Judge Orders Delay in Trump’s New York Trial – The criminal trial involving Donald Trump in Manhattan will be postponed by at least three weeks, as the judge overseeing the case granted additional time for both the former president and the district attorney’s office to review records from federal prosecutors.
Originally slated to commence on March 25, the delay is seen as advantageous for Trump, who has been actively seeking to postpone all four of his criminal cases. Despite the postponement, the Manhattan case, focusing on a hush money payment Trump allegedly orchestrated during the 2016 election to silence a porn star’s claims of a sexual encounter with him, is expected to be the first to proceed to trial.
The rescheduling of the trial date occurred following requests from both Trump and prosecutors from Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office for additional time to examine thousands of pages of documents provided by federal prosecutors who previously handled the hush money case.
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Trump, in a court filing, sought either outright dismissal of the case or a postponement of at least 90 days, alleging that Bragg’s office had not fully disclosed documents that could potentially benefit his defense. In response, Bragg primarily attributed the timing of the document disclosure to Trump, stating that federal prosecutors had only recently handed over documents in response to a subpoena issued by Trump in January.
He also criticized the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan for delivering materials requested by the district attorney’s office over a year ago, which federal prosecutors at the time had declined to provide. While Bragg argued against dismissing the case, he expressed willingness to support a trial delay of up to 30 days to allow Trump sufficient time to review the documents.
In his ruling on Friday, Justice Merchan announced that he would convene a hearing on March 25 to discuss the documents. He also ordered both Trump and the district attorney’s office to produce “a detailed timeline of the events surrounding the requests and ultimate production of documents” by federal prosecutors.
The U.S. attorney’s office possesses pertinent material for the case, as its prosecutors previously investigated the hush money payment in 2018 and subsequently charged Michael Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer, who facilitated the payment to Stormy Daniels, a porn star, and was later reimbursed by Trump.
Cohen pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations related to the payment and is anticipated to serve as a crucial witness for the prosecution in Trump’s forthcoming trial. Trump has consistently denied any involvement in a sexual encounter with Daniels. Since March 4, Bragg’s office stated, the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office has furnished approximately 73,000 pages of documents in response to Trump’s subpoena issued in January.
Additionally, federal prosecutors produced an extra 31,000 pages of documents on Wednesday, as outlined in Bragg’s filing. Furthermore, in a separate submission on Friday, Bragg’s office confirmed that the U.S. attorney’s office would supply the remaining documents by the end of the day. The implications of the Manhattan trial delay on Trump’s other criminal cases are currently unclear.
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His federal case in Florida, involving charges of mishandling classified documents, is slated for trial on May 20 but is highly likely to be postponed until at least the summer, or potentially after the November election. In his Friday decision, Merchan wrote that his previous “directive that the parties, including the Defendant, not engage or otherwise enter into any commitment pending completion of this trial remains in effect.”
