• Trump will try to use his new status as president-elect to his advantage in New York, experts tell BI.
• Trump should immediately request a postponement of his sentencing, they predicted Wednesday.
• He could also use his new status to step up his ongoing efforts at the state and federal level to delay sentencings.

Donald Trump will use his new status as president-elect in a renewed effort to challenge his upcoming conviction following his secret sentencing in Manhattan, legal experts predicted Wednesday.

Asset, the only American president to be convicted of a felony, is scheduled to be sentenced Nov. 26. He faces as little prison time as possible and up to four years in prison for falsifying business records to retroactively hide a secret $130,000 payment to porn actress Stormy Daniels made two weeks before November 26. 2016 election.

As candidate Trump, he fought to delay his sentencing repeatedly, arguing that he was too busy and his responsibilities as GOP standard-bearer were too important for the affair to be interrupted.

He will push this argument even harder as president-elect, as his lawyers continue to pursue their efforts. time-consuming legal challenges through federal and state appeals courts, and eventually the U.S. Supreme Court, as legal experts believe he has the right to do.

“He’s definitely going to start this now,” said Charles Solomon, who served as a state Supreme Court justice in Manhattan for 33 years before his retirement in 2017.

“Wouldn’t you use that argument if you were president-elect? Of course he’s going to claim that he’s about to become the leader of the free world, and that’s a special case, something that doesn’t happen. has never been produced before,” Solomon added.

“What he’s going to try to do is adjourn, adjourn, adjourn” while his lawyers challenge his indictment, trial and conviction on grounds of presidential immunity, Solomon predicted.

“And if he doesn’t get an adjournment, he can appeal,” added the former judge. “He can seek to obtain delays in many ways.”

Trump’s legal challenges to his hush money case

Manhattan prosecutors should expect Trump to file a motion in the coming days asking the trial judge to postpone the Nov. 26 sentencing because he is too busy before taking office, they said. predicted experts on Wednesday.

New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan is meanwhile considering a previous defense request to drop the entire indictment, or at least the conviction. Trump’s defense team argued that prosecutors exposed the trial’s grand jurors and jury to evidence that would be considered evidence of “official acts” – meaning evidence involving actions taken by Trump in his official capacity as president – now banned under the SCOTUS Presidential Immunity Notice.

Prosecutors from Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office countered that any official evidence was used in their case. amounts to a “harmless error”.

Merchan said he would issue a written decision on Tuesday, Nov. 12, a week before the sentencing date. Trump’s lawyers have said they are prepared to immediately appeal in state court if he loses.

In another effort, Trump is fighting to have the case moved to federal court in Manhattan, again on grounds of presidential immunity. A U.S. District Court judge rejected that attempt in September, and the decision remains under appeal to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.

If Merchan wants to proceed with sentencing — and he may consider himself obligated to do so for reasons of speedy trial — Trump can seek a delay from federal and state appeals courts, said Michel Paradis, a lawyer who teaches national security and constitutional law at New York University. Colombian Law School.

“Any of these leads can get you to the United States Supreme Court pretty quickly, if that’s their goal,” Paradis said.

A “unique place in the history of this nation”

Merchan addressed the unique circumstances of Trump’s prosecution, trial and conviction in September, when he agreed to delay sentencing a second time.

The original sentencing date was July 11, Merchan said in a four-page decision who set the date for November.

“However, on July 1, 2024, the Supreme Court of the United States issued a historic and interim decision in Trump v. United States,” a decision to which the defense needed time to respond, wrote Merchan.

He decided to postpone the second sentencing date, September 18, until after the election in recognition of the “unique facts and circumstances of this case,” Merchan wrote at the time.

“This case is unique, at a unique moment in the history of this nation,” the judge added, referring to Trump’s presidential candidacy.

The prosecution of Trump was already unprecedented when Trump was just a candidate and former president, said Mark Bederow, a criminal defense attorney and former prosecutor in the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.

Trump’s election “takes things to a whole new level,” Bederow said. “There is no guide to all of this,” he added. “A state judge is now potentially moving to sentence the most powerful federal officer in the world.”

Even if sentencing occurs before Inauguration Day, it is highly unlikely that as a 78-year-old non-violent first-time offender, Trump will be sentenced to prisonFormer New York City judges told Business Insider.

“What’s Merchan going to do? He’s not going to argue that the next president should go to state prison,” said Solomon, the former judge. “He’s not going to ask him to do community service on the weekends and pick up trash in Central Park when he’s not dealing with the Joint Chiefs of Staff.”

Any sentence Merchan imposes would be stayed, or “stayed,” pending Trump’s appeal of his conviction, which itself would take years, experts said.

Assuming that Trump’s sentencing proposals fail, “Merchan will convict Trump and Trump will appeal the conviction and sentence, first to the New York appeals courts and then to the U.S. Supreme Court. United States,” said former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani.

“It is more likely that Trump will be fined and given a very short sentence and will have to appeal his conviction. This is all unprecedented,” added Rahmani, president of West Coast Trial Lawyers, by way of comment. warning. “And we are in uncharted legal waters.”

Trump’s campaign and lawyers did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A spokesperson for Bragg did not immediately respond to a request for comment.