Donald Trump has failed to convince a New York appeals court to postpone an upcoming criminal trial involving a so-called hush money conspiracy, despite his challenge to a gag order prohibiting him from publicly attacking trial participants and court staff members’ families.
On Tuesday, a state appeals court judge rejected his second 11th-hour attempt to further delay the trial, one day after another judge declined his motion to relocate the case out of Manhattan.
Mr. Trump’s latest attempts to postpone the proceedings follow previous failures to halt what will be the first of four criminal trials he is scheduled to face in the coming months.
A grand jury charged the former president with 34 counts of falsifying business records in connection with repayments to his then-lawyer Michael Cohen, who orchestrated a hush money scheme to prevent the release of potentially damaging stories about Mr. Trump and his affair with an adult film star.
According to prosecutors, the case brought by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg could rely on Cohen’s testimony that Mr. Trump authorized his company to falsely file payments as legal expenses as part of an alleged effort to quash stories that could jeopardize then-candidate Trump’s 2016 campaign.
He’s pleaded not guilty.
A full state appeals court panel will start hearing his plea to postpone the trial on Monday, coinciding with the start of jury selection. Mr. Trump’s legal team has until 10 a.m. on Monday to react.
Later this month, the panel will consider his challenge to Judge Merchan’s gag order.
Judge Merchan’s gag order, imposed hours after Mr. Trump lashed out at his daughter on his Truth Social last month, prohibits the former president from making any statements “made with the intent to materially interfere” with any activity in the case.
Last Monday, the judge broadened the order to prevent attacks on family members of court personnel and attorneys participating in the case, citing President Trump’s “very real” threat to the trial’s integrity.
“The average observer must now, after hearing [Mr. Trump’s] recent attacks, draw the conclusion that if they become involved in these proceedings, even tangentially, they should worry not only for themselves but for their loved ones as well,” the judge concluded.
“Such concerns will undoubtedly interfere with the fair administration of justice and constitute a direct attack on the rule of law itself,” he said.
Judge Merchan has also denied Mr. Trump’s request to postpone the trial until the US Supreme Court rules on his “presidential immunity” claim in a separate criminal case involving his attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
The judge has yet to rule on Mr. Trump’s claim that he will not receive a fair trial due to “prejudicial media coverage.” On his Truth Social, Mr. Trump urged that the case be relocated to Staten Island, the only New York borough he won in 2016 and 2020.
Judge Merchan has also yet to rule on Mr. Trump’s plea for the judge to recuse himself from the case, citing his daughter’s political activities.
On Monday, Mr. Bragg’s office rejected his attorneys’ requests, which prosecutors described as an attempt to “pollute” the court and continue Mr. Trump’s attacks “as part of a meritless effort to call the integrity of these proceedings into question.”
Prosecutors described the request as “yet another last-ditch attempt to address [the] defendant’s real objective…to delay this proceeding indefinitely.”
