Trump’s lawyers try for a third day to get NY appeals court to delay hush-money trial
NEW YORK — Donald Trump’s lawyers tried for the third day in a row on Wednesday to get an appeals court in New York to postpone his hush-money trial, which was set to begin next Monday.
Trump’s legal team has asked the appeals court to halt the case indefinitely while it fights to have the judge removed, according to a person familiar with the matter. They are challenging several recent rulings by Judge Juan M. Merchan, including his refusal to delay the trial until the Supreme Court rules on an immunity claim he filed in one of his other criminal cases, the person said.
The former president’s lawyers filed paperwork Wednesday asking the state’s mid-level appeals court to intervene and issue an order preventing jury selection from beginning as scheduled. The paperwork related to Trump’s final call was sealed and no documents were publicly available.
The person who confirmed the subject of the procedural document was not authorized to speak about it publicly and did so on condition of anonymity.
A listing shows Wednesday’s action was designed as a new attempt to charge Merchan under a state law known as Section 78, which allows judges to be prosecuted over certain court decisions.
An appeals court judge was scheduled to hear arguments during an emergency hearing Wednesday afternoon.
An appeals court judge on Monday rejected Trump’s bid to delay the trial while he tries to move it out of Manhattan. Another judge on Tuesday rejected a request, filed as part of a lawsuit against Merchan, to delay the trial while Trump fights a silence order imposed on him in recent weeks.
Trump has separately demanded that Merchan throw out the case, accusing him of bias and conflict of interest, citing his daughter’s work as head of a firm whose clients include President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and other Democrats are.
Merchan denied a similar request in August and has not yet ruled on Trump’s pending request. The judge also has yet to rule on another request for a delay from the defense, which claims that Trump will not receive a fair trial because of “adverse media reporting.”
Last Wednesday, Merchan rejected the presumptive Republican nominee’s request to delay the trial until the Supreme Court rules on the presidential immunity claims he raised in his election interference case in Washington, DC. The Supreme Court will hear arguments in the case on April 25.
Trump’s hush money trial is the first of his four criminal charges to go to trial and would be the first-ever criminal trial of a former president.
He is accused of falsifying his company’s records to conceal the nature of payments to his former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen, who helped Trump bury negative stories during his 2016 campaign. Cohen’s activities included paying porn actor Stormy Daniels $130,000 to suppress her claims of an extramarital sexual encounter with Trump years earlier.
Trump pleaded not guilty last year to 34 felony counts of falsifying company records. He has denied having a sexual encounter with Daniels. His lawyers argue that the payments to Cohen were legitimate legal fees.