Delay Sentencing? President Trump APPEALS to Federal Court to Intervene

The President is asking a federal court to swoop in and deal with this joke-of-a-case, the so-called hush money trial.

His legal team argues that the prosecution stepped all over his constitutional rights.

Not only that, they ignored the Supreme Court’s recent “presidential immunity” ruling.

Basically, they’re looking to press pause on his sentencing long enough to overturn it.

Something will have to give way quickly.

The sentencing is supposed to take place next month, on Sept. 18.

BREAKING: Donald Trump asks federal court to intervene in his hush money case in a bid to overturn his conviction and delay sentencing. https://t.co/DHEawJYZng

— The Associated Press (@AP) August 30, 2024

CBS News reports:

President Donald Trump asked a federal court late Thursday to intervene in his New York “hush money” criminal case, seeking a pathway to overturn his felony conviction and indefinitely delay his sentencing next month.

Lawyers for the current Republican nominee asked the federal court in Manhattan to seize the case from the state court where it was tried, arguing that the historic prosecution violated his constitutional rights and ran afoul of the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent presidential immunity ruling.

Trump’s lawyers, who failed last year in a pretrial bid to get the case shifted to federal court, said moving it now will give him an “unbiased forum, free from local hostilities” to address those issues. In state court, they said, Trump has been the victim of “bias, conflicts of interest, and appearances of impropriety.”

If the case is moved to federal court, Trump’s lawyers said they will then seek to have the verdict overturned and the case dismissed on immunity grounds.

It really seems like they’re desperate to get Trump behind bars.

But they’re just spinning their wheels. And they’ve got just about 3 weeks until the scheduled sentencing.

So much can happen before then.

The Washington Post adds:

NEW YORK — Donald Trump is making a second effort at getting his state court hush money case removed to federal court as his lawyers engage in aggressive efforts to get his sentencing postponed until after the November election.

In a filing Thursday evening, Trump attorneys Todd Blanche and Emil Bove argued that the former president and current GOP nominee is being harmed by actions taken by the state court judge who has overseen the New York case.

ADVERTISEMENT

Trump was convicted in May of 34 counts of falsifying business records in connection with a hush money payment ahead of the 2016 election. He is scheduled to be sentenced on Sept. 18.

“The ongoing proceedings will continue to cause direct and irreparable harm to President Trump … and voters located far beyond Manhattan,” Blanche and Bove wrote.

Their filing cited a recent Supreme Court decision giving broad immunity to sitting presidents from actions that relate to official duties. While that ruling stemmed from a different criminal case against Trump, his legal team has since argued that a significant part of the Manhattan district attorney’s hush money case relied on evidence and testimony connected to his first year in the White House.