The Dictatorship
Judge rejects Trump’s bid to toss hush money conviction because of Supreme Court immunity ruling
NEW YORK (AP) — A judge Monday refused to throw out President-elect Donald Trump’s hush money conviction because of the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling on presidential immunity. But the overall future of the historic case remains unclear.
Manhattan Judge Juan M. Merchan’s decision blocks one potential off-ramp from the case ahead of the former and future president’s return to office next month. His lawyers have raised other arguments for dismissal, however. It’s unclear when — or whether — a sentencing date might be set.
Prosecutors have said there should be some accommodation for his upcoming presidency, but they insist the conviction should stand.
A jury convicted Trump in May of 34 counts of falsifying business records related to a $130,000 hush money payment to porn actor Stormy Daniels in 2016. Trump denies wrongdoing.
The allegations involved a scheme to hide the payout to Daniels during the final days of Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign to keep her from publicizing — and keep voters from hearing — her claim of a sexual encounter with the married then-businessman years earlier. He says nothing sexual happened between them.
A month after the verdict, the Supreme Court ruled that ex-presidents can’t be prosecuted for official acts — things they did in the course of running the country — and that prosecutors can’t cite those actions to bolster a case centered on purely personal, unofficial conduct.
Trump’s lawyers then cited the Supreme Court opinion to argue that the hush money jury got some improper evidence, such as Trump’s presidential financial disclosure form, testimony from some White House aides and social media posts made while he was in office.
In Monday’s ruling, Merchan denied the bulk of Trump’s claims that some of prosecutors’ evidence related to official acts and implicated immunity protections.
The judge said that even if he found that some evidence related to official conduct, he’d still conclude that prosecutors’ decision to use “these acts as evidence of the decidedly personal acts of falsifying business records poses no danger of intrusion on the authority and function of the Executive Branch.”
Even if prosecutors had erroneously introduced evidence that could be challenged under an immunity claim, Merchan continued, “such error was harmless in light of the overwhelming evidence of guilt.”
Prosecutors had said the evidence in question was only “a sliver” of their case.
Trump communications director Steven Cheung on Monday called Merchan’s decision a “direct violation of the Supreme Court’s decision on immunity, and other longstanding jurisprudence.”
“This lawless case should have never been brought, and the Constitution demands that it be immediately dismissed,” Cheung said in a statement.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office, which prosecuted the case, declined to comment.
Merchan’s decision noted that part of the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling declared that “not everything the president does is official.” Trump’s social media posts, for example, were personal, Merchan wrote.
He also pointed to a prior federal court ruling that concluded that the hush money payment and subsequent reimbursements pertained to Trump’s private life, not official duties.
Trump, a Republican, takes office Jan. 20. He’s the first former president to be convicted of a felony and the first convicted criminal to be elected to the office.
Over the last six months, his lawyers have made numerous efforts to get the conviction and the overall case dismissed. After Trump won last month’s election, Merchan indefinitely postponed his sentencing — which had been scheduled for late November — so defense lawyers and prosecutors could suggest next steps.
Trump’s defense argued that anything other than immediate dismissal would undermine the transfer of power and cause unconstitutional “disruptions” to the presidency.
Meanwhile, prosecutors proposed several ways to preserve the historic conviction. Among the suggestions: freezing the case until Trump leaves office in 2029; agreeing that any future sentence won’t include jail time; or closing the case by noting he was convicted but that he wasn’t sentenced and his appeal wasn’t resolved because he took office.
The last idea is drawn from what some states do when a defendant dies after conviction but before sentencing.
Trump’s lawyers branded the concept “absurd” and took issue with the other suggestions, too.
Trump was indicted four times last year. The hush money case was the only one to go to trial.
After the election, special counsel Jack Smith ended his two federal cases. They pertained to Trump’s efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss and allegations that he hoarded classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate.
A separate state election interference case in Fulton County, Georgia, is largely on hold.
Trump denies wrongdoing in all.
The Dictatorship
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The suspect in an attack at a synagogue near Detroit lost several family members in an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon this month, according to the Islamic Institute of America in Dearborn and community leaders.
Ayman Mohamad Ghazali, a 41-year-old U.S. citizen originally from Lebanon, lost his two brothers and a niece and nephew in the strike on their home, according to those sources. Whether that played a role in the motive for the attack remains unclear, and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer deferred a question about it to the FBI on Friday, citing an ongoing investigation.
Authorities are looking at the possibility Ghazali may have had familial ties to Hezbollah in Lebanon, two law enforcement officials briefed on the investigation told MS NOW.
Ghazali died in the Thursday attack, in which authorities say he drove a car into Temple Israel in West Bloomfield, Michigan, injuring a security officer. Ghazali was a resident of Dearborn Heights, Mayor Mo Baydoun said in a Facebook post. Baydoun also said in that post that Ghazali “lost several members of his own family, including his niece and nephew, in an Israeli attack on their home in Lebanon” this month.
The Thursday attack in Michigan came as the U.S. and Israel wage a war with Iranwhich they launched on Feb. 28. Security around Jewish communities in places such as New York has been heightened since the conflict began.
Ghazali first came to the U.S. in 2011 on a spousal visa before being granted citizenship in 2016, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said.
In a phone interview with Fox host Brian Kilmeade, President Donald Trump appeared to blame former President Joe Biden for Ghazali’s entry into the country when asked about the Michigan attack and the deadly shooting at Old Dominion University in Michigan.
“They came in a lot through Biden, and they came in through other presidents, frankly, and it’s a disgrace,” Trump said.
Temple Israel describes itself as the country’s largest Jewish Reform congregation, and it also has an early childhood education center on site that more than 100 kids attend, Whitmer said. All children were safely evacuated following the attack, Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard said.
“This is targeting babies who are Jewish,” Whitmer said. “That’s antisemitism at its absolute worst.”
The security guard who was injured was hospitalized but is expected to recover.
Whitmer on Friday thanked the synagogue’s security personnel, who she said “were selfless in their courage and they saved lives.”
Sen. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., added that if the synagogue’s private security, local law enforcement and first responders “had not all done their jobs almost perfectly, we would be talking about an immense tragedy here today with children gone.”
Andrew Bossone and Chris O’Leary contributed to this report.
Julianne McShane is a breaking news reporter for MS NOW who also covers the politics of abortion and reproductive rights. You can send her tips from a non-work device on Signal at jmcshane.19 or follow her on X or Bluesky.
Marc Santia is an investigative correspondent for MS NOW.
The Dictatorship
Missile strikes a helipad inside the U.S. Embassy compound in Baghdad, Iraqi security officials say
BAGHDAD (AP) — A missile struck a helipad inside the U.S. Embassy compound in Baghdad, two Iraqi security officials said.
Associated Press footage showed a column of smoke rising Saturday morning over the embassy compound.
The sprawling embassy complex, one of the largest U.S. diplomatic facilities in the world, has been repeatedly targeted by rockets and drones fired by Iran-aligned militias.
There was no immediate comment from the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. On Friday, the embassy renewed its Level 4 security alert for Iraq, warning that Iran and Iran-aligned militia groups have previously carried out attacks against U.S. citizens, interests and infrastructure, and “may continue to target them.”
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