The criminal sentencing of Trump will be delayed until after the election
He’s not going to be in person at the Capitol, but he’ll be on the case: The 2021 Washington siege will not happen
Trump will not appear in person at the courthouse, steps away from the Capitol crime scene. Instead, he’s scheduled to give a midday campaign speech at the Economic Club of New York. He has authorized his lawyers to plead not guilty to “each and every count” in a new superseding indictment from special counsel Jack Smith.
This year, voters will decide the race for the presidency — and, by extension, whether Trump will ever face justice on charges that he led overlapping conspiracies to try to cling to power.
A D.C. grand jury indictment accused Trump of actions that culminated in the violent siege at the U.S. Capitol in early 2021. If he regains the White House, Trump is expected to direct new Justice Department leaders to drop the landmark case.
The decision comes after Trump’s lawyers tried to use the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision to clear his record before the election.
Last week, prosecutors retooled the allegations against Trump, scrapping language that mentioned his bid to use the Justice Department to advance phony claims of election fraud. The case was changed to focus on Trump’s role as a political candidate and not as a political officeholder.
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Randall Eliason, a George Washington University law professor, said it is not an easy task to sort through the decision of the court and decide how to apply it at the trial.
The judge has directed Trump and the special counsel team to identify areas where they agree about how to proceed. But there’s virtually no common ground, a point underscored by their late-night court filing the Friday before Labor Day weekend.
Prosecutors said they want to start with the core issue of presidential immunity. They’ve signaled they believe the immunity described by the Supreme Court majority “does not apply” to the new indictment or to “additional unplead categories of evidence the Government intends to introduce at trial and will proffer in its brief.”
If Chutkan agrees, “there could be a lot of allegations coming out in the next couple of months about what’s the proof at trial,” said Eliason, the GWU law professor.
The Attorney General said that the superseding indictment was an attempt to respond to instructions from the Supreme Court about how to effectuate a new indictment. “The special counsel is required by the regulations to follow the policies of the Justice Department, including the election sensitivities policies, and I’m quite confident he did so.”
Perhaps the biggest legal fight ahead will be the role of then-Vice President Mike Pence in any future trial. Trump is charged with leaning on Pence to delay the electoral count on Jan. 6, 2021, as rioters screamed “Hang Mike Pence” outside the Capitol.
The indictment showed that the defendants had a desire to become president of the Senate, but that they did not have an official duty to do so.
The conviction of Trump has been used to raise money. Within 24 hours of the guilty verdict, Trump’s campaign boasted of raising millions of dollars. Since officially being named GOP presidential nominee, he has continued to discuss the trials at various campaign events.
Merchan also postponed consideration on whether to overturn the criminal conviction in light of a recent Supreme Court decision on presidential immunity and other evidence. There is a hearing on November 12.
Evidence like former White House employees, as well as statements he made while in power, violate the Supreme Court ruling that ruled presidents have immunity from prosecution for their official actions, according to his legal team.
“The imposition of sentence will be adjourned to avoid any appearance—however unwarranted—that the proceeding has been affected by or seeks to affect the approaching Presidential election in which the Defendant is a candidate,” Merchan said in his decision. “The Court is a fair, impartial, and apolitical institution.”
A New York judge delayed the sentencing in a criminal case against former President Donald Trump to make sure the court is seen as politically neutral.
The verdict came nearly a year after a grand jury indicted Trump on March 30, giving him the first time a former or sitting president faced criminal charges.
A Manhattan jury examines the case of Donald Trump falsifying records to conceal a $130,000 hush money payment to Stormy Daniels
The jurors were able to choose whether those unlawful means were violating the Federal Election Campaign Act, falsifying tax returns or falsifying other business records.
Steven Cheung said that there should be no sentencing in the election interference witch hunt. “As mandated by the United States Supreme Court, this case, along with all of the other Harris-Biden Hoaxes, should be dismissed.”
New York jurors in May said they unanimously agreed that Trump falsified business records to conceal a $130,000 hush money payment to adult-film star Stormy Daniels to influence the 2016 presidential contest.
The jury heard from 22 witnesses in a Manhattan criminal court. Jurors also weighed other evidence — mostly documents like phone records, invoices and checks to Michael Cohen, Trump’s once-loyal “fixer,” who paid Daniels to keep her story of an alleged affair with the former president quiet.
What prosecutors needed to prove was that Trump falsified the records in order to further another crime — in this case, violating the New York election law that makes it a crime for “any two or more persons [to] conspire to promote or prevent the election of any person to a public office by unlawful means.”
