In the beginning of December, President Elect Donald J. Trump pleaded with a New York judge to dismiss the 34 charges from his criminal trial in May. Shortly after, Trump nominated his criminal defense lawyer to be deputy attorney general of the United States which has caused serious concern amongst legislators about Trump’s possible abuse of power.
Manhattan prosecutors stood their ground and urged the judge to not throw away the charges. Their response to Trump’s reference to “presidential immunity” was featured in their filing; they wrote, “President-elect immunity does not exist. And even after the inauguration, the defendant's temporary immunity as the sitting President will still not justify the extreme remedy of discarding the jury’s unanimous guilty verdict and wiping out the already-completed phases of this criminal proceeding.”
Trump was convicted in May on 34 counts of falsifying business records concerning hush money he paid to adult film star Stormy Daniels during his 2016 campaign. Members of his defense team Todd Blanche and Emil Bove have recently been nominated for the roles of deputy attorney general and principal associate deputy attorney general. Compared to his failed nomination for former Rep. Matt Gaetz, Blanche and Bove seem like more standard picks but still show Trump’s clear reliance on his allies.
John Suer, Trump's nominee for solicitor general, recently pulled in the victory of Trump’s presidential immunity. In a statement, Trump explained, “John is a deeply accomplished, masterful appellate attorney, who clerked for Justice Antonin Scalia in the United States Supreme Court, served as Solicitor General of Missouri for six years, and has extensive experience practicing before the U.S. Supreme Court and other Appellate Courts.”
After four different prosecutions and a total of 91 different charges, Trump is on the verge of beating his convictions, largely with the help of winning the 2024 election. Judge Tanya Chutkan dismissed the election-interference case but results concerning the remaining charges are still pending.
“Trump’s best strategy right now is delay,” David French, a conservative columnist for The New York Times told FRONTLINE in the documentary. “Because he’s a very unusual defendant in terms of his potential power. If he wins the election, he can just order the DOJ to drop the case entirely. So he has an enormous personal incentive to win the presidency just to get himself out of legal jeopardy.”
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