Judge sentences Trump in hush money case but declines to impose any punishment
Trump, wearing a dark suit and seated next to one of his lawyers with an American flag in the background, appeared on a video screen as he again insisted he did not commit a crime.
President-elect Donald Trump was sentenced Friday in his felony hush money case, but the judge declined to impose any punishment, an outcome that cements his conviction but frees him to return to the White House unencumbered by the threat of a jail term or a fine.
The punishment-free judgement marks a quiet end to an extraordinary case that for the first time put a former president and major presidential candidate in a courtroom as a criminal defendant. The case was the only one of four criminal indictments that has gone to trial and possibly the only one that ever will.
Manhattan Judge Juan M. Merchan could have sentenced the 78-year-old Republican to up to four years in prison. Instead, he chose a sentence that sidestepped thorny constitutional issues by effectively ending the case but assured that Trump will become the first person convicted of a felony to assume the presidency.
Unlike his trial last year, when Trump brought allies to the courthouse and addressed waiting reporters outside the courthouse, the former president did not appear in person Friday, instead making a brief virtual appearance from his home in Palm Beach, Fla.
Trump called the case “a weaponization of government” and “an embarrassment to New York.” “It’s been a political witch hunt. It was done to damage my reputation so that I would lose the election, and obviously, that didn’t work,” Trump said.
Trump’s sentence of an unconditional discharge caps a norm-smashing case that saw the former and future president charged with 34 felonies, put on trial for almost two months and convicted on every count. Yet, the legal detour — and sordid details aired in court of a plot to bury affair allegations — didn’t hurt him with voters, who elected him to a second term.
Merchan said that like when facing any other defendant, he must consider any aggravating factors before imposing a sentence, but the legal protection that Trump will have as president “is a factor that overrides all others.”
“Despite the extraordinary breadth of those legal protections, one power they do not provide is that they do not erase a jury verdict,” Merchan said.
Before Friday’s hearing, Merchan had indicated he planned the no-penalty sentence, called an unconditional discharge, which meant no jail time, no probation and no fines would be imposed.
Prosecutors said Friday that they supported a no-penalty sentence, but they chided Trump’s attacks on the legal system throughout and after the case.
“The once and future President of the United States has engaged in a coordinated campaign to undermine its legitimacy,” prosecutor Joshua Steinglass said.
Rather than show remorse, Trump has “bred disdain” for the jury verdict and the criminal justice system, Steinglass said, and his calls for retaliation against those involved in the case, including calling for the judge to be disbarred, “has caused enduring damage to public perception of the criminal justice system and has put officers of the court in harm’s way.”
As he appeared from his Florida home, the former president was seated with his lawyer Todd Blanche, whom he’s tapped to serve as the second-highest ranking Justice Department official in his incoming administration.
“The American voters got a chance to see and decide for themselves whether this was the kind of case that should’ve been brought. And they decided,” Blanche said. “And that’s why in 10 days President Trump is going to assume the office of the president of the United States.”
Before the hearing, a handful of Trump supporters and critics gathered outside. One group held a banner that read, “Trump is guilty.” The other held one that said, “Stop partisan conspiracy” and “Stop political witch hunt.”
The hush money case accused Trump of fudging his business’ records
To veil a $130,000 payoff to porn actor Stormy Daniels.
She was paid, late in Trump’s 2016 campaign, not to tell the public about a sexual encounter she maintains the two had a decade earlier. He says nothing sexual happened between them, and he contends that his political adversaries spun up a bogus prosecution to try to damage him.
“I never falsified business records.
It is a fake, made-up charge,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform last week.
Democratic Manhattan Dist. Atty. Alvin Bragg’s office, which brought the charges, said in a court filing Monday that Trump committed “serious offenses that caused extensive harm to the sanctity of the electoral process and to the integrity of New York’s financial marketplace.”
While the specific charges were about checks and ledgers, the underlying accusations were seamy and deeply entangled with Trump’s political rise. Prosecutors said Daniels was paid off — through Trump’s personal attorney at the time, Michael Cohen — as part of a wider effort to keep voters from hearing about Trump’s alleged extramarital escapades.
Trump denies any encounters occurred. His lawyers said he wanted to squelch the stories to protect his family, not his campaign. And while prosecutors said Cohen’s reimbursements for paying Daniels were deceptively logged as legal expenses, Trump says that’s simply what they were.
“There was nothing else it could have been called,” he wrote on Truth Social last week, adding, “I was hiding nothing.” I did not have sex with that woman ~ Clinton
Trump’s lawyers tried unsuccessfully to forestall a trial.
Since his May conviction on 34 counts of falsifying business records, they have pulled virtually every legal lever within reach to try to get the conviction overturned, the case dismissed or at least the sentencing postponed.
The Trump attorneys have leaned heavily into assertions of presidential immunity from prosecution, and they got a boost in July from a Supreme Court decision that affords former commanders-in-chief considerable immunity.
Trump was a private citizen and presidential candidate when Daniels was paid in 2016. He was president when the reimbursements to Cohen were made and recorded the following year.
Merchan, a Democrat, repeatedly postponed the sentencing, initially set for July. But last week, he set Friday’s date, citing a need for “finality.” He wrote that he strove to balance Trump’s need to govern, the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling, the respect due a jury verdict and the public’s expectation that “no one is above the law.”
Trump’s lawyers then launched a flurry of last-minute efforts to block the sentencing. Their last hope vanished Thursday night with a 5-4 Supreme Court ruling that declined to delay the sentencing.
Meanwhile, the other criminal cases that once loomed over Trump have ended or stalled ahead of trial.
After Trump’s election, special counsel Jack Smith closed out the federal prosecutions over Trump’s handling of classified documents and his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden. A state-level Georgia election interference case is locked in uncertainty after prosecutor Fani Willis was removed from it.
Sisak, Peltz, Offenhartz and Price write for the Associated Press.
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Do you regret your vote?
I voted for President Trump and I Respect and Trust Him and Thank Him for Fighting for America 🙏🙏🙏 So Proud of President Trump for Standing up to this corrupt government COUP and Justice System!!!
FJB … God and Trump Always Wins!
I love my felon. He’s in good company with many who have been persecuted!
Thank The Lord for Standing with Trump & protecting him 🙏🇺🇸❤️
My President is a felon, and I’m proud!
Everyone with a brain knows this was a sham show!! 
Absolutely not. Jesus was convicted in a shame trial, and I still follow Him.
I think the Department of “Injustice” weaponization helped get President Trump elected. He will be vindicated! Biden , although not proven guilty of anything because he’s too much of a doodling old man to stand trial, is guilty of crimes….DJTs one misdemeanor morphs into 34 felonies….That’s the real travesty here.
No I do not … this was a sham trial where Trump has a gag order, and both the judge and daughter are making money off this. and to top it off a group that Brennen is part of is funding it.
It was bull 
case they were out to get the Real POTUS
It just solidifies that democrats will do anything to smear him.
Not at all. I would vote for Trump again, and again. You see, I don’t appreciate the weaponization of the justice system. I don’t appreciate Matthew Colangelo moving from the Biden DOJs #3 position moving to a state case to get Trump. I don’t appreciate Alvin Bragg running for office on getting Trump. I don’t appreciate Judge Merchan’s daughter raising millions for Democrats with an unconstitutional gag order.
The case was a sham and anyone with a brain knows it.
Also add – NY had to change the law to allow these charges to be brought. And, Merchan’s instructions to the jury were highly unethical. The whole thing will be overturned on appeal. Hopefully, Merchan and all who participated in the lawfare will be charged. And now there is no gag order. He can say and show to the public whatever he wants.
I would rather a President, whom the Democratic Party has convicted as a felon, than a President who once was an official from California, where they allow the homes of their residents to burn to protect the wildlife or are simply incapable of local management!
SIMPLIFIED SUMMARY- Why TRUMP IS NOT GUILTY of any crime according to legal experts of every political persuasion.
1. **Allegations and Denial**: Trump was accused of sexual misconduct, which he claims were slanderous.
2. **Legal Payment**: His attorney made a payment to the accuser in exchange for a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA), which is legal.
3. **Reimbursement**: Trump made 34 monthly payments to reimburse this legal expense.
4. **Prosecution’s Argument**: The prosecution argued these payments were mislabeled as legal fees by claiming the intent was solely to influence the campaign, not to address a personal matter. (Imagine if this scenario involved you and your family.)
5. **Misdemeanor Status**: Normally, this would classify as a single misdemeanor, which was also past the statute of limitations.
6. **Felony Elevation**: To bypass this, the prosecution suggested motives like election fraud or tax evasion, arguing the payments were purely a campaign strategy rather than personal defense.
7. **Jury Instructions**: Judge Merchan instructed the jury that they didn’t need to unanimously agree on the specific additional crime for it to be considered a felony, allowing the prosecution to use multiple insinuations to sway the jury.
8. **Bias Concerns**: The trial took place in an area with a strong anti-Trump sentiment, with a judge perceived as biased against Trump and whose daughter profited from anti-Trump campaigns, circumstances that historically require a judge to recuse themselves.
9. **Irony and Legal Critique**: Many legal experts view this case as an attempt by the prosecution, possibly in collusion with the administration and supportive media, to engage in election interference through never seen before legal maneuvers.
This effort to convert a single not guilty misdemeanor into 34 guilty felony counts is seen by most legal experts and scholars as unprecedented election interference, using the legal system to impact the election. Grimes Calls Los Angeles Wildfires ‘Biblical’ After Evacuating City: ‘We Might Be Outta Time’
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