Let me bring in former US attorney and former senior
FBI official Chuck Rosenberg.
Is that how you read this, Chuck?
It is.
I think Lisa has the legal part of it precisely
right, Chris.
I will say, look, Judge Murchan's decision was fraught.
Someone's going to be unhappy no matter what he does.
He's doing what judges do all the time around the
country in state and federal courts.
He's balancing competing interests.
And this is not an easy one, and it is
rather unprecedented.
And so, look, I think on balance, he has it
right.
Can I just ask you, though, is it fraught legally
or is it fraught because of the politics surrounding it?
Yeah, I think it.
Yeah.
It's a great question, Chris.
I would say more so politically and less so legally,
I think the law is pretty clear.
Once you're convicted by a jury of felonies, you get
sentenced.
And that happens all the time.
But here you have the rather unique situation of the
person who is to be sentenced running for president as
a major party candidate.
And so Judge Mershon is balancing those competing interests.
And I think, as he probably sees it, if he
does anything to interfere in the election, then he's done
something wrong.
And so he can wait.
The verdict doesn't go away.
Mr.
Trump presumably will still be sentenced.
It's simply after the election rather than before.
And when you balance his interest.
That makes sense to me, Chris.
So let me ask you, what happens then between now
and November 12th?
What will both sides be doing, Chuck?
Well, I, I imagine the Trump team will be trying
to find ways to postpone or indefinitely or to get
rid of the case entirely then that's been their strategy,
not just delay, but to make the darn thing go
away.
Prosecutors will defend against that, of course, and they'll prepare
for sentencing as they always do.
So I don't know that strategies on either side change
in in meaningful ways.
Chris, I want to bring in Diane Casel, a former
Manhattan assistant District Attorney and retired New York City Criminal
Court judge.
It's good to see you again.
I think it's it would be hard to argue against
what Chuck said, that this was always going to be
a fraught decision.
Anything that deals with a presidential election is both unprecedented
and therefore fraud.
But how complex do you think this was?
And what do you think of of the decision that
he made?
Well, I agree with Chuck.
There's nothing fraught about this.
Legally, this happens all the time.
Defendants get convicted, they file 330 motions.
They those motions either get granted or denied, the defendant
gets sentenced.
And if the defendant's still unhappy, then he can file
a 440 motion, which is essentially a post sentence motion.
The only thing that was ever fraught here was the
politics.
And I think Judge Marshawn really was between a rock
and a hard place.
If he sentenced him now, he looked as if he
were trying to influence the election in a negative manner.
If he puts it over to after the election, he
looks as if to some people perhaps, that he's doing
a favor.
The problem is I see it, though, is, I mean,
what's going to happen after the election, It's going to
be more the same.
If Mr.
Trump wins the election, it's going to be, well, I
can't be sentenced now.
I'm working on a transition team.
I'm too busy.
I don't know what happens if he doesn't get convicted.
I guess that, excuse me, elected.
I guess that makes it easier for Judge Marshawn.
Frankly, the easiest thing for Judge Marshawn would have been
to simply sentence and let the Appellate Division worry about
it.
But I do think the judge, who is known to
be fair, was trying to be fair.
I want to go back to Vaughn Hilliard.
And Vaughn, I understand we are hearing from Team Trump.
Yeah, we just got an initial statement here from one
of the spokespersons for the Trump campaign.
Let's read it to you here.
Quote, there should be no sentencing in the Manhattan district
attorney's election interference wit which end as mandated by the
United States Supreme Court.
This case along with all of the other Harris Biden
hoaxes should be dismissed at Stephen Chung, spokesman for the
Trump campaigns initial statement.
Of course, this is what Lisa is getting at.
Here is the fact that we are waiting for Judge
Bershon to also decide the merits of the Trump teams
appealed to Judge Marshawn to all but nullify the decision
of the jury back in May on the grounds that
some of the evidence that was admitted was before the
US Supreme Court's immunity decision, which granted some protections to
Donald Trump in his role as president over what could
be or could not be admissible.
Of course, it was the prosecution from District Attorney Alvin
Bragg's office which ferociously pushed back in suggesting that it
was de minimis, that the evidence that would potentially have
not been shown before the jury was minimal in terms
of what was overwhelming evidence that would have been admissible,
including the actual testimony of the witnesses who took the
stand.
And so, of course, here Donald Trump is continued to
suggest that all of the cases, not just this one,
should be dismissed.
Of course, he has referenced the judge.
Cannon in Florida is the only judge who is so
are done her job with ethics, which of course, Judge
Cannon, who is not throwing out that case on the
grounds of the immunity decision, but on the grounds that
she considered it to have been a special counsel that
was not rightfully appointed by the District Attorney General or
by the attorney general here.
And so this is for the Trump campaign.
I think just a little bit of an insight into
what we should hear from Donald Trump here in North
Carolina today, in Wisconsin tomorrow.
On the trail is he continues to make the case
nationally and publicly like he did when he was on
the stage in Milwaukee at the Republican National Convention that
these cases should not be brought at all, not only
on the substance, but also under the Supreme Court's immunity
decision, which we will wait to hear from Judge Marshawn.
And as it applies to the specific case.
I have another question for you, Vaughn, but before I
go to it, can you please read that very brief
statement again?
Quote, there should be no sentencing in the Manhattan DEA's
election interference winch hunt as mandated by the United States
Supreme Court.
This case along with all of the other Harris Biden
hoaxes should be dismissed.
So they see this as an opportunity to continue what
their arguments have been all along, that none of these
cases are legitimate.
And and not to say, of course, we got to
win because we're right.
There was none of that.
There was none of the this is the argument we
made.
Whether or not this is exactly what Juan Marshawn said,
the judge agrees with us.
This is clearly fighting mode.
Fighting mode and also an effort to, let's be very
frank, distort, right?
I think that the this particular statement here from Stephen
Chung could very well have merits.
We will wait to hear from Judge Marshawn, at least
as it applies to the hush money payment case, about
whether there was enough evidence that he finds should not
have been admitted under the Supreme Court's decision.
At the same time, when I say distort, Donald Trump
has repeatedly distorted the not only Judge Cannon's decision and
the classified documents case.
He said it was exoneration, right?
That's what we've heard in the impeachment.
And he often uses the word exoneration to suggest that
somehow these judges are finding that he did not actually
do any wrongdoing.
And for anybody that may not be listening to right
wing provocative media that is Trump aligned or reading to
the second and third paragraph of a story, I think
the Trump's words hold great weight because we often after
traveling on the campaign trail here, his lines parroted by
a swaths of his supporters here.
And so I think that, you know, including the effect
that people make the case that the Supreme Court granted
him immunity and that none of these cases should be
brought before him.
Of course, again, this is going to come down to
the likes of Judge Barshan and Judge Shutkin, who are
based off of how the US justice system works, going
to give the defendants attorneys, Donald Trump's attorneys, their due
chance to present in briefings and in hearings.
What they believe is, is, is protected from the rights
of Donald Trump as being the former president from the
immunity decision here.
And so this is part of the justice system that
sometimes gets, again, I'll use the word distorted by Donald
Trump when by and large, this is absolutely going through
the process that those who of like Chuck and Lisa
have actually operated through and other reporters like ourselves have
watched transpire.
Donald Trump is getting his due course in the court
of law.
And clearly Judge Marshawn, who he has continually suggested has
political motives, could have very well, if he had desired,
kept the September 18th sentencing on the books, but he
chose not to.
Instead, he's pushing it back the after the election.
And in his decision, they're even noting so that the
American public would not distort what ultimately his decision was
as part of the memo.