Judge postpones sentencing in Trump silence case until September

In a major reprieve for former President Donald Trump, sentencing on his bribery charges was postponed Tuesday until at least September as the judge agreed to weigh the possible impact of a new Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity.

Trump was scheduled to go on trial July 11, just before the Republican nominating convention, for his convictions for falsifying business records in New York. He denies any wrongdoing.

The postponement sets the earliest possible sentencing date for September 18, if it occurs at all, as Trump's lawyers argue that the Supreme Court's decision justifies not only delaying sentencing but also overturning his conviction.

The impact of the immunity decision is a strong and clear signal for justice in the United States, Trump said on his social media site Truth Social after the sentencing was delayed.

Using capital letters, he claimed that the Supreme Court's decision gave him complete exoneration in this and other criminal cases he faces.

Manhattan prosecutors, who brought the hush-money case, did not immediately comment on the postponement of sentencing.

Although the September 18 date is well after this month’s Republican National Convention, where Trump is expected to formally accept the party’s nomination for president this year, it is much closer to Election Day, which could put the issue at the forefront of voters’ minds just as they are seriously considering the race. Because of mail-in voting deadlines in some states, some voters may have already cast their ballots before anyone knows whether the former president will face time in jail or under house arrest.

The delay caps a series of political and legal victories Trump has won in recent days, including the Supreme Court's ruling on immunity and a debate widely seen as a disaster for Democratic President Joe Biden.

The immunity ruling all but closes the door on Trump being tried in his 2020 election interference case in Washington before the November vote. The timing itself is a victory for the former president, who has sought to delay his four criminal cases until after the election.

An appeals court recently stayed another election interference case against Trump in Georgia; no trial date has been set. His classified federal documents case in Florida remains mired in pretrial disputes that resulted in an indefinite cancellation of the trial date.

Monday's Supreme Court ruling granted broad immunity protections to presidents, while barring prosecutors from citing official acts as evidence to try to prove that a president's unofficial actions violated the law.

The Supreme Court ruled that former presidents enjoy absolute immunity from prosecution for acts that fall within their core constitutional functions, such as their interactions with the Justice Department, and that they enjoy at least presumptive immunity for all other official acts. The justices left intact the long-standing principle that no immunity exists for purely personal acts.

It is not yet clear what effect this decision will have on the New York bribery case.

The case was based on allegations that, before his presidency, Trump participated in a scheme to suppress sex stories that he believed would hurt his 2016 campaign. But the real accusations involved payments made in 2017 to his then-lawyer, Michael Cohen, who paid Trump hush money. Trump was president when he wrote the checks to Cohen.

Trump's lawyers tried unsuccessfully before the trial to exclude some evidence they said related to official acts, including social media posts he made as president.

New York Judge Juan M. Merchan said in April that it would be hard to convince me that something he tweeted to millions of people voluntarily can’t be used in court when it’s not presented as a crime. It’s just used as an act, something he did.

When Trump unsuccessfully sought last year to have the bribery case transferred from state to federal court, U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein rejected the former president's claim that the allegations in the bribery indictment involved official duties.

The evidence overwhelmingly suggests that this was a purely personal matter for the president, a cover-up of an embarrassing event, Hellerstein wrote last year.

Hours after the Supreme Court's decision Monday, Trump's lawyer asked Merchan to overturn the jury's guilty verdict and delay sentencing to consider how the high court's decision might affect the hush-money case.

Merchan wrote that hell will reign on September 6th and that the next date in the case would be September 18th, if that is still necessary.

In the defense brief filed Monday, Trump's lawyers argued that Manhattan prosecutors gave prejudicial weight to evidence of official acts, including Trump's social media posts and witness testimony about Oval Office meetings.

Prosecutors responded that they believed those arguments were without merit, but would not object to adjourning sentencing for two weeks while the judge considered the case.

Trump was convicted on May 30 of 34 counts of falsifying business records stemming from what prosecutors said was an attempt to conceal a $130,000 cash payment to porn star Stormy Daniels just before the 2016 presidential election.

Daniels claims she had a sexual relationship with Trump in 2006 after meeting him at a celebrity golf tournament in Lake Tahoe. Trump has repeatedly denied the claim, saying during his June 27 debate with Biden, “I did not have sex with a porn star.”

AP correspondent Julie Walker reports that the Manhattan district attorney will not object to delaying Trump's sentencing in his bribery case.

Prosecutors said Daniels' payment was part of a larger scheme to buy the silence of people who might have publicly revealed embarrassing stories during the campaign that Trump had extramarital sex. Trump has said all of those stories are false.

Cohen paid Daniels and was later reimbursed by Trump, whose company recorded the reimbursements as legal expenses.

Trump's defense argued that the payments were indeed for legal work and were therefore properly classified.

Falsifying business records carries a possible sentence of up to four years in prison. Other possible penalties include probation, a fine or parole, which would require Trump to stay out of trouble to avoid further punishment. Trump is the first former president to be convicted of a crime.

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Associated Press writers Michael R. Sisak in Fort Pierce, Fla., Jill Colvin in New York and Eric Tucker in Washington contributed to this report.

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