UPDATE: This is an expended version of an earlier post.)
Continuing to use his political candidacy as a legal shield, former President Donald Trump has asked a New York state court judge to delay until after the election a decision on his sentencing on 34 criminal convictions.
In a letter Wednesday to Judge Juan M. Merchan in New York City, lawyers for Trump argued that any sentencing before voters go to the polls on November 5 would mean “naked election interference” and would be “personally and politically prejudicial” to Trump and his family. The text of the letter is here: trump-sentencing delay letter 8-13-24.)
The new legal maneuver, if successful, could also mean that prosecutors in the case would not be filing their recommendation on whether Trump should be given a prison term, a fine or some other punishment. Such a recommendation, before the election, the letter said, could cause “public opprobrium.”
Judge Merchan has set September 18 as the date for a sentencing hearing, with both sides to file sentencing recommendations before that. The judge has indicated that sentencing may not need to be imposed then, if the judge, between now and then, grants Trump’s pending request that the entire prosecution be dismissed because, Trump argues, the case violates the right to presidential immunity that the Supreme Court established in a historic constitutional ruling on July 1.
The judge’s has said that he will make a ruling on the immunity plea on September 16. In the new request for delay in the schedule, Trump’s attorneys noted that there would be only one business day between that ruling and the sentencing, if the case is not dismissed. That, the letter argued, would be “an unreasonably short period of time” for Trump to pursue an appeal if his immunity plea fails. The filing noted that the Supreme Court had required that the immunity issue involving a former President should be resolved before any criminal case goes forward. An appeal of a decision against immunity, the lawyers argued, would bar Judge Merchan from ruling on anything else, including imposing a sentence.
Trump was convicted in May in the New York state case, which involved attempts to cover up a sex scandal involving Trump so that the scandal did not become public in the final weeks of Trump’s successful run for the Presidency in 2016. A Manhattan jury convicted Trump on all 34 counts charged. The judge has the option of sentencing Trump to up to four years in prison.
Although Trump has been charged with crimes in three other jurisdictions, each of those other cases is on hold while pre-trial proceedings or pre-trial appeals go ahead.
The Trump filing asking to put off sentencing told Judge Merchan that early voting in the presidential election will have begun before the September 18 sentencing date. With the coming election being “of paramount importance to the entire Nation,” the letter said, delay of sentencing would “reduce, even if not eliminate,” the appearance that the integrity of the continuing case had been impaired.
Even if sentencing might not actually interfere with the election, the letter contended, there is “no reason for the court to keep the current sentencing date on the calendar. There is no basis for continuing to rush.”
Presumably, New York state prosecutors will respond to the delay request before Judge Merchan rules.
