A New York judge has ruled that Donald Trump will be sentenced for his felony conviction on January 10, 2024, nearly a year after being found guilty of falsifying business records. The conviction stems from Trump’s attempt to cover up a hush-money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels in the final stretch of the 2016 presidential race.
Trump’s sentencing has been a long time coming. Originally scheduled for July, it was pushed back after legal arguments around presidential immunity gained attention. But Judge Juan Merchan ruled that Trump should face consequences for his actions, despite his team’s attempts to delay or dismiss the case. The former president has argued that as a president-elect, he shouldn’t be subject to criminal prosecution, a theory Merchan flatly rejected.
According to a report from The Washington Post, Trump’s lawyers tried to claim that the same protections afforded to sitting presidents should also apply to president-elects, even for crimes committed before taking office. But Merchan wrote that there’s no legal precedent for such a claim and dismissed it outright.
Merchan also took a firm stand against the idea of postponing sentencing until after Trump’s second term, which would have effectively allowed him to avoid the penalty. Prosecutors had urged that the case move forward to preserve the integrity of the jury’s verdict and uphold the rule of law.
Trump was convicted in May on 34 counts of falsifying business records after he was found to have orchestrated the $130,000 payment to Daniels to keep her quiet about an alleged affair ahead of the 2016 election. The jury deliberated for just over a day before handing down the historic verdict, making Trump the first former U.S. president to be convicted of a crime.
At the trial, prosecutors presented evidence that Trump reimbursed his former lawyer, Michael Cohen, for the payment, which was disguised as legal expenses. Cohen testified about Trump’s efforts to hide the true nature of the payment, while Daniels herself gave testimony detailing the alleged affair and the subsequent payment.
Although Trump faced up to four years in prison, most legal experts doubted he would actually be incarcerated, given his age, lack of prior convictions, and the nature of the charges. But the decision to schedule sentencing just before his inauguration as the 47th president will still mark a significant moment in American history.
Trump’s legal battles are far from over. This case, in which he was convicted of business record fraud, is just one of several criminal cases he’s currently facing. His federal trials in Washington D.C. and Florida are still ongoing, and he’s also facing charges in Georgia related to attempts to overturn the 2020 election results.
Despite all of this, Trump remains a dominant figure in American politics, having just won the Republican nomination for president. But with his sentencing set for January 10, the question of whether or not he’ll face prison time — or if he’ll become the first U.S. president to take office with a criminal conviction hanging over him — is still very much on the table.
