A New York appeals court on Wednesday declined another bid by former President Trump to delay his hush money trial for the third time this week.
The former president’s lawyers took aim at three rulings by Judge Juan Merchan:
Refusing to recuse, not delaying the trial until the Supreme Court rules on Trump’s presidential immunity claim and requiring Trump to seek permission before filing new motions before trial.
Trump is using a maneuver under New York state law, known as an Article 78 proceeding, that involves suing the judge over their decisions.
The filings were placed under seal and are not publicly available. The Hill has requested comment from Trump’s lawyers.
It marked the latest of a series of eleventh-hour efforts by Trump’s lawyers to stop jury selection from beginning on Monday, which would mark the first criminal trial of a former president.
The three appeals will now go to a full five-judge panel for consideration.
Two other attempts to delay the trial were already rejected by appeals judges this week,
regarding a gag order imposed on the former president and the venue of his trial.
At emergency arguments held Monday, Trump’s lawyers claimed the trial should be
moved out of deep-blue Manhattan and into a friendlier borough – Staten Island.
State prosecutors claimed Trump’s request to change venues came too late.
On Tuesday, the lawyers argued that the judge’s gag on Trump threatens “irreparable” harm to Trump’s First Amendment rights. Their effort to pause the trial over the gag order was similarly framed as a lawsuit against Merchan.
The state claimed the gag order – which bars Trump from attacking witnesses, prosecutors, court staff and the judge’s family, but it doesn’t stop him from hurling
insults at Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg (D) or the judge himself – protects the “integrity of the trial” from Trump’s attacks.
Trump is charged in the case with 34 counts of falsifying business records. Bragg
accuses Trump of criminally concealing a hush money payment that hid damaging information from voters ahead of the 2016 presidential election.
The Associated Press contributed.
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