President-elect Donald Trump’s sentencing in his New York hush-money case is poised to be postponed — potentially until after the presidency — as Trump’s lawyers contest that his recent election victory requires that the case be dismissed.
The Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, told the court that his office would be open to a four-year freeze on Trump’s sentencing while maintaining that it would continue to back the jury's guilty verdict in the case.
“The people deeply respect the office of the president, are mindful of the demands and obligations of the presidency, and acknowledge that defendant’s inauguration will raise unprecedented legal questions,” Bragg wrote. “We also deeply respect the fundamental role of the jury in our constitutional system.”
Bragg went on to say that “Consideration must be given to various non-dismissal options” including postponing all remaining proceedings in the case “until after the defendant’s upcoming presidential term.”
Trump had been scheduled to be sentenced next week, on Nov. 26, for a conviction on 34 felony counts relating to falsified business records concerning hush money paid to adult film actress Stormy Daniels. Now sentencing appears to be delayed indefinitely.
Trump’s spokesman, Steven Cheung, called the decision by the court a “total and definitive victory for President Trump” and said that Trump’s “legal team is moving to get it dismissed once and for all.”
Judge Juan Merchan, who is overseeing the case, had been scheduled last week to rule on how the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity ruling would affect the case. However, he pushed the deadline to Tuesday to give the prosecution more time to decide how they wanted to move forward. Now it’s not clear whether the case will be dismissed or whether sentencing will be punted until after Trump’s second term in office.
David Schoen, an attorney who represented Trump during his second impeachment, told Salon that he sees today’s developments as potentially foreshadowing the case’s dismissal, saying that the case is now “about the institution of the presidency, not Donald Trump alone” and that he thinks it would not be appropriate for Merchan to delay sentencing for more than four years while Trump is president.
“I believe the case ultimately must be dismissed. He was right to adjourn the sentencing hearing because the issues must be addressed and, in my view, because the entire criminal process should be stopped as a result of the election,” Schoen said. “It is not a matter of any man being above the law or any disrespect to the jury process.”
James Sample, a professor of constitutional law at Hofstra University, agreed that the issue of “respecting the presidency” would be central to Merchan’s judgment but added that he must also balance “respecting a jury verdict.”
“If Judge Merchan delays sentencing until after Mr. Trump’s term of office, that would be prudent and sensible under the indisputably extraordinary circumstances. But a delay in sentencing is not, nor should it be perceived to be, a prelude to a dismissal,” Sample told Salon.
Sample noted that winning an election “should not mean disrespecting another important part of our democracy — the jury trial.”
“The interests can be balanced, and a delayed sentence without a dismissal does just that,” Sample said.
Bennet Gershman, a law professor at Pace University, called this “a watershed moment” and said that Merchan needs to “balance competing interests” regarding the presidency and the jury’s conviction. He believes the prosecution will likely push to have Trump’s sentencing deferred until 2029.
“I see situations similar to this where a defendant has been convicted and sentenced in more than one jurisdiction and the second jurisdiction has to wait sometimes many years until the first sentence is completed,” Gershman said. “These delays happen.”
Whatever the district attorney’s office decides to do, it’s clear that Trump’s legal team will be pushing to have the case dismissed with Trump’s lawyer, Todd Blanche, claiming in a Nov. 8 letter that “dismissal is required because a sitting president may not be prosecuted.” Trump’s team is also likely to appeal any decision to delay sentencing, which would also halt the case in its tracks.
The two federal cases against Trump are also winding down in light of his election victory with special counsel Jack Smith anticipating that Trump will kill his election interference case once he assumes office and a federal judge in Florida dismisses the classified documents case against him. The state-level election interference case in Georgia is also on pause as the court resolves a dispute over whether Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis should remain on the case.
