The former president’s criminal hush-money in New York trial will begin on April 15, Judge Juan Merchan ruled on Monday
Donald Trump‘s first criminal trial will begin on April 15.
Judge Juan Merchan ruled on Monday that the former president’s criminal hush-money trial will kick off next month. The ruling comes after Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg agreed to delay the initial start date of March 25 so that his office could review new records from the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Merchan rejected Trump’s latest push to delay the trial even further, while excoriating his team for making bogus allegations of misconduct against Bragg. “You are literally accusing the Manhattan DA’s office and the people assigned to this case of prosecutorial misconduct and trying to make me complicit in it,” the judge said.
Trump was not happy with Merchan’s decision. “This is a pure case of voter intimidation and election interference,” he said outside the hearing. “They decide to wait until now, just during the election, so that I won’t be able to campaign. I will be appealing this.”
The ruling is all but final, although Merchan is allowing Trump to file a motion arguing that the trial should be delayed on the grounds of pretrial publicity. Bragg’s office will have a week to respond, although the office noted on Monday that “pretrial publicity has been caused and exacerbated by the defendant,” according to CNN. In other words, the trial is almost certainly kicking off next month.
Bragg indicted Trump last March on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records related to a payment to porn star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 election to keep her quiet about her alleged affair with Trump. Trump would be criminally indicted three more times in the ensuring months — twice by the Justice Department and once in Georgia by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis — but it’s looking like the case in Manhattan is the only one that will go to trial before the 2024 election.
Trump has repeatedly decried his legal troubles as a Democratic conspiracy to prevent him from retaking the White House. He continued to allege election interference while speaking to the press outside of the hearing on Monday. “I don’t know how you can have a trial that is going on right in the middle of an election,” he said. “It’s not fair at all. He knows that. He’s a Democrat judge and he wants to do that because they’re all trying to damage Trump as much as possible.”
“We’ll bring crime back to law and order,” the former president added.
