Donald Trump, the first former US president to be convicted of a criminal offence, in New York at the end of May, would like his sentencing to be postponed from mid-September until after the presidential election on 5 November, according to a request from his lawyer.
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The Republican candidate, who dreams of returning to the White House, has been using arguments for months to delay his trials and, above all, to have this verdict overturned.
Mr. Trump was convicted of 34 counts of falsifying accounting records to cover up a $130,000 payment to a porn actress just before his 2016 presidential victory to keep quiet about a sexual relationship she said she had with him in 2006, something he has always denied.
A lawyer for the former president, Todd Blanche, in a letter dated Wednesday to New York judge Juan Merchan, argues that “there is no legal basis to continue rushing” toward the September 18 sentencing date, except to “pursue objectives that are clearly political interference.”
“The sentencing is scheduled to take place when early voting for the presidential election begins” and “by adjourning it until after that election, the court would resolve, or even eliminate, questions about the integrity of the proceedings,” Mr.e White.
Photo Getty Images via AFP
In a separate move Wednesday, lawyers for Mr. Trump asked that Judge Merchan recuse himself on the grounds that his daughter is tied to the Democratic Party, which fuels “the perception of a conflict of interest.”
The judge, who had referred his personal case to an ethics committee of peers, rejected the Republican billionaire’s “unsubstantial” arguments.
His sentence, with a minimal risk of a prison sentence, was due to be handed down on July 11, but was postponed until September 18 by the U.S. Supreme Court. With a conservative majority, the highest court on July 1er July, expanded the scope of presidential criminal immunity.
The former White House resident (2017-2021) believes that his trial was unnecessary.
But Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who brought the case, argued in late July that there was “no immunity” in the case of “unofficial acts” by a US president.
This question of immunity and therefore of the cancellation of the New York trial will be decided on September 16 by Judge Merchan. If he rejects it, he will pronounce the sentence against Mr. Trump two days later, on the 18th.
