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After the judge overseeing his hush money trial refused to throw out Donald Trump’s conviction, the president-elect blasted the order as “completely illegal” and “psychotic.”
Trump’s attorneys pushed the judge to overturn a jury’s verdict and dismiss the case, which they argued was compromised by evidence that should be shielded under the scope of the Supreme Court’s ruling on presidential “immunity.”
On Monday, New York Justice Juan Merchan on Monday rejected the attempt, arguing that evidence surrounding Trump’s falsification of business records to cover up hush money payments to an adult film star has nothing to do with the “official duties” of the presidency that can be shielded from prosecution.
In addition, evidence and witness testimony paled in comparison to “other overwhelming evidence of defendant’s guilt,” Merchan wrote.
Trump called Monday’s decision a “completely illegal, psychotic order” from a “deeply conflicted, corrupt, biased, and incompetent” judge, who “completely disrespected the United States Supreme Court, and its Historic Decision on Immunity.”
But “even without Immunity, this illegitimate case is nothing but a Rigged Hoax,” Trump wrote on Truth Social Tuesday.
“Merchan, who is a radical partisan, wrote an opinion that is knowingly unlawful, goes against our Constitution, and, if allowed to stand, would be the end of the Presidency as we know it,” he insisted.
Trump — who refused to testify during his weeks-long trial in Manhattan, where he was surrounded by at least three criminal defense attorneys — baselessly claimed he is the “only Political Opponent in American History not allowed to defend myself.”
The president-elect called Merchan “far worse” and “more corrupt” than special counsel Jack Smith, who brought two federal criminal indictments against him for Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election and for his withholding of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago compound.
Mechan “just cannot let go of this charade,” Trump said.
A unanimous jury found Trump guilty on May 30 on 34 counts of falsifying business records in connection with a scheme to silence adult film star Stormy Daniels, whose story about having sex with Trump threatened to derail his 2016 presidential campaign.
Trump’s reimbursements to his then-attorney Michael Cohen, who paid off Daniels, were falsely recorded in accounting records as “legal expenses.”
Throughout the case, Trump repeatedly lashed out at the judge and his family members, as well as members of the Manhattan District Attorney’s office and other lawyers, prosecutors and judges involved in the criminal and civil cases against him and his allies.
Last week, prosecutors with Alvin Bragg’s office reminded Judge Merchan of Trump’s “false claims of misconduct” aimed at the courts, and argued that his ongoing defiance should not be rewarded with a dismissal of the convictions against him.
“Apart from defense counsel’s disingenuous and repeated effort to malign and menace [prosecutors], the Court, and their families with inflammatory falsehoods and conspiracy theories, there is no misconduct here — much less any showing of the ‘exceptionally serious misconduct’ required to support dismissal in the interest of justice,” they wrote.
Trump’s conduct and his “dangerous pattern of harassment and intimidation” should also weigh heavily in the judge’s decision to preserve his conviction, including his “ominous and violent“ rhetoric and “frequent attacks on witnesses and their families” based on “transparent falsehoods,” prosecutors said.
Judge Merchan is expected to soon issue another decision after weighing Trump’s latest arguments that the case should be dismissed because he is about to be president.
