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Donald Trump’s legal team is asking to delay sentencing and any other substantive actions in the hush money case while a new effort to move the case to federal court plays out, according to a letter obtained by CNN.
The request to New York State Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan cites special counsel Jack Smith’s move this week to secure a new indictment against Trump in the federal election interference case that tailors the allegations in light of the Supreme Court’s immunity decision.
The superseding indictment, Trump’s lawyers say, helps the former president’s argument for a dismissal in the New York case.
“Those prosecutors’ unsuccessful efforts to purge the taint of the Presidential immunity violations identified by the Supreme Court in Trump, by obtaining a new charging instrument from a different grand jury, are consistent with President Trump’s position in this case that (District Attorney of New York’s) use of official-acts evidence in grand jury proceedings requires dismissal,” the letter states.
“In order to allow adequate time … to address President Trump’s recent federal submission and to avoid the forms of prejudice and irreparable harm detailed in that filing, President Trump respectfully requests that this Court refrain from deciding the pending Presidential immunity motion until after the US District Court has had an opportunity to resolve the Second Removal Notice with input from all parties,” the letter adds.
Merchan has said he would issue a ruling the week of September 16 on Trump’s motion to vacate the conviction in the wake of the SCOTUS presidential immunity ruling that determined Trump has broad sweeping immunity for “official acts” while he was in office.
Trump filed a petition Thursday asking a federal court in Manhattan to remove his state criminal case to its jurisdiction considering the Supreme Court ruling. The filing in federal court also says the state court shouldn’t sentence Trump until that federal request for removal is litigated.
Trump has asked to delay the sentencing – a request Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s office did not oppose – and the judge was expected to rule on that as soon as next week, according to CNN’s reporting.
In the latest letter Trump’s attorneys say “there is no good reason” to sentence him before Election Day, asking Merchan to indefinitely delay the sentencing currently scheduled for September 18.
“There is no good reason to sentence President Trump prior to November 5, 2024, if there is to be a sentencing at all, or to drive the post-trial proceedings forward on a needlessly accelerated timeline relative to the manner in which similar issues are being addressed by the Special Counsel’s Office and the Department of Justice,” the letter says.
Trump was convicted earlier this year of 34 charges of falsifying business records, stemming from his hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels.
