NEW DELHI: Former US President Donald Trump‘s legal team submitted a request to a federal court on Friday, seeking its intervention in his hush money criminal case. The objective is to find a way to overturn his conviction and postpone his sentencing indefinitely, which is currently set for next month.
Trump’s attorneys argued that the state-level prosecution infringed upon his constitutional rights and contradicted the recent Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity.They asked the US district court in Manhattan to assume control of the New York City criminal case.
In May, Trump was found guilty in state court in Manhattan on 34 counts of falsifying business records. These charges were related to a payment made to suppress allegations of an affair that had the potential to overshadow his 2016 presidential campaign.
Last year, a federal judge denied Trump’s initial attempt to transfer the case to federal court, paving the way for his unprecedented trial in state court.
According to the filing submitted on Friday, Trump’s lawyers said that transferring the case to federal court following his conviction on May 30 would provide him with an “unbiased forum, free from local hostilities” to address the aforementioned issues. If the case is successfully moved to federal court, Trump’s legal team intends to pursue the overturning of the verdict and the dismissal of the case.
Trump’s lawyers, Todd Blanche and Emil Bove, wrote in a 64-page US district court filing, “The ongoing proceedings will continue to cause direct and irreparable harm to President Trump — the leading candidate in the 2024 Presidential election — and voters located far beyond Manhattan.”