Summary

New York judge Juan Merchan denied Donald Trump’s request to delay his sentencing on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records, set for January 10, 2025, just 10 days before his inauguration.

Trump argued for a delay based on pending immunity appeals, but the court rejected the claim, citing repetitive arguments and delays caused by Trump himself.

Prosecutors noted the timing avoids potential legal complications during his presidency.

The judge plans to sentence Trump to an unconditional discharge, leaving him a convicted felon without further punishment.

The case involves hush money payments from 2016.

    • morgan423@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      If he pronounces no sentence except for sticking the felon branding, then it isn’t even a slap on the wrist. It doesn’t affect him in any way whatsoever, even after his term is over.

        • takeda@lemm.ee
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          2 days ago

          Seems like McDonald’s has tougher job requirements than our highest position.

          • Soup@lemmy.world
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            2 days ago

            Tougher job requirements and easier to punish you when you fuck up. Hell, you don’t even have to fuck up that bad and this idiot’s about to tank the entire country even worse and lose nothing.

        • officermike@lemmy.world
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          2 days ago

          Except he can in Florida where he lives and where voting rights are restored upon fulfilling all terms of your sentence… so nothing.

      • ramble81@lemm.ee
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        2 days ago

        “Yeah they found you guilty, but don’t worry, we’re not gonna do anything”

    • takeda@lemm.ee
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      2 days ago

      Yeah, the moment he postponed July sentencing it was clear that the whole thing was a mockery of our judicial system.

  • chingadera@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Guess which of these sentences aren’t in the article.

    “The current schedule is entirely a function of defendant’s repeated requests to adjourn”

    “Merchan said in his ruling Friday that he did not plan to jail Trump and that he was likely to sentence him to an unconditional discharge, meaning he would remain a convicted felon but would have no other punishment”

    “We are not to blame for flushing democracy down a shit riddled toilet”

    How the fuck can we ever take our courts seriously again?

    • JonEFive@midwest.social
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      22 hours ago

      There is some twisted logic to this. Your’e right, the system is broken, but this decision potentially avoids the constitutional crisis of whether a president can pardon themself. It may also make an appeal less likely. In short, it may be the best way to make the conviction stick. Now, what good is a conviction if there’s no punishment? The only thing I can think of that would have any impact on Trump is civil liability stemming from a criminal conviction.

      • chingadera@lemmy.world
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        19 hours ago

        Without punishment or rehabilitation, it doesn’t matter like you said. It’s the most in our faces it could possibly get, different rules apply. I forgot where I read or heard it, and it’ll be paraphrased:

        The Constitution is just a piece of paper. It doesn’t mean a fucking thing if people do not back up it’s intent. And the people who are supposed to be are willingly neglecting their duty/oath to do so.

        We were already an oligarchy in a trenchcoat pretending to be a democracy, we’re well beyond that now. Shit will get grim.

  • ExtremeDullard@lemmy.sdf.org
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    2 days ago

    I wish I could commit felonies with impunity too.

    Although, come to think of it, I don’t really want to commit felonies, because I’m not a criminal.

  • Lodespawn@aussie.zone
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    2 days ago

    Itd be nice if he got to sentencing, said “PSYCHE! JAIL FOR YOU! FOUR YEARS! NO PAROLE!” and then had some cuffs slapped on him and dragged him directly to prison. It’s not going to happen, but it’d be nice.

    • NateNate60@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Rikers Island becoming the new seat of the American government wasn’t something I had on my bingo card

    • ramenshaman@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      If that happened then I’m pretty sure Vance would be president. I’d prefer having Trump doing damage to his own party for the next 4 years, I guess. Either way, fuck.

  • Emberleaf@lemmy.ml
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    2 days ago

    You’re all missing the main point here: If you live a clean life, stay true to your faith, commit 34 felonies and be a sexual predator, you too could grow up to be the next president of the USA!!

  • Rhoeri@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    They’ve already said there will be no punishment, so why does this even matte? It’s almost like the news wants us to be angry.

    I wonder why that is….

  • Nate Cox@programming.dev
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    2 days ago

    I still don’t understand how a convicted felon loses the right to vote for president but can still be eligible to run for that office.

    • ExtremeDullard@lemmy.sdf.org
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      2 days ago

      Simple: the Founding Fathers never envisaged that a convicted felon would ever have the balls to run for president, much less that anybody would be stupid enough to vote for one, because it’s fucking insane.

      • JonEFive@midwest.social
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        22 hours ago

        Or that, in true democratic fashion, they belived that the populace knows best. Allowing it or remaining silent could have been intentional. When forming a new government to escape from corruption, you wouldn’t want to create a situation that would outright exclude anyone that the corrupt government labels a felon.

        They could never have imagined such vast distribution of misinformation and all three branches being so thouroughly compromised.

        • ExtremeDullard@lemmy.sdf.org
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          21 hours ago

          I doubt very much that the Founding Fathers had any illusion about the judgment capacity of the populace. If they had, the electoral college wouldn’t exist.

          But they did believe that letting the citizens decide, however bad the decision, was the least worst option. And - more relevant to the Trump problem - I’m convinced they believed there was a level of stupidity and lack of morals below which even the most uneducated, most foolish citizenry could never stoop. That’s why didn’t put guardrails against the unthinkable.

          Of course, Trump and the magards proved them wrong: there is no bottom rung on that particular ladder.

      • eldavi@lemmy.ml
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        2 days ago

        The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.

        • unknown
      • TransplantedSconie@lemm.ee
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        2 days ago

        Turns out all you need is racism, stupidity, and a massive propaganda machine. I’d like to thank the 150 million idiots who made this possible. I’ll be thinking of you all when the 2nd Great Depression pops off with some sprinkles of pandemic 2.0 on top.

    • skulblaka@sh.itjust.works
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      21 hours ago

      Because if felons were unable to be elected the Republicans would try to pre-emptively jail their opponent in every single election. It’s one of few checks against corruption that I believe is still working properly.

    • Sciaphobia@lemm.ee
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      1 day ago

      You wouldn’t really want being a felon to prevent someone from running for president, because if they couldn’t there’d be a significant incentive to weaponize the DOJ against political rivals.

      • DreamlandLividity@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        Sir, this is Lemmy.world. We only do emotional outbursts against republicans and capitalism here. Not rational thought! Please take that somewhere else. /s

    • ExtremeDullard@lemmy.sdf.org
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      2 days ago

      He always wants to come out on top even if it doesn’t matter. He can’t help it: It’s pathological in people who seek power.

    • ChonkyOwlbear@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Doesn’t a felony conviction make related civil suits against you much easier? I can think of a lot of people who would love to take a chunk out of his fortune.

      • Furbag@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        That no longer matters, because the President is immune to civil suits. Since they seem so reluctant to throw him in jail, I’d be shocked if he even bothers to show up to the hearing.

        Yeah, the American people fucked up big time if they thought that there were any remaining guardrails keeping Trump accountable. We just made him a king, and if you disagree he could publicly order you to be murdered and suffer zero consequences because the courts and congress are incapable of holding him accountable.

        • ChonkyOwlbear@lemmy.world
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          The President is only immune from civil suits for actions taken while he was president. These felonies precede his term and are actionable.

          You are right about him being functionally a king once he is back in office though.

  • Nougat@fedia.io
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    2 days ago

    Why bother? The sentence is going to be “Now, now, you shouldn’t have done that!”

  • Chozo@fedia.io
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    2 days ago

    The judge plans to sentence Trump to an unconditional discharge, leaving him a convicted felon without further punishment.

    Justice is dead.