Donald Trump’s lawyers have asked for the former president’s conviction in his hush-money criminal case to be overturned and his sentencing this month delayed, US media report.
A letter sent by Trump’s lawyers to the New York judge presiding over the trial reportedly cites Monday’s Supreme Court ruling that granted the former president immunity from prosecution for official actions he took while in office.
In May, Trump was convicted on 34 counts of falsifying business records. He will be sentenced on 11 July.
His team points out that he signed off the records while president in 2017, but one lawyer suggested this was unlikely to be considered an official act.
No, but the issue is that some of the evidence that was presented at trial came from after Trump was President, and members of his inner circle had White House roles. Under this new doctrine, simply presenting that evidence that involved White House officials would no longer be allowed, even if that evidence pointed to a crime. So the judge now has to make a determination of how much of the prosecution’s case depended on that. The Judge himself may have to throw the verdict out, if too much of that seeped into the trial. It wouldn’t let Trump totally off the hook, but would necessitate a new trial. Which is bullshit, because there’s nothing the prosecution could have done about it. The SC changed the rules after the trial was over.
This was the very point that Amy Coney Barrett wrote about in her concurring opinion, she felt this part went too far. So this evidentiary point was really decided 5-4, and seems to be the most egregious part of it.
And now, all any corrupt President needs to do is give their corrupt friends roles in the Administration, and they can do all the crime they want, knowing that prosecutors are shielded from ever using evidence from those people in court.
As a Canadian, with whom you share the longest undefended border in the world and billions of dollars in cross-border trade, I feel bad for you all.
But I think we might have to build our own wall soon to keep this kind of shit out of Canada.
