New York (AP) – President Donald Trump's pursuit to overturn his criminal conviction will be addressed in federal appeals court this Wednesday. This is a crucial step in his effort to negate last year’s controversial verdict regarding hush money.
A panel of three judges has been assigned to evaluate Trump's ongoing struggle to shift New York cases from state court to federal court, where he seeks to nullify the verdict based on presidential immunity.
Republicans are urging the second U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to get involved after a lower court judge denied this request twice. Trump aims to gain jurisdiction over the criminal case in a federal appeals court and ultimately decide to contest the sentence.
According to Trump’s legal team, the Second Circuit “should only be determined once that this unprecedented criminal prosecution of the former and current president of the United States belongs to federal court,” as stated in their court documents.
The Manhattan District Attorney's Office, which is prosecuting Trump's case, hopes to keep it in state court. Trump's Justice Department, now led by former criminal defense lawyers, backs his attempt to transfer the case to federal court.
If Trump loses, he may take the matter to the US Supreme Court.
Trump was found guilty on 34 felony counts in May 2024 for falsifying business records to conceal hush money payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels, an incident that jeopardized the 2016 presidential campaign. Trump has denied any wrongdoing.
Following his indictment in March 2023, Trump's legal team attempted to move the case to federal court, arguing that former federal officials, including the president, have the right to face charges in federal court for actions taken while in office. This criminal case involved a check he issued during his presidency.
They made another attempt after his conviction, asserting that Trump’s historic prosecutors had violated his constitutional rights and referenced the Supreme Court's Presidential Immunity Judgment, decided about a month after the hush money trial concluded.
The control over the former president’s prosecution relating to official conduct places limits on prosecutors when they cite official actions as evidence that the president’s personal conduct is illegal.
US District Judge Alvin Hellerstein denied both motions and concluded that Trump’s claims were related to his personal life, rather than his duties as president.
In a four-page ruling, Hellerstein remarked that the High Court’s decision did not affect his previous determination that, in Trump’s situation, the monetary payments were “a private and informal act outside the scope of the enforcement body.”
Trump’s lawyers argued that prosecutors rushed to trial instead of waiting for the Supreme Court to make a decision on the president’s exemption, claiming that prosecutors improperly engaged judges who should not have been involved under the ruling, including former White House aides who detailed how Trump reacted to media coverage of the payments and tweets sent by the president in 2018.
Trump’s former criminal defense attorney, Todd Blanche, is now the deputy U.S. Attorney General, while another of his attorneys, Emil Bove, holds a prominent role in the Department of Justice.
Judge Juan M. Merchant denied Trump's request to vacate his conviction on the grounds of presidential immunity, issuing an unconditional discharge on January 10th, which left his conviction intact while allowing him to avoid punishment.
Trump, who appeared on video during the ruling, characterized the situation as a “political witch hunt,” a “weaponization of government,” and an “embarrassment toward New York.”
Source: apnews.com