Judge delays Trump’s hush money sentencing until at least September 18 after immunity ruling
- Trump had been expected to face sentencing on July 11 but judge agreed to weigh possible impact of Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity
Former President Donald Trump’s sentencing in his hush money case has been postponed until at least September after the judge agreed on Tuesday to weigh the possible impact of a new Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity.
Trump had been expected to face sentencing on July 11 on his New York conviction on charges of falsifying business records. He denies any wrongdoing.
The new date is well after this month’s Republican National Convention, where Trump is set formally to accept the party’s nomination for president in this year’s race.
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What if Trump wins?
There was no immediate comment from Trump’s campaign or Manhattan prosecutors, who brought the case.
The immunity decision all but closed the door on the possibility that Trump could face trial in his 2020 election interference case in Washington before this November’s vote. The timeline in itself is a victory for the former president, who has sought to delay his four criminal cases past the balloting.
An appeal court recently paused a separate election interference case against Trump, in Georgia; no trial date has been set. His federal classified documents case in Florida remains bogged down by pretrial disputes that have resulted in an indefinite cancellation of the trial date.
Monday’s Supreme Court ruling granted broad immunity protections to presidents, while also restricting prosecutors from citing any official acts as evidence in trying to prove a president’s unofficial actions violated the law.
Hours after it was issued, Trump’s lawyer requested that New York Judge Juan Merchan set aside the jury’s guilty verdict and delay the sentencing to consider how the High Court’s ruling could affect the hush money case.
Merchan wrote that he will rule on September 6, and the next date in the case would be September 18, “if such is still necessary”.
In their filing on Monday, defence lawyers argued that Manhattan prosecutors had placed “highly prejudicial emphasis on official-acts evidence”, including Trump’s social media posts and witness testimony about Oval Office meetings.
Prosecutors said before the judge’s decision on Tuesday that they believed those arguments were “without merit” but that they would not oppose adjourning the sentencing for two weeks as the judge considers the matter.
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Donald Trump pleads not guilty to 34 felony counts over 2016 hush money case in New York court
Trump was convicted on May 30 on 34 counts of falsifying business records arising from what prosecutors said was an attempt to cover up a US$130,000 hush money payment to porn actor Stormy Daniels just before the 2016 presidential election.
Daniels claims she had a sexual encounter with Trump in 2006 after meeting him at a celebrity golf tournament in Lake Tahoe. Trump has repeatedly denied that claim, saying at his June 27 debate with Biden: “I didn’t have sex with a porn star.”
Prosecutors said the Daniels payment was part of a broader scheme to buy the silence of people who might have gone public during the campaign with embarrassing stories alleging Trump had extramarital sex. Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen paid Daniels and was later reimbursed by Trump, whose company logged the reimbursements as legal expenses.
Falsifying business records is punishable by up to four years behind bars. Other potential sentences include probation, a fine or a conditional discharge which would require Trump to stay out of trouble to avoid additional punishment. Trump is the first ex-president convicted of a crime.
