Judge delays sentencing in Trump’s New York criminal case, pushing decision past election

A New York judge has delayed former President Donald Trump’s sentencing date in his criminal case for a second time, allowing Trump to wait until after the election to learn his fate after his conviction in his “hush money” case.

Trump had been scheduled to be sentenced in the case on Sept. 18. His attorneys asked on Aug. 14 for his sentencing to be pushed back until after the presidential election, arguing that a delay is necessary to resolve ongoing legal challenges to his conviction.

Justice Juan Merchan issued an order on Friday delaying sentencing until Nov. 26.

Merchan wrote that he made the decision “to avoid any appearance — however unwarranted — that the proceeding has been affected by or seeks to affect the approaching Presidential election in which the Defendant is a candidate.” 

“The Court is a fair, impartial, and apolitical institution,” he continued, adding that the postponement “should dispel any suggestion that the Court will have issued any decision or imposed sentence either to give an advantage to, or to create a disadvantage for, any political party and or any candidate for any office.”

Trump was convicted in May by a unanimous jury on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. Prosecutors said Trump signed off on a scheme to hide reimbursements to a lawyer who wired a $130,000 “hush money” payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels days before the 2016 presidential election. Trump denied the encounter and pleaded not guilty.

Merchan has wide leeway in determining Trump’s sentence. The charges carry a maximum sentence of up to four years in jail, but Merchan can also hand down a sentence that involves a variety of alternatives to incarceration, including probation. Most legal observers expect Trump to avoid jail time, given his status as a first-time offender and sentences handed down for the same crime in other cases.

Trump was originally scheduled to be sentenced on July 11, but that date was pushed back after he filed a motion seeking to set aside his conviction following a landmark Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity. The judge’s decision on that effort is expected on Sept. 16.

Trump attorneys Todd Blanche and Emil Bove’s latest request for a delay argued it would be inappropriate to hand down the sentence on Sept. 18, after early voting in the presidential election has already begun. They also argued the delay would allow time for ongoing legal challenges to his conviction.

“By adjourning the sentencing until after that election … the Court would reduce, even if not eliminate, issues regarding the integrity of any future proceedings,” they wrote.

In reply, prosecutors from Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office declined to advocate either for or against further delaying the sentencing, writing that they “defer to the court.”

Trump sought repeatedly to delay proceedings in the case, including twice requesting it be removed to federal jurisdiction. A federal judge rejected his request both times. Judge Alvin Hellerstein wrote in 2023 and on Sept. 3 that the “hush money” scheme was a personal matter, outside the bounds of Trump’s official acts as president.

Earlier Friday, Trump was in a courtroom just a block from the Manhattan criminal court where Merchan presides. Trump listened to lawyers argue his appeal of a 2023 civil judgment in which a jury concluded he likely sexually abused and defamed the writer E. Jean Carroll.

Trump has denied all allegations in both cases, as well as three other criminal cases, two of which revolve around his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, and one — recently dismissed — in which he was charged for taking confidential documents from the White House at the end of his presidency.