Donald Trump He received a sentence this Friday in the case of the former porn film actress Stormy Daniels in one judgment symbolic although historical which does not imply jail in MOREbut what makes the president-elect the first convicted felon to reach the White House.
“This court has determined that the only legal ruling that allows the entry of a conviction without invading the highest office in the land, It is an unconditional release“said the judge of the Manhattan District Court, Juan Merchanin an audience to which Trump attended virtually.
This unusual sentence maintains guilt but does not imply conviction to jail, fine or probation.
The 78-year-old Republican, who will return to the Casa Blanca next January 20, declared guilty last May by a popular jury of 34 counts of accounting falsification to hide the payment of 130 thousand dollars in the final stretch of the 2016 elections to the former adult film actress Stormy Danielswith whom he would have had a fleeting relationship extramarital 10 years earlier, passing it off as legal expenses.
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The president-elect called the criminal process “shame on the system” judicial.
The judgment was madeto damage my reputation so that I would lose the election and obviously that didn’t work“said the tycoon by videoconference from Florida with one of his lawyers.
Historic and symbolic sentence against Donald Trump
Trump suffered one final setback Thursday night after the conservative Supreme Court narrowly rejected –five votes to four– an emergency appeal to prevent in extremis the announcement of the sentence, in the only one of the four judicial fronts that he had open that has put him on the bench.
Trump’s lawyers have tried by all legal means to ensure that the future 47th president of the United States was not sentenced and the case was dismissed by invoking the favorable ruling of the Supreme Courtwhich last July decreed presidential immunity for official acts.
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The defense of Trump alleged that the immunity from prosecution granted to a sitting president should be extended to an elected president and so “prevent grave injustice and harm to the institution of the presidency and the operations of the federal government“.
The prosecutor of the case Joshua Steinglassrecalled at the hearing that the jury’s verdict is “unanimous and decisive and must be respected.”
Furthermore, he accused the next president of “engage in a coordinated campaign to undermine“the process that has caused lasting damage to the public perception of the criminal justice system.”
The revelation of Trump’s telephone conversation in recent days with the conservative supreme court justice Samuel Alitowho voted in favor of the suspension on Thursday night, had raised fears about his alleged influence over the country’s highest judicial authority, in which six of the nine judges are conservatives, half appointed by the former president himself.
Donald Trump was convicted this Friday in the case of former porn actress Stormy Daniels in a historic but symbolic sentence, which makes the president-elect the first convicted criminal to reach the White House. pic.twitter.com/Gp1etiCPW8
— Agence France-Presse (@AFPespanol) January 10, 2025
“Unofficial”
The Manhattan District Attorney, Alvin Braggrecalled in a letter addressed to the justices of said court, released on Thursday that when Trump was “accused, tried and convicted of conduct that he admits is entirely unofficial“He was a private citizen.
On Thursday, New York State Court of Appeals Judge Jenny Riveradenied another appeal from the magnate’s defense to avoid the sentence.
Two days before, another judge of a lower court of the Manhattan Court of Appeals had rejected another appeal from Trump’s defense in which they argued that sentencing should be postponed while he appealed the conviction.
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The sentence of Trump It was postponed several times since July, following the Supreme Court decision. In September, Merchan delayed it again to avoid interference with the presidential campaign.
Following his election in early November, a hearing scheduled for November 26 was delayed while the president-elect and Manhattan prosecutors argued over how to proceed in the unprecedented situation of his re-election. Last week Merchan scheduled it again for this Friday, 10 days before Trump’s inauguration.
This has been the only one of the four cases pending against Donald Trump that has put him on the bench. The other three in which he was accused, two of them for the alleged attempt to reverse the result of the 2020 presidential election that he lost to Joe Biden and due to the preservation of classified documents in his house, they have been put on hold after his election.
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