New York's high court denies Trump's last-minute bid for sentencing delay

(CN) — The New York Court of Appeals on Thursday declined to grant President-elect Donald Trump’s last-ditch request to delay being sentenced in his Manhattan hush money case, which is set to happen Friday morning.

Trump filed an order to show cause with New York’s high court on Wednesday, one of several bids from the incoming president to ice his criminal proceedings on the eve of his sentencing. So far, all of his efforts have been futile, with New York’s state criminal court, a mid-level state appellate court and now the state’s highest court all denying his attempts.

The court shot down Trump’s latest request via a brief filing addressed to Trump’s defense attorney Todd Blanche, which stated that New York Court of Appeals Associate Judge Jenny Rivera, a Democrat appointed by then-Governor Andrew Cuomo in 2013, reviewed the case.

“Your proposed order to show cause was reviewed by Judge Rivera, who declined to sign the order,” the clerk of the court wrote in the filing. “As a result of the judge’s determination, no motion is pending in the above title at the Court of Appeals.”

A Trump spokesperson didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday.

All eyes are now on the U.S. Supreme Court, where Trump filed an application Wednesday morning that remains pending. If that effort, too, is unsuccessful, Trump is expected to appear virtually at Friday’s sentencing.

Trump’s flurry of last-minute delay requests came after New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan set the sentencing hearing, which was previously delayed indefinitely, to Friday — 10 days before Trump’s presidential inauguration.

In scheduling the sentencing, Merchan rejected arguments from Trump that the guilty verdict against him be tossed. Trump claims that presidential immunity should shield him from any criminal proceedings as he prepares to return to the White House.

Merchan disagreed, finding that vacating the jury’s verdict “would not serve the concerns set forth by the Supreme Court in its handful of cases addressing presidential immunity nor would it serve the rule of law.”

So far, other New York courts have sided with Merchan. Before denying Trump’s appeal earlier this week, Associate Justice Ellen Gesmer of New York’s Appellate Division, First Department pressed Blanche on the lack of case law surrounding this issue.

“Do you have any support for the notion that presidential immunity extends to presidents-elect?” Gesmer asked at an emergency hearing on Tuesday.

Blanche conceded he did not, as “there has never been any case like this before.”

The lack of precedent is one of the reasons Trump’s sentencing has already been pushed off as far as it has. A Manhattan jury in May 2024 found Trump guilty of 34 counts of falsifying business records, which was part of a broader scheme by Trump to keep stories about his adulterous behavior from negatively affecting his 2016 presidential campaign.

After the verdict, Merchan had set the sentencing for July 11, but pushed the date back at Trump’s request after the Supreme Court’s ruling for broad presidential immunity raised evidentiary questions about the case.

Merchan later delayed the case once more to keep the sentencing from impacting the 2024 presidential election, and once Trump won that election, Merchan froze the proceedings indefinitely to address the unprecedented legal challenge of sentencing an incoming president.

Each delay of the sentencing was done at Trump’s request — a fact not lost on Gesmer as she sparred with Trump’s attorney earlier this week.

“Justice Merchan would have been happy to hold that sentencing in July,” the judge quipped to Blanche, who was lamenting that the sentencing was being held so close to Inauguration Day.

Merchan indicated that he is likely to sentence Trump to unconditional discharge, which would preserve the guilty verdict and cement Trump as a convicted felon without requiring the president-elect to serve a tangible punishment.

It’s the “most viable solution,” the judge ruled, as he attempts to balance upholding the jury’s verdict with allowing Trump carry out the duties of commander-in-chief.

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