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THE OTHER SIDE: Felonious Don

As we take a look at how it is that litigation against Donald Trump has ended in a whimper, let’s try and find the smallest bit of solace amongst the ruins of diminished expectations.

In so many ways, marked by the ascendancy of the Trumpist autocracy and the decline of both constitutional norms and just plain human decency, these last many years have required a substantial letting go. I am probably one of the few Americans who have spent too much time reading, analyzing, and commenting on the so many court cases that have attempted to hold Donald Trump accountable. A series of missteps, foolish prosecutors, a seemingly incompetent and corrupt judge, and a clearly politically motivated and extraordinarily arrogant Supreme Court have combined to make a mockery of that all-too-familiar brag that “in America, no man is above the law.” So, as we take a look at how it is that litigation against Donald Trump has ended in a whimper, let’s try and find the smallest bit of solace amongst the ruins of diminished expectations.

By the slightest of margins, in a 5-4 decision, the United States Supreme Court finally said no to Donald Trump, refusing to delay sentencing for the 34 counts for which a New York City jury unanimously found him guilty. You are forgiven if you have forgotten to which of the several Trump court cases this refers. But this is the New York State Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen hush-money case. As a reminder, here is an excerpt from the Statement of Facts:

People of the State of New York v. Donald Trump, Statement of Facts. Highlighting added.

I have written about this case several times before: first, in “Donald Trump v. The New York Knicks,” where I relied on the text of the indictment itself and then, as the case progressed, in “Donald and David’s catch and kill,” when court transcripts were available.

NBC reported the following on prosecutor Matthew Colangelo’s opening statement:

‘This case is about a criminal conspiracy and a cover-up,’ prosecutor Matthew Colangelo told the 12-person jury and six alternates. Trump, he said, conspired to corrupt the 2016 presidential election by scheming with his lawyer Michael Cohen and David Pecker, who was the publisher of the National Enquirer at the time.

‘Then, he covered up that criminal conspiracy by lying in his New York business records over and over and over again,’ Colangelo said.

At the heart of this story is Stormy Daniels, she of the unsatisfying sex act with Donald Trump, and Michael Cohen, he “lawyer A” who was designated to make knowledge of said sex act vanish before the 2016 election. You might recall that the disappearing act was made all the more necessary following the furor over the release of the Access Hollywood audio where Donald Trump boasted about grabbing women’s genitalia.

As the Statement of Facts notes:

One component of this scheme was that, at the Defendant’s request, a lawyer who then worked for the Trump Organization … covertly paid $130,000 to an adult film actress shortly before the election to prevent her from publicizing a sexual encounter with the Defendant. Lawyer A made the $130,000 payment through a shell corporation he set up and funded at a bank in Manhattan. This payment was illegal, and Lawyer A has since pleaded guilty to making an illegal campaign contribution and served time in prison. Further, false entries were made in New York business records to effectuate this payment, separate and apart from the New York business records used to conceal the payment.

After the election, the Defendant reimbursed Lawyer A for the illegal payment through a series of monthly checks, first from the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust (the ‘Defendant’s Trust’) —a Trust created under the laws of New York … and then from the Defendant’s bank account. Each check was processed by the Trump Organization, and each check was disguised as a payment for legal services … The payment records, kept and maintained by the Trump Organization, were false New York business records. In truth, there was no retainer agreement, and Lawyer A was not being paid for legal services rendered in 2017. The Defendant caused his entities’ business records to be falsified to disguise his and others’ criminal conduct.

People’s Exhibit 226: Donald Trump and Stormy Daniels, 2006, Lake Tahoe, Nev.

The jury was presented with copies of the invoices that Michael Cohen sent to Donald Trump for reimbursement of the payments he made to Stormy Daniels:

Invoice for $35,000, partial reimbursement for Cohen’s payment to Stormy Daniels. Highlighting added.

Here are the first two counts of the 34 felonies brought by District Attorney Alvin Bragg:

The first and second counts in Trump’s indictment. Highlighting added.

The testimony the jury heard was convincing: from Stormy Daniels’ account of her sexual encounter with Donald Trump and David Pecker’s explanation of how, for so many years, he had buried unflattering stories about Trump in the National Enquirer or placed false stories about Trump’s enemies and opponents. So too was Michael Cohen’s detailed retelling of the efforts he made to pay Stormy Daniels for her silence. Especially convincing was Cohen’s tape recording of his interactions with Trump himself:

Transcript of Michael Cohen’s conversation with Donald Trump about the details for his reimbursement. Highlighting added.

Over these many past years, Donald Trump has had a remarkable record of disregarding the truth. So many of his lies seem never to make enough of an impression to last beyond the moment. And as his reelection demonstrates, not enough Americans seem to care. But this time, in this one particular New York City courtroom, try as Trump attorney Todd Blanche might, the lies just didn’t do the trick. Trump and Blanche weren’t able to tell a convincing enough story; they couldn’t assure the jury that Donald hadn’t slept with Stormy, or that if he had slept with her, Trump didn’t want the story to surface because he just didn’t want to embarrass Melania. It was an incredibly difficult task to come up with a story that didn’t include Trump’s great desire to win the White House and the obvious conclusion that he would do pretty much anything to make that happen.

It seemed impossible to ignore his history with Michael Cohen and how he had often sent Michael, his fixer, to handle things for him. Clearly, it wasn’t Michael who had slept with Stormy, which meant there just wasn’t any good reason to believe he would choose to pay for her silence. And it was hard to disregard those invoices Michael Cohen had sent or the reimbursement checks Trump wrote to Michael Cohen when there just wasn’t any retainer agreement.

So, Blanche tried to argue that it wasn’t really all that big of a deal:

So, what on Earth is a crime? What is a crime about what I just described? This business records violation that the People have brought against President Trump, the 34 counts, ladies and gentlemen, are really just 34 pieces of paper, the 34 counts of the invoices that Mr. Cohen sent to the folks at Trump Tower, the checks that were generated because of that invoice, and then the ledger notation from the invoice that said ‘for retainer agreement and legal services.’

Blanche continued:

You’ll learn President Trump had nothing to do with any of the 34 pieces of paper, the 34 counts, except he signed on to the checks, in the White House while he was running the country. That’s not a crime … And, look, the reality is President Trump is not on the hook, is not criminally responsible for something that Mr. Cohen may have done years after the fact. The evidence will prove otherwise … The People just told you that the reason why these invoices were recorded the way they were recorded way after the election … was to cover up for Mr. Cohen, suggesting that Mr. Cohen was somehow trying to influence – ‘influence’ is the word they used — the 2016 election. I have a spoiler alert. There is nothing wrong with trying to influence an election. It’s called democracy. They put something sinister on this idea, as if it was a crime. You’ll learn it’s not. Michael Cohen paying Stormy Daniels or Stephanie Clifford $130,000 in exchange for her agreeing to not publicly spread false — false claims about President Trump is not illegal.

Trump and Blanche were prepared to try anything. It was then time for another favorite Trump move: blame everyone and anyone else. And, so, they turned on Stormy Daniels. She had made up their sexual encounter. It was actually “an attempt by Ms. Clifford/Ms. Daniels to extort President Trump … It was sinister. And it was an attempt to try to embarrass President Trump, to embarrass his family …”

Then Blanche blamed Michael Cohen:

You will learn that shortly after the election in 2016, Michael Cohen wanted a job in the administration. He didn’t get one … unbeknownst to President Trump, in all the years that Mr. Cohen worked for him, Mr. Cohen was also a criminal … shortly after getting caught in 2018, you will learn that … the decision that he made was to blame President Trump for virtually all of his problems. He had been eventually disbarred as an attorney. He’s a convicted felon. And he also is a convicted perjurer. He is an admitted liar… He has a goal, an obsession with getting Trump. And you’re going to hear that. I submit to you that he cannot be trusted …

[Emphasis added.]

What is it they keep saying and the rule that criminals keep forgetting? It’s not the crime but the cover-up. Ironically, we are now learning that if Republicans have their way, Pete Hegseth, despite cheating on his wives, fathering a child out of wedlock rampant alcoholism, incompetently running two small non-profits and being accused of sexual assault, may very well be our next secretary of defense.

So what was it that Donald Trump and Michael Cohen tried so hard to hide from American voters? They were trying to hide the fact that, like so many other American husbands, Trump had cheated on his wife. And, yes, his infidelity was certainly no less a betrayal than all the rest of them, but, really, considering Donald’s love of power and the fact that the White House itself was in the balance, can’t you imagine the American people giving the former star of “The Apprentice” a pass on this kind of adultery?

Call me crazy, but I am thinking, in retrospect, if anyone could have pulled off admitting to a night with an adult film star while his wife was pregnant, then paying her a small fortune to keep the night to herself, it was Donald Trump. Like Pete Hegseth, he could have talked about a coming-to-Jesus moment and thanking God for appreciating and forgiving his human failings. I mean this is the guy who lied his way out of the draft and then publicly humiliated an American hero, the late John McCain, former Arizona senator and a Vietnam prisoner of war.

Even before and then during the entire trial, there was continual speculation about how easy it would be for just one MAGA stalwart to hang the jury, to prevent unanimity. Remember how invincible Donald Trump seemed? Given the extraordinary polarization in the country and the significant support Trump enjoyed, how unlikely was it that one shrewd MAGA devotee couldn’t hide amongst the jury until the final crucial moment? Then, TV news commentators often reminded their viewers of Michael Cohen’s credibility problems and speculated about the problems the prosecution would face by relying on the testimony of an adult film star.

But as I read the transcripts of the trial, I was continually impressed by the case the prosecution was making, about how believable David Pecker and Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen seemed. And, of course, having been on two juries, I often wondered what the jury members were thinking and, given the stakes of the case and Donald Trump’s past history of going after anyone he imagined had opposed him, about the pressure they might be feeling.

Judge Merchan’s instructions to the jury highlighted the responsibility they had undertaken:

Reminder: Fairness

Remember, you have promised to be a fair juror. A fair juror is a person who will keep their promise to be fair and impartial and who will not permit the verdict to be influenced by a bias or prejudice in favor of or against a person who appeared in this trial on account of that person’s race, color, national origin, ancestry, gender, gender identity or expression, religion, religious practice, age, disability or sexual orientation, and further, a fair juror must be mindful of any stereotypes or attitudes about people or about groups of people that the juror may have, and must not allow those stereotypes or attitudes to affect their verdict …

Presumption of Innocence

We now turn to the fundamental principles of our law that apply in all criminal trials: the presumption of innocence, the burden of proof, and the requirement of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Throughout these proceedings, the defendant is presumed to be innocent. As a result, you must find the defendant not guilty, unless, on the evidence presented at this trial, you conclude that the People have proven the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt …

In determining whether the People have proven the defendant’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, you should be guided solely by a full and fair evaluation of the evidence. After carefully evaluating the evidence, each of you must decide whether that evidence convinces you beyond a reasonable doubt of the defendant’s guilt …

If you are not convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty of a charged crime, you must find the defendant not guilty of that crime and if you are convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty of a charged crime, you must find the defendant guilty of that crime.

Over these last few years, there have been a series of unexpected heroes like Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, the Georgia poll workers who were unfairly attacked by Rudy Giuliani and Donald Trump for joining Cassidy Hutchinson in testifying before Congress in the January 6 hearings. So, too, this New York City jury deserves our great thanks for pushing to the side the heightened political pressures and doing what we expect all our juries to do: to impartially weigh the evidence presented to them. Here is an excerpt from their verdict sheet:

People of the State of New York v. Donald Trump, Verdict Form. Highlighting added.

The Washington Post wrote:

A Manhattan jury on Thursday found Donald Trump guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records to conceal a hush money payment to an adult-film actress, delivering a historic verdict that could shape the November election and that makes Trump the first former U.S. president convicted of a crime.

The verdict is an extraordinary loss for the presumptive GOP nominee, who delivered near-daily tirades outside the courtroom throughout the trial — excoriating the justice system and declaring his innocence. Twelve jurors, whose names were shielded by the judge from public view, spent a little more than a day weighing the felony counts against Trump before returning their judgment unanimously saying otherwise. New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan scheduled the former president’s sentencing for July 11 — just days before the start of the Republican National Convention, where Trump is set to be formally nominated by his party.

The verdict propels the country into unprecedented territory, and its impact will reverberate across U.S. politics in the coming months. While awaiting his sentence, Trump will continue to campaign to reclaim the White House. Trump, who has been charged in three other criminal cases, is expected to appeal the New York verdict; neither the conviction nor any sentence he may receive prevents him from serving as president.

Of course, this hoped-for schedule never came to be. With appeals, the Supreme Court presidential immunity decision, and Trump’s reelection victory, not only was the sentencing itself delayed, but the very terms of the sentence were severely limited by the reality that, despite his conviction, Trump, a soon-to-be sitting president, would be granted great powers again. And with the Supremacy Clause now back in play, a state court’s sentencing decision would have to be subjugated in deference to the authority of the executive.

Of course, few Americans facing criminal indictment, conviction, and sentencing have the Supreme Court of the United States seemingly anxious and willing to help the defendant escape the normal consequences of committing crimes. But with Donald Trump v. United States, Trump now had Chief Justice Roberts and several other justices bending over backwards on his behalf.

The Supreme Court decision in Donald Trump v. United States. Highlighting added.

Donald Trump immediately took advantage of their help to claim that Alvin Bragg’s prosecution of the hush-money case had incorrectly relied on testimony from some of those working for him in his official capacity as the president. He argued that, as the Supreme Court mandates, such testimony falls under the rubric of official presidential actions and should have been precluded.

The Hill added these details:

Trump challenged testimony from Hope Hicks, his 2016 campaign press secretary who later became White House communications director. Hicks detailed her efforts shaping media narratives during the campaign, including how aides handled the infamous ‘Access Hollywood’ tape in which Trump is heard bragging about grabbing women’s genitals. But Hicks went on to testify about four communications she had with Trump while in the White House concerning the hush money deals at the center of the case … Trump’s attorneys argued that any communication between Trump and Hicks in the White House must receive immunity to preserve the president’s ability to speak freely to their aides. Trump similarly challenged the testimony of Madeleine Westerhout, the only other White House aide that testified. Westerhout served as Trump’s White House secretary and confirmed to the jury details about how Trump signed the checks that partially make up his charges.

CNN headline, Dec. 16, 2024. Highlighting added.

But as CNN reported, Judge Merhan ruled against that claim:

Donald Trump’s felony conviction in the New York hush money case should not be tossed out because of the Supreme Court’s ruling on presidential immunity, Judge Juan Merchan ruled Monday.

Merchan wrote the Supreme Court’s ruling that Trump should receive broad immunity for official acts during his time in office did not mean the conviction should be dismissed, ruling that the evidence presented by the Manhattan district attorney’s office was not related to Trump’s official conduct as president.

The evidence contested by Trump’s lawyers, the judge wrote, related ‘entirely to unofficial conduct’ and should receive no immunity protections. ‘This Court concludes that if error occurred regarding the introduction of the challenged evidence, such error was harmless in light of the overwhelming evidence of guilt … Even if this Court did find that the disputed evidence constitutes official acts under the auspices of the Trump decision, which it does not, Defendant’s motion is still denied as introduction of the disputed evidence constitutes harmless error and no mode of proceedings error has taken place.’

Nevertheless, Trump’s many appeals had worked in his favor. As CNN noted:

Trump has yet to be sentenced following his May conviction … Trump was initially scheduled to be sentenced in July, but that was postponed twice as a result of the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity ruling, pushing a sentencing date back until after the election.

The combination of the Supreme Court decision and Trump’s recent election success had severely restricted the normal impact of the unanimous 34-count guilty decision rendered by the New York City jury. MSNBC reported on Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s response to Donald Trump’s motion to dismiss:

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg is opposing Donald Trump’s motion to have his hush money case dismissed due to his election as president, telling Judge Juan Merchan that ‘[p]resident-elect immunity does not exist’ and that the case can instead be put on hold while Trump is in office. ‘At most, defendant should receive temporary accommodations during his presidency to prevent this criminal case from meaningfully interfering with his official decision-making,’ Bragg’s office wrote to Merchan in a response dated Monday that was made public Tuesday. Trump’s request for dismissal, Bragg wrote, goes ‘well beyond what is necessary to protect the presidency and would subvert the compelling public interest in preserving the jury’s unanimous verdict and upholding the rule of law.’

“Trump’s motion,” MSNBC noted, “cited a long list of complaints against various actors in the legal system and said dismissal is required due to presidential immunity, federal law regarding the presidential transition, and the Constitution’s supremacy clause …”

Article VI, Section 1, Clause 2 of the U.S. Constitution, the Supremacy Clause. Image courtesy of Georgetown Law School.

The Congressional Research Center makes clear that a reelected Donald Trump would have renewed protection under the Supremacy Clause and his election would preclude enforcement of any sentence of incarceration under New York State Law:

The Supremacy Clause is among the Constitution’s most significant structural provisions. In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the Supreme Court relied on the Clause to establish a robust role for the federal government in managing the nation’s affairs. In its early cases, the Court invoked the Clause to conclude that federal treaties and statutes superseded inconsistent state laws … The Supreme Court continued to apply this foundational principle — that federal law prevailed over conflicting state law — throughout the latter half of the nineteenth century … The basic principle enshrined in the Clause — federal supremacy — is now well-settled. Generally, litigants do not dispute the Clause’s meaning or advance conflicting theories on its scope.

Bragg appreciated that time was running out, and he knew that once Donald Trump was back in the White House, the chance of any substantial punishment would be increasingly impossible. In his People’s Memorandum of Law in Opposition to Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss, Bragg settled on offering Judge Merchan a series of more practical alternatives: “If defendant is not sentenced before his inauguration, there is also no legal barrier to deferring that sentencing until after the end of his presidency …”

Bragg continued:

… an adjournment that resulted in sentencing being held after the end of defendant’s presidential term would be reasonable. Courts routinely approve of years-long delays in sentencings when the delay is attributable to the defendant’s own conduct, or when it is attributable to factors outside of the People or the Court’s control.

Then Bragg signaled his willingness to preclude from any potential sentence the possibility that Donald Trump would be required to spend time in jail:

In addition, many of defendant’s concerns stem from the possibility that he will face ‘potential incarceration’ here. Def.’s Mem. 38. Here, however, because defendant has no prior criminal convictions and was convicted of Class E felonies, this Court is not required to impose a sentence of incarceration at all, and could even impose an unconditional discharge.

Most significantly, Bragg argued:

The Court could therefore conclude that presidential immunity, while not requiring dismissal, nonetheless would require a non-incarceratory sentence in these circumstances. Such a constitutional limitation on the range of available sentences would further diminish any impact on defendant’s presidential decision-making without going so far as to discard the indictment and jury verdict altogether.

It was clear that both Bragg and Judge Merchan had decided Trump’s reelection severely limited any rigorous sentence. On January 10, 2025, BBC News reported:

BBC News headline, Jan. 10, 2025. Highlighting added.

The BBC wrote:

A judge has sentenced US President-elect Donald Trump to an ‘unconditional discharge,’ bringing to an end the first criminal trial of a former US president.

The sentence in the hush-money payment case means the incoming president has been spared any penalty, including jail time or a fine, but he will still take office as the first US president with a felony conviction.

‘Never before has this court been presented with such a unique and remarkable set of circumstances,’ Justice Juan Merchan said shortly before announcing the sentence, calling it a ‘truly extraordinary case’.

Assistant Manhattan District Attorney Joshua Steinglass took the opportunity to make some critical comments about the case:

… the defendant has publicly threatened to retaliate against the prosecutors who have sought to hold him accountable in this and other matters and the courts who have endeavored to fairly and faithfully adjudicate these matters. Such threats are designed to have a chilling effect, to intimidate those who have the responsibility to enforce our laws in the hopes that they will ignore the defendant’s transgressions because they fear that he is simply too powerful to be subjected to the same rule of law as the rest of us. …

Put simply, this defendant has caused enduring damage to public perception of the criminal justice system and has placed officers of the court in harm’s way.

In the probation report which we just received this morning, the author — having interviewed the defendant — noted that the defendant sees himself as above the law and won’t accept responsibility for his actions. And that’s certainly consistent with everything else that we’ve seen.

Now, in a typical case, both the offense conduct and these other exacerbating factors would impact the appropriate sense. But in this case, we must be respectful of the office of the presidency and mindful of the fact that the defendant will be inaugurated as president in ten days. Any undischarged portion of the sentence has the potential to interfere with the defendant’s performance of the duties of his office. As a practical matter, the most sensible sentence prior to his inauguration is an unconditional discharge. The court has expressed an inclination to do exactly that because, in the court’s words, ‘the most viable solution to ensure finality and allow defendant to pursue his appellate options’ is to proceed to sentence. …

The American public has the right to a presidency unencumbered by pending court proceedings or ongoing sentence-related obligations, but imposing this sentence ensures that finality. Sentencing the defendant permits this court to enter judgment to cement the defendant’s status as a convicted felon while he pursues whatever appeals he intends to pursue, and it gives full effect and respect to the jury’s verdict while preserving the defendant’s ability to govern.

People therefore recommend that this court impose a sentence of an unconditional discharge.

[Emphasis added.]

Not surprisingly, President-elect Donald Trump couldn’t help himself when he addressed the Court, once more denying he had done anything wrong:

It’s been a political witch hunt. It was done to damage my reputation so that I’d lose the election, and obviously that didn’t work. And the people of our country got to see this firsthand because they watched the case in your courtroom. They got to see this firsthand and then they voted, and I won and got the largest number of votes by far, of any Republican candidate in history and won, as you know, all seven swing states. Won conclusively, all seven swing states, and won the popular vote by millions and millions of votes and they’ve been watching your trial, so they understood it …

I’m totally innocent. I did nothing wrong. They talk about business records, and the business records were extremely accurately counted. I had nothing to do with them. That was done by an accountant or bookkeeper … With all that’s happening in our country today, with a city that’s burning to the ground — one of our largest, most important cities burning to the ground — with wars that are uncontrollably going on, with all of the problems of inflation and attacks on countries, and all of the horrible things that are going on, I got indicted over calling a legal expense a legal expense. It’s called a legal expense …

I believe that this and other cases that were brought, as you know, the DOJ is very much involved in this case because that’s the political opponent they’re talking about. The DOJ is very involved … But in the meantime, I won the election and a massive landslide. And the people of this country understand what’s gone on. This has been a weaponization of government. They call it lawfare. Never happened to any extent like this, but never happened in our country before, and I just like to explain that I was treated very, very unfairly, and I thank you very much.

Finally, Judge Merchan declared:

The imposition of sentence is one of the most difficult and significant decisions that any criminal court judge is called upon to make … never before has this court been presented with such a unique and remarkable set of circumstances. Indeed, it can be viewed fairly that this has been a truly extraordinary case. There was unprecedented media attention, public interest, and heightened security involving various agencies. And yet, the trial was a bit of a paradox, because once the courtroom doors were closed, the trial itself was no more special, unique or extraordinary than the other 32 criminal trials that took place in this courthouse at the same exact time …

So, while one can argue that the trial itself was in many respects somewhat ordinary, the same cannot be said about the circumstances surrounding this sentencing, and that is because of the office you once occupied and which you will soon occupy again. To be sure, it is the legal protections afforded to the Office of the President of the United States that are extraordinary, not the occupant of the office. The legal protections, especially within the context of a criminal prosecution afforded to the Office of the President, have been laid out by our founders, the Constitution, and most recently interpreted by the United States Supreme Court in the matter of Trump v. The United States, which was decided on July 1st, 2024 … the considerable, indeed extraordinary legal protections afforded by the office of the Chief Executive is a factor that overrides all others.

To be clear, the protections afforded to the office of the president are not a mitigating factor. They do not reduce the seriousness of the crime or justify its commission in any way. The protections are, however, a legal mandate which, pursuant to the rule of law, this court must respect and follow. However, despite the extraordinary breadth of those protections, one power they do not provide is a power to erase a jury verdict.

It is clear from legal precedent — which until July 1st was scarce — that Donald Trump, the ordinary citizen, Donald Trump, the criminal defendant, would not be entitled to such considerable protections. I’m referring to protections that extend well beyond those afforded the average defendant who winds their way through the criminal justice system each day. No, ordinary citizens do not receive those legal protections. It is the Office of the President that bestows those far-reaching protections to the office holder, and it was the citizenry of this nation that recently decided that you should once again receive the benefits of those protections, which include, among other things, the Supremacy Clause and presidential immunity. It is through that lens and that reality that this court must determine a lawful sentence.

[Emphasis added.]

Not surprisingly, at the end of it all, Judge Merchan proved himself to be the far superior man. Despite the avalanche of unwarranted attacks on his credibility, his ability to be fair, his commitment to do his job without prejudice and, worse, the attacks upon his family, he acted with grace and dignity.

Merchan continued:

After careful analysis in obedience to governing mandates and pursuant to the rule of law, this court has determined that the only lawful sentence that permits entry of a judgment of conviction without encroaching upon the highest office in the land is an unconditional discharge, which the New York State Legislature has determined is a lawful and permissible sentence for the crime of falsifying business records in the first degree. Therefore, at this time I impose that sentence to cover all 34 counts. Sir, I wish you Godspeed as you assume your second term in office. Thank you.

Donald Trump could not for a single moment return the favor and conjure up even the slightest bit of respect for the judge or jury, let alone remorse for his crimes:

Donald Trump’s Jan. 10, 2025, post on Truth Social. Highlighting added.

Despite the efforts of the United States Supreme Court and their willingness to dispense with the bedrock principle that, in America, no man is meant to be above the law, I am left with gratitude for how a jury of Donald Trump’s peers resisted all distraction to hold him accountable. And I remind you to remember some of the final words of Judge Merchan: Despite the great advantages the Supreme Court’s immunity decision and the Supremacy Clause have offered Donald Trump, “one power they do not provide is a power to erase a jury verdict.” And so, in the years to come, no matter how many bend their knees, he will remain Felonious Don.

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