NEW YORK (AP) — Donald Trump’s hush-money trial will go ahead as scheduled with jury selection starting March 25, a New York judge ruled Thursday, turning aside demands for delay from the former president’s defense lawyers, who argued it would interfere with his campaign to retake the White House.
The decision means that the first of Trump's to proceed to trial is a case centered on years-old accusations that he sought to bury stories about extramarital affairs that arose during his 2016 presidential run. Other cases charge him with and
In leaving the trial date intact, Judge Juan Manuel Merchan pointed to the recent delay in the separate prosecution in Washington related to efforts to undo the 2020 election. That case, , has been effectively frozen pending the outcome of Trump's appeal on the for actions taken while in office.
Noting that he had resisted defense lawyer , Merchan said, “In hindsight, frankly, I’m glad that I took that position, because here we are and the D.C. case did not go forward.” He said he decided to stick with the trial date after speaking last week with the judge in the Washington case, Tanya Chutkan.
The hush-money trial is expected to last six weeks, Merchan said.
Assuming the New York case remains on schedule, it will open just weeks after the Super Tuesday primaries, colliding on the political calendar with a time period in which Trump will be looking to sew up the Republican race and emerge as the presumptive nominee in this year’s presidential contest. His attorneys cited that schedule in urging the judge to reconsider the March trial date.
“We strenuously object to what is happening in this courtroom,” said defense lawyer Todd Blanche, adding that "the fact that we are now going to spend, President Trump is now going to spend, the next two months working on this trial instead of out on the campaign trial running for president is something that should not happen in this country.”
Trump made a similar case after leaving the courtroom, telling reporters that "instead of being in South Carolina and other states campaigning, I’m stuck here.”
“We’ll just have to figure it out," he added. “I'll be here during the day and I’ll be campaigning during the night.”
In fact, Trump has repeatedly attended court proceedings where his presence was not required and he went to court Thursday voluntarily. The judge had said he could join remotely by video from Georgia, where he was contemplating attending a simultaneous hearing in his criminal case there.
Thursday marked Trump’s first return visit to court in the New York case since that historic indictment made him the first ex-president charged with a crime. Since then, he has also been indicted in Florida, Georgia and Washington, D.C.
The hearing was held amid a busy overlapping stretch of legal activity for the Republican presidential front-runner, who has increasingly made his court involvement part of his political campaign. On Monday, for instance, he voluntarily attended charging him with hoarding classified records.
A as a judge considered arguments on whether to toss Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis off the state’s because of a with a special prosecutor she hired.
The New York case has long been considered the least legally perilous of the four indictments filed against Trump last year, with the alleged misconduct — generally known to the public for years — seen by many as less grave than accusations of mishandling classified documents or plotting to subvert a presidential election.
Chutkan officially delayed the Washington case last month, with the Supreme Court now weighing the immunity question. There’s no new date. The classified documents case in Florida is set for trial May 20, but that date could be moved. No trial date is scheduled in the Atlanta case.
Over the past year, Trump has lashed out at Merchan as a “Trump-hating judge,” and sought to move the case , all to no avail. making several small donations to Democrats, including $15 to Trump’s rival Biden, but said he’s certain of his “ability to be fair and impartial.”
Trump is also awaiting a decision, possibly as early as Friday, in a that threatens to upend his real estate empire. If the judge rules against Trump, who is accused of inflating his wealth to defraud banks, insurers and others, he could be on the hook for millions of dollars in penalties among other sanctions.
Along with clarifying the trial schedule, Merchan also rejected a .
Trump’s lawyers accuse , a Democrat, of bringing the case to interfere with Trump’s political chances. Bragg’s predecessor, Cyrus Vance Jr., .
Trump is . Each count carries a potential punishment of up to four years in prison, but there is no guarantee that a conviction would result in prison time.
The case centers on payoffs to two women, and former Playboy model , as well as to a who claimed to have a story about Trump having a child out of wedlock. Trump says he didn’t have any of the alleged sexual encounters.
Trump’s lawyer at the time, Michael Cohen, paid Daniels $130,000 and arranged for the to pay McDougal $150,000 in a practice known as “catch-and-kill.”
Trump’s company then paid Cohen $420,000 and logged the payments as legal expenses, not reimbursements, prosecutors said. Bragg charged Trump last year with falsifying internal records kept by his company, the Trump Organization, to hide the true nature of payments.
Trump’s legal team has argued that no crime was committed.
___
Tucker reported from Washington.
Follow Sisak at and send confidential tips by visiting
