Former President Donald Trump wants to postpone the upcoming sentencing date in his Manhattan criminal case until after the election, his attorneys said in a letter Thursday reported by multiple outlets, arguing the sentencing would interfere with the election and not give Trump enough time to appeal an upcoming decision on whether the verdict against him should be tossed out.
Former President Donald Trump departs the courtroom after being found guilty on all 34 counts in his ... [+]
Trump’s attorneys asked New York Judge Juan Merchan to delay sentencing until an unspecified point after the election, according to copies of the letter reported by CNN, ABC News and Politico, after the ex-president was convicted on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records.
Merchan is currently set to sentence Trump on September 18, which Trump’s attorneys claimed would play into prosecutors’ purported “naked election-interference objectives” by sentencing Trump while the election is underway.
Delaying the sentencing until after the election “would reduce, even if not eliminate, issues regarding the integrity of any future proceedings,” Trump’s attorneys argued, after they’ve previously claimed—unsuccessfully—that Merchan is biased because his daughter works for a firm connected to Vice President Kamala Harris.
Merchan is also set to rule September 16 on Trump’s motion to throw out the verdict after the Supreme Court gave him some immunity for criminal charges for “official acts” in office, as Trump claims some evidence used against him at trial should not have been allowed under the court’s ruling.
Since that ruling will come out only two days before Trump’s sentencing, the ex-president’s attorneys claim it doesn’t give them enough time to weigh their options for appealing if Merchan rules against Trump, arguing sentencing should only take place after the immunity issue is “addressed fully and finally,” and claiming, “A single business day is an unreasonably short period of time for President Trump to seek to vindicate these rights.”
The Manhattan District Attorney’s office has not yet responded to a request for comment.
“Setting aside naked election-interference objectives, there is no valid countervailing reason for the Court to keep the current sentencing date on the calendar,” Trump’s attorneys wrote. “There is no basis for continuing to rush.”
It’s unclear when Merchan could rule on Trump’s request or if he’ll agree to postpone the sentencing. The judge has already delayed Trump’s sentencing once before, after Trump submitted the motion to have the verdict thrown out, after the sentencing was initially supposed to take place in July. Merchan rejected Trump’s claims that the judge is biased against him in a ruling Wednesday in which Merchan refused to recuse himself from the case, calling Trump’s arguments “unsubstantiated” and writing, “Innuendo and mischaracterizations do not a conflict create.”
This story is breaking and will be updated.