Trump’s last-ditch trial delay attempt denied as expert warns 'accountability is coming'

A New York appeals court judge on Tuesday refused Donald Trump’s last-ditch effort to delay the start of his criminal trial, by denying his motion to pause trial while he argues against a gag order. Trump is facing 34 felony counts for falsification of business records in an alleged attempt to hide his “hush money” payments to an adult film actress and interfere in the 2016 presidential election.

Jury selection will start on Monday, April 15, but the court has also asked for written arguments which a full appeals court panel will use to formally rule on Trump’s motion to remove the gag order imposed by New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan. Trump is claiming the gag order is “unconstitutional,” violates his First Amendment rights, and interferes with his presidential campaign.

“Trump had argued there was ongoing, irreparable harm to him and ‘the voting public’ caused by restricting his speech,” Law360’s Frank G. Runyeon reports:

“A full appellate panel will now decide Monday (same day jury selection is set to begin) whether to delay the trial. Then, the actual merits of the gag order will be considered later in the month,” reports Law360’s Rachel Scharf.

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Countering Trump attorney Emil Bove’s claims, Steven Wu of the Manhattan district attorney’s office, according to NBC News told the judge, “we are talking about inflammatory and denigrating remarks about witnesses and family members of court staff. This is not political debate. These are threats against staff that have lead to a barrage of attacks that have led to the NYPD becoming involved.”

Trump’s attorneys had also requested a change of venue, arguing he cannot get a fair trial in New York. That motion was denied on Monday. They claimed, “polling and quantitative analysis of media coverage shows that a fair and impartial jury cannot be selected right now based on prejudicial pretrial publicity,” according to the document posted by Runyon.

The New York Times called it “another blow to the former president’s increasingly desperate attempts to prevent the trial from starting next week.”

National security attorney Brad Moss, commenting on this latest denial, wrote: “Trump is headed to trial on Monday. Not a civil case. A criminal trial. Nothing is going to stop that now. He needs to prepare himself for it. Accountability is coming.”

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