Judge slaps down Trump’s 'dead horse' move to transfer felony convictions

On Friday, a federal judge denied President Donald Trump’s attempt to transfer the New York criminal case that resulted in his 34 felony convictions to federal court, which would have allowed him to fast-track his appeal to the Supreme Court. According to Judge Alvin Hellerstein, a Clinton appointee and senior district judge in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, the arguments provided by Trump’s attorneys were “neither new nor legally sufficient.” As the judge declared, “He has failed to show good cause and diligence.”

While All Rise News Editor-in-Chief Adam Klasfeld notes that “Trump's gambit here was pretty low stakes” as the appeal will likely still work its way to the Supreme Court — it will now have to pass through the New York judiciary first — Klasfeld also points out that “this finding doesn't bode well for Trump.” Trump’s attorneys argue that he has immunity under a previous Supreme Court decision, which ruled presidents are immune while conducting “official acts,” and that his felonies should be overturned. Judge Hellerstein, however, has bad news for the president, writing, “The trial evidence shows no relationship to official acts,” and that the evidence cited “showed the absence of anything that could qualify as an official act.”

Found guilty of 34 felonies in 2024 relating to falsifying business records to disguise hush-money payments made to adult film star Stormy Daniels, Trump received an unconditional discharge in 2025 that upheld the charges but eliminated prison, financial and probationary penalties. While he has previously expressed a desire to pardon himself, state convictions cannot be overturned by federal pardon, so Trump hopes the Supreme Court will do it for him.

Trump’s attorneys had made previous requests to have the case transferred, and were denied each time. During those oral arguments, reports Klasfeld, “Hellerstein left little doubt that he would reject Trump’s effort a third time on multiple grounds. First, Hellerstein indicated that Trump waived his right to transfer the case to federal court by first choosing to litigate the fallout of the Supreme Court immunity’s decision in state court. ‘That’s a strategic decision,’ the 92-year-old jurist said.” Then, “with an adverse state court ruling imminent, Trump filed his second removal request nearly 60 days later — after the statutory 30-day clock expired. Hellerstein said that Trump’s lawyers were seeking a ‘second bite of the apple’ after losing in New York, which the removal statute doesn’t allow.”

“I think we are beating a dead horse,” said the judge when Trump's lawyers asked for the transfer a third time. According to Klasfeld, “Toward the end of oral arguments, Hellerstein noted that Trump is ‘not above the law.’”