President-elect Donald Trump recently made a substantial legal maneuver to retaliate against Manhattan Judge Juan Merchan, who is seeking to sentence him before his inauguration later this month. As Trump’s sentencing hearing is scheduled for this Friday, his legal team has petitioned the Supreme Court to intervene to either delay or cancel the sentencing, given his need to serve the United States without the deterrent of legal punishment.
As background, Trump was found guilty of 34 felony counts related to his business documents in the hush money case last year. Shortly after Trump’s decisive victory in the 2024 election, Merchan reportedly considered throwing out the case, given the Supreme Court’s ruling on presidential immunity. However, the judge apparently changed his mind, maintaining that the incoming president should face some form of legal punishment.
The filing with the Supreme Court forces Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg to respond with an anticipated objection if the nation’s highest court rules on the matter before Friday. Trump’s attorneys have argued that the president-elect is immune from the charges he has been convicted of and should, therefore, not face legal punishment.
“This Court should enter an immediate stay of further proceedings in the New York trial court to prevent grave injustice and harm to the institution of the Presidency and the operations of the federal government,” Trump’s legal counsel wrote in the filing. Furthermore, Trump spokesman Steven Cheung also weighed in with a statement to NBC News. “The Supreme Court’s historic decision on Immunity, the Constitution, and established legal precedent mandate that this meritless hoax be immediately dismissed,”
The American Tribune previously reported in December on Judge Merchan’s decision to not toss out the hush money case, despite the Supreme Court’s ruling on presidential immunity. He said, “This Court concludes that if error occurred regarding the introduction of the challenged evidence, such error was harmless in light of the overwhelming evidence of guilt.”
Merchan further argued that the SCOTUS decision is not applicable to the hush money case. “Even if this Court did find that the disputed evidence constitutes official acts under the auspices of the Trump decision, which it does not, Defendant’s motion is still denied as introduction of the disputed evidence constitutes harmless error and no mode of proceedings error has taken place.”
Judge Merchan continued, “Further, even if this Court were to deem all of the contested evidence, both preserved and unpreserved, as official conduct falling within the outer perimeter of Defendant’s Presidential authority, it would still find that the People’s use of these acts as evidence of the decidedly personal acts of falsifying business records poses no danger of intrusion on the authority and function of the Executive Branch, a conclusion amply supported by non-motive-related evidence.”
Watch legal expert Alan Dershowitz explain how the Merchan’s move to sentence Trump is “Stalinism”:
At the time, Trump reacted to the news on Truth Social, writing in part, “BREAKING: In a completely illegal, psychotic order, the deeply conflicted, corrupt, biased, and incompetent Acting Justice Juan Merchan has completely disrespected the United States Supreme Court, and its Historic Decision on Immunity. But even without Immunity, this illegitimate case is nothing but a Rigged Hoax. Merchan, who is a radical partisan, wrote an opinion that is knowingly unlawful, goes against our Constitution, and, if allowed to stand, would be the end of the Presidency as we know it. Merchan has so little respect for the Constitution that he is keeping in place an illegal gag order on me, your President and President-Elect, just so I cannot expose his and his family’s disqualifying and illegal conflicts.”