Donald Trump’s attempt to have the criminal case over hush money payments to an adult film star transferred to federal court was further thwarted when a US appeals court late on Thursday rejected to intervene in a lower judge’s decision to maintain the case in state court.
On August 29, almost three months after being found guilty in the nation’s first-ever criminal prosecution of a sitting president, Trump requested that US District Judge Alvin Hellerstein transfer the case from Manhattan’s state court to federal court, citing constitutional rights violations during the trial.
Because the jury at the trial saw proof of Trump’s official acts as president, the Republican contender for president in the November 5 election, Donald Trump, declared that he would petition the federal court to dismiss the case entirely if it were moved.
He claimed that went against a significant ruling by the US Supreme Court, which established presidents’ extensive immunity from prosecution for official acts.
On September 3, Hellerstein rejected the motion, citing the fact that the case involved “private, unofficial acts, outside the bounds of executive authority.” As it reviewed the merits of his case, Trump requested that the Second US Circuit Court of Appeals postpone that ruling.
Trump’s appeal was refused by a three-judge panel at the Second Circuit, citing Judge Juan Merchan’s decision to move Trump’s sentencing date from September 18 to November 26. Merchan expressed his desire to prevent any erroneous belief that he had a political agenda in his writing.
Merchan will now choose on November 12th whether to dismiss the case due to the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling, which resulted from a different federal criminal lawsuit that Trump is facing about his attempts to reverse his defeat to Joe Biden in the 2020 election. With numerous legal issues still looming over him, Trump entered a not-guilty plea in that case.
A jury in the New York state case found Trump guilty on May 30 of felony falsifying business records to conceal the $130,000 payment made by his former attorney Michael Cohen to adult film actor and producer Stormy Daniels in exchange for her silence regarding an alleged sexual encounter with Trump before the 2016 election. The former president has pledged to appeal his conviction after he is jailed and denies ever having sex with Daniels.
