Former US President Donald Trump speaks in the hallway outside a courtroom where he is listening to his criminal case involving allegations of hush money payments to a porn star, in New York City, USA, March 25, 2024 .
Brendan McDermid | Reuters
Donald Trump’s lawyers are asking a judge to “significantly” delay his upcoming criminal hush-money trial, saying the Republican presidential candidate was denied access to an impartial jury due to “biased pretrial publicity.”
Trump’s lawyers wrote in a statement last week that the trial on charges of falsifying business records must be put on hold until news coverage “abates.” Archive In the New York Supreme Court.
However, after making this request, Trump himself used a large number of social media posts to attack the trial judge and the judge’s adult daughter, publicly expressing doubts about the fairness of the trial.
The posts came after Judge Juan Merchan issued a gag order barring Trump from talking about possible witnesses and other figures involved in the case.
The gag order does not explicitly prohibit Trump from attacking the judge himself. Prosecutors on Thursday asked Merchin to “clarify or confirm” the order protecting family members in court.
Trump recently published a series of posts in The Truth Society magazine calling for a silent investigation and recusing himself from the case, accusing him of political bias. Many of the posts referenced Murchin’s daughter’s work at a Democratic political firm, and at least one included her full name and photo.
But Trump’s lawyers argued in court filings seeking a delay that it was the media, not the former president, who tainted the jury pool.
Citing a survey of 400 New York residents, the attorneys wrote: “It is clear that potential jurors in Manhattan have been exposed to a substantial amount of biased and unfair media coverage related to this case.”
“Many potential jurors already incorrectly believe President Trump is guilty,” their filing said.
They also noted that a “media study” found that many articles contained “prejudicial discussion of other lawsuits involving President Trump, as well as inaccurate and irrelevant discussion of alleged sexual misconduct, including regarding ‘rape.’ false claims.”
Last year, Trump was found responsible in a separate federal civil trial for sexually abusing author E. Jean Carroll in the mid-1990s and defaming her decades later.
The defense attorney’s filing also alleges that the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office “used strategic leaks” in prosecuting Trump, accusing him of falsifying business records to conceal hush-money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels.
The document also accuses the district attorney’s office of scheduling the sentencing of former Trump Organization executive Allen Weisselberg — who pleaded guilty to perjury last month — close to the trial date in an effort to attract more attention. Many news reports.
Weisselberg is scheduled to be sentenced on April 10, five days before jury selection begins in the hush money trial.
The filing also argued that continued criticism of Trump by two key trial witnesses – Daniels and Trump’s former personal attorney Michael Cohen – underscored his “current inability to receive a fair trial in New York County.”
“Accordingly, the court should delay the trial date until the prejudicial media reports subside,” the attorneys wrote.
The document is dated March 18 but was released after a court hearing last week on another motion by Trump to dismiss the indictment or delay the trial.
At that hearing, Murchin ordered jury selection to begin on April 15 after rejecting accusations from Trump’s lawyers that the DA’s office violated evidence-sharing rules. But the judge allowed the lawyers to file a motion to delay the trial, citing negative press coverage.
“The news media that was created was not the result of President Trump,” defense attorney Todd Branch said during the hearing.
Prosecutor Matthew Colangelo responded by calling the possibility of delaying the trial due to media coverage “extremely unlikely.”
Colangelo told the judge that the case, the first of four criminal cases against Trump, will not abate in public attention.
Prosecutors also noted that the intense media coverage “was caused and exacerbated by Trump.”
Merchants gave the district attorney’s office a week to submit a complete answer.
About The Author
