Court delays decision on sentencing Trump in hush money case

NEW YORK: The judge in Donald Trump´s New York criminal case has delayed to November 19 a decision on potentially throwing out the US president-elect´s conviction, the court said on Tuesday.Trump was convicted of 34 felony counts in May after a jury found he had fraudulently manipulated business records to cover up an alleged sexual encounter with a porn star ahead of the 2016 election.

Trump, due to be sentenced on November 26, may receive a reprieve if Judge Juan Merchan decides to dismiss the case following the Supreme Court´s recent ruling on presidential immunity.

That landmark ruling saw the court, with a 6-3 conservative majority, decide that presidents have sweeping immunity from prosecution for a range of official acts committed while in office.

Ahead of the election, Trump´s lawyers moved to have the case thrown out in light of the Supreme Court decision, a move that prosecutors have firmly rejected.

If Merchan throws out the case on that basis, there will be no sentencing of Trump, 78.

If he does not, Trump´s legal team would almost certainly seek to oppose or delay any sentencing, insisting it would interfere with Trump´s role as commander-in-chief once he is sworn in on January 20.

“The joint application for a stay of the current deadlines... until November 19, is granted,” the court wrote in an email to parties in the case, seen by AFP.

An editorial in the Kansas City Star newspaper called for the judge in the case to “do what was once unthinkable -- force a president-elect to take the oath of office in a jail cell.”

“The surreal scene, while certainly shocking for the rest of the free world to witness, would send an unmistakable message -- the rule of law still applies in America.”

But Trump´s former attorney general Bill Barr said that both the New York case as well as others around the country had been “plainly brought for political purposes (and) have now been extensively aired and rejected in the court of public opinion.”

“Further maneuvering on these cases in the weeks ahead would serve no legitimate purpose and only distract the country and the incoming administration from the task at hand,” he wrote.

Trump has repeatedly derided the case as a witch hunt, saying it “should be rightfully terminated.”