Donald Trump’s sentencing in the hush money case has been delayed indefinitely and New York Judge Juan Merchan has opened the door for the charges to be thrown out.
It was the latest stunning turnaround in the case, where Trump had been scheduled to be sentenced before the election aft his conviction on 34 counts of falsifying financial records.
That sentencing, which could have brought four years of jail time, was delayed. Trump’s team wants the case tossed entirely, now that their client, set to become the 47th president and already the first former president to be convicted of a crime, is set to take the reins of power.
Underlining the peculiarities of the case, Trump’s lawyer Todd Blanche, who urged the case get tossed, is now being nominated to be the No. 2 official at the Department of Justice.
‘Just as a sitting President is completely immune from any criminal process, so too is President Trump as President-elect,’ wrote lawyer Todd Blanche and lawyer Emil Bove, who is also nominated to a top DOJ post, in a filing to judge Merchan.
It came after Trump’s lawyers wrote the judge calling for an ‘immediate dismissal’ as mandated by the ‘federal Constitution, the Presidential Transition Act of 1963, and the interest of justice.’
It is necessary in order to ensure an ‘orderly transition of power,’ the filing went on.
An Office of Legal Counsel memo protecting the president from prosecution, along with the Supreme Court’s summer decision on presidential immunity, is also causing the collapse of Trump’s other criminal cases.
Trump’s incoming White House communications director Steven Cheung declared victory in a statement released by the Trump transition.
‘In a decisive win for President Trump, the hoax Manhattan Case is now fully stayed and sentencing is adjourned. President Trump won a landslide victory as the American People have issued a mandate to return him to office and dispose of all remnants of the Witch Hunt cases,’ Cheung said in a statement.
‘All of the sham lawfare attacks against President Trump are now destroyed and we are focused on Making America Great Again,’ he added. A jury convicted Trump on 34 counts of falsifying business records but Trump’s lawyers argued it would be a miscarriage of justice to continue after Trump was reelected.
Merchan granted Donald Trump permission to seek dismissal of his hush money criminal case, in which he was found guilty earlier this year, in light of his victory in the Nov. 5 U.S. presidential election.
Trump, 78, had been scheduled to be sentenced on Nov. 26. But prosecutors with Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office earlier this week asked New York State Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan to consider deferring all proceedings in the case until after Trump finishes his four-year presidential term that begins on Jan. 20.
Lawyers for Trump, a Republican, have argued that the case must be dismissed because having it loom over him while he was president would cause what they called “unconstitutional impediments” to his ability to govern.
Bragg’s office said they would argue against dismissal, but agreed Trump deserved time to make his case through written motions.
Merchan on Friday set a Dec. 2 deadline for Trump to file his motion to dismiss, and gave prosecutors until Dec. 9 to respond.
The trial itself featured bombshell testimony from porn star Stormy Daniels, who claims she had a 𝑠e𝑥ual encounter with Trump and who received a $130,000 payoff weeks before the 2016 elections.
It also included an appearance by former Trump ‘fixer’ Michael Cohen, who testified about what he calls Trump’s ‘dirty deeds’, but who now himself believes the case should be dismissed.