conviction carried the possibility of punishment ranging from a fine or probation to up to four years in prison.
Cohen, a key prosecution witness who had previously called for Trump to be put in prison, said that “based upon all of the intervening circumstances” Merchan’s decision to sentence Trump without punishment “is both judicious and appropriate.”
Trump’s sentencing initially was set for last July 11, then postponed twice at the defense’s request. After Trump’s Nov. 5 election, Merchan delayed the sentencing again so the defense and prosecution could weigh in on the future of the case.
