Following the Supreme Court’s immunity decision, the judge in Donald Trump’s hush money case faces the task of applying the ruling to Trump’s criminal conviction.
With Donald Trump’s sentencing in his New York hush money case delayed until September following Tuesday’s decision by Judge Juan Merchan, the judge now faces the task of applying the Supreme Court’s new test for the limits of presidential immunity to the former president’s criminal conviction.
Trump in May was found guilty on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records related to a 2016 hush money payment to adult film actress Stormy Daniels in order to boost his electoral prospects in the 2016 presidential election.
Trump’s lawyers have argued that the judge should «set aside» the jury’s verdict in the case because the jury heard evidence during the trial that would have been protected by presidential immunity, based on Monday’s ruling by the Supreme Court that Trump is entitled to «at least presumptive immunity» from criminal prosecution for official acts taken while in office.
To rule on the defense’s request — which Judge Merchan plans to do by Sept. 6 — he will likely have to answer two key questions, according to former federal prosecutor Jarrod Schaeffer.
The first question is, would the Supreme Court’s decision have limited some of the evidence and testimony at trial?
Rather than argue that Trump’s conduct related to Daniels’ hush money payment constituted official acts of the presidency — an argument a federal judge rejected last year — Trump’s lawyers have focused on what they have called «official-acts evidence.»
Evidence including Trump’s social media posts in 2018, a government ethics disclosure, and phone records were cited as examples of evidence related to official acts that prosecutors emphasized during their closing arguments to the jury.
Prosecutors introduced some of Trump’s tweets about his former lawyer Michael Cohen to emphasize what they called a «pressure campaign» to prevent him from cooperating with investigators in 2018.
«Michael is a businessman for his own account/lawyer who I have always liked & respected. Most people will flip if the Government lets them out of trouble, even if it means lying or making up stories», Trump wrote in an April 2018 tweet.
