Donald Trump has been denied a last minute bid to halt his sentencing in a hush money case by the US Supreme Court.
The president-elect had urged the top court to consider whether he was entitled to an automatic stay of his sentencing, but the justices rejected the application by five-four.
He was found guilty on all 34 counts lobbied against him for falsifying records in an attempt to cover up hush money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels in the lead up to the 2016 presidential elections, last May. Daniels alleged that she had sexual relations with Trump in 2006, which he has continually denied.
The guilty verdict made Trump the first-ever President of the United States to be convicted of a crime.
Justice Juan Merchan, who is overseeing the case, has indicated he will not consider a jail term for Trump, reports BBC News. Two of the Supreme Court’s conservative justices – John Roberts and Amy Coney Barrett – joined the three liberals to deny Trump’s request for a delay.
Donald Trump in court on May 30, 2024 CREDIT: Steven Hirsch-Pool/Getty Images
The remaining four judges – Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh – would have allowed Trump’s bid to postpone sentencing. Alito had also been criticised for speaking to Trump just a day before the decision in a phone call when the top judge recommended one of his former law clerks for a job with the incoming president’s administration.
Reacting to the decision Trump branded the case a “disgrace”, although the Supreme Court decision was a “fair decision, actually.” “He said: “It’s a judge that shouldn’t have been on the case, they can have fun with their political opponent.
Trump later posted on his Truth Social platform: “The pathetic, dying remnants of the Witch Hunts against me will not distract us.”
Three lower New York courts had previously rejected Trump’s delay attempt before the Supreme Court made its final decision on Thursday evening (January 9) to let the sentencing proceed as scheduled.
Trump’s lawyers had asked the Supreme Court to consider whether presidents-elect had immunity from criminal prosecution.
But Manhattan prosecutors had urged the Supreme Court to reject Trump’s petition, arguing there was a “compelling public interest” in holding the sentencing and that there was “no basis for such an intervention”.
Last year, the Supreme Court’s six-three conservative majority handed Trump a major victory, when they ruled that US presidents had immunity from criminal prosecution for “official acts” undertaken in office. That decision ended a federal prosecution against him on charges he illegally interfered in the 2020 election outcome, which he denied and pleaded not guilty.
But since his re-election, Trump’s lawyers have tried to persuade a series of judges that those presidential immunity protections should also apply to a president-elect in the current Manhattan criminal case.
Prosecutors argued in their own brief to the Supreme Court that Trump’s “extraordinary immunity claim is unsupported by any decision from any court”.
“It is axiomatic that there is only one President at a time,” they added.
Elsewhere, The Kills frontwoman Alison Mosshart recently hit out at Trump amid the ongoing wildfires in California, saying it will be “harder” to rebuild communities once he is in power.
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