Latest news with #2ndUSCircuitCourtofAppeals
Yahoo
a day ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Appeals court denies Trump plea to review $5 million judgment in E. Jean Carroll abuse and defamation case
A federal appeals court on Friday rejected another attempt by President Donald Trump to review a $5 million judgment against him for sexually abusing and then defaming E. Jean Carroll. A three-judge panel from the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against Trump in December. Trump asked the full court to reconsider, but the court rejected the plea Friday. The president's next stop, should he wish, would be the Supreme Court. Carroll, a former magazine columnist, alleged that Trump raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman department store in New York in the 1990s and then defamed her when he denied her claim, said she wasn't his type and suggested she made up the story to boost sales of her book. The jury found Trump liable for battery based on the sexual assault claim, that he should pay about $2 million in damages to Carroll for the civil battery claim and that he should pay her nearly $3 million in damages for successfully proving her defamation claim against him. While the jury found that Trump sexually abused her, sufficient to hold him liable for battery, the jury did not find that Carroll proved he raped her. Trump denied all claims brought against him by Carroll and called the civil trial verdict 'a total disgrace.' 'The American People are supporting President Trump in historic numbers, and they demand an immediate end to the political weaponization of our justice system and a swift dismissal of all of the Witch Hunts, including the Democrat-funded Carroll Hoax, which will continue to be appealed,' a Trump legal spokesman said in a statement Friday. Two judges dissented from the order, agreeing with Trump's argument that the use of the Access Hollywood tape in which he bragged that stars can 'do anything' to women and other evidence of alleged prior bad acts was prejudicial. 'The result was a jury verdict based on impermissible character evidence and few reliable facts,' wrote Judges Steven Menashi and Michael Park, both of whom were appointed by Trump in his first term. CNN's Paula Reid contributed to this report.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Federal appeals court wrestles with Trump effort to fight hush money conviction
A federal appeals court in New York wrangled Wednesday with President Donald Trump's claim that his hush money conviction should be reviewed by federal courts and seemed open to the idea that the Supreme Court's landmark immunity decision may weigh in the president's favor. 'It seems to me that we got a very big case that created a whole new world of presidential immunity,' US Circuit Judge Myrna Pérez, who was nominated to the bench by President Joe Biden, said at one point during oral arguments. 'The boundaries are not clear at this point.' At issue is whether Trump can move his state court case on 34 counts of falsifying business records to federal court, where he hopes to argue that prosecutors violated the Supreme Court's immunity decision last year by using certain evidence against him, including testimony from former White House Communications Director Hope Hicks. 'The scope of a federal constitutional immunity for the president of the United States should be decided by this court and the Supreme Court, not by New York state courts,' said Jeffrey Wall, a former acting US solicitor general who is representing Trump in the case. 'Everything about this cries out for federal court.' The Supreme Court's decision last year granted Trump immunity from criminal prosecution for his official acts and barred prosecutors from attempting to enter evidence about them, even if they are pursuing alleged crimes involving that president's private conduct. Without that prohibition on evidence, the Supreme Court reasoned, a prosecutor could 'eviscerate the immunity' the court recognized by allowing a jury to second-guess a president's official acts. And so, the underlying question is whether prosecutors crossed that line by including the testimony from Hicks and former executive assistant Madeleine Westerhout, as well as a series of social media posts Trump authored during his first term criticizing the hush money case. The three-judge panel of the New York-based 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals, all appointed by Democratic presidents, asked probing questions of both sides and it wasn't clear after more than an hour of arguments how they would decide the case. The judges pressed the attorney representing Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg on why the Supreme Court's decision last year didn't preclude the evidence at issue in the case. 'The Supreme Court used very broad language in talking about evidentiary immunity,' noted Circuit Judge Susan Carney. Bragg's office has countered that it's too late for federal courts to intervene. That's because Trump was already convicted and sentenced. Prosecutors have also argued that the evidence at issue wasn't the kind the Supreme Court was referring to. Hicks may have been a White House official when she testified, they said, but she was speaking about actions Trump took in a private capacity. 'The fact that we are now past the point of sentencing would be a compelling reason to find no 'good cause' for removal,' said Steven Wu, who was representing Bragg. Federal officials facing prosecution in state courts may move their cases to federal court in many circumstances under a 19th century law designed to ensure states don't attempt to prosecute them for conduct performed 'under color' of a US office or agency. A federal government worker, for instance, might seek to have a case moved to federal court if they are sued after getting into a car accident while driving on the job. Wu analogized Trump's argument to a postal worker who commits a crime on the weekend and then confesses to his boss at work on Monday. The confession, even though it happened in a post office, doesn't suddenly convert the content of the conversation to an official US Postal Service action. 'The criminal charges were private and unofficial conduct,' Wu said. Trump was ultimately sentenced in January without penalty. He had been accused of falsifying a payment to his former lawyer, Michael Cohen, to cover up a $130,000 payment Cohen made to adult-film star Stormy Daniels to keep her from speaking out before the 2016 election about an alleged affair with Trump. (Trump has denied the affair.) US District Judge Alvin Hellerstein, nominated to the bench by President Bill Clinton, denied Trump's request to move the case to federal court – keeping his appeals instead in New York courts. Trump, who frequently complained about the New York trial court judge in his case, Juan Merchan, has said he wants his case heard in an 'unbiased federal forum.'
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Federal appeals court to hear arguments in Trump's long-shot effort to fight hush money conviction
Five months after President Donald Trump was sentenced without penalty in the New York hush money case, his attorneys will square off again with prosecutors Wednesday in one of the first major tests of the Supreme Court's landmark presidential immunity decision. Trump is relying heavily on the high court's divisive 6-3 immunity ruling from July in a long-shot bid to get his conviction reviewed – and ultimately overturned – by federal courts. After being convicted on 34 counts of falsifying business records, Trump in January became the first felon to ascend to the presidency in US history. Even after Trump was reelected and federal courts became flooded with litigation tied to his second term, the appeals in the hush money case have chugged forward in multiple courts. A three-judge panel of the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals – all named to the bench by Democratic presidents – will hear arguments Wednesday in one of those cases. Trump will be represented on Wednesday by Jeffrey Wall, a private lawyer and Supreme Court litigator who served as acting solicitor general during Trump's first administration. Many of the lawyers who served on Trump's defense team in the hush money case have since taken top jobs within the Justice Department. The case stems from the 2023 indictment announced by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, a Democrat, who accused Trump of falsely categorizing payments he said were made to quash unflattering stories during the 2016 election. Trump was accused of falsifying a payment to his former lawyer, Michael Cohen, to cover up a $130,000 payment Cohen made to adult-film star Stormy Daniels to keep her from speaking out before the 2016 election about an alleged affair with Trump. (Trump has denied the affair.) Trump was ultimately convicted last year and was sentenced without penalty in January, days before he took office. The president is now attempting to move that case to federal court, where he is betting he'll have an easier shot at arguing that the Supreme Court's immunity decision in July will help him overturn the conviction. Trump's earlier attempts to move the case to federal court have been unsuccessful. US District Judge Alvin Hellerstein, nominated by President Bill Clinton, denied the request in September – keeping Trump's case in New York courts instead. The 2nd Circuit will now hear arguments on Trump's appeal of that decision on Wednesday. 'He's lost already several times in the state courts,' said David Shapiro, a former prosecutor and now a lecturer at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. And Trump's long-running battle with New York Judge Juan Merchan, Shapiro said, has 'just simmered up through the system' in New York courts in a way that may have convinced Trump that federal courts will be more receptive. Trump, who frequently complained about Merchan, has said he wants his case heard in an 'unbiased federal forum.' Trump's argument hangs largely on a technical but hotly debated section of the Supreme Court's immunity decision last year. Broadly, that decision granted former presidents 'at least presumptive' immunity for official acts and 'absolute immunity' when presidents were exercising their constitutional powers. State prosecutors say the hush money payments were a private matter – not official acts of the president – and so they are not covered by immunity. But the Supreme Court's decision also barred prosecutors from attempting to show a jury evidence concerning a president's official acts, even if they are pursuing alleged crimes involving that president's private conduct. Without that prohibition, the Supreme Court reasoned, a prosecutor could 'eviscerate the immunity' the court recognized by allowing a jury to second-guess a president's official acts. Trump is arguing that is exactly what Bragg did when he called White House officials such as former communications director Hope Hicks and former executive assistant Madeleine Westerhout to testify at his trial. Hicks had testified that Trump felt it would 'have been bad to have that story come out before the election,' which prosecutors later described as the 'nail' in the coffin of the president's defense. Trump's attorneys are also pointing to social media posts the president sent in 2018 denying the Daniels hush money scheme as official statements that should not have been used in the trial. State prosecutors 'introduced into evidence and asked the jury to scrutinize President Trump's official presidential acts,' Trump's attorneys told the appeals court in a filing last month. 'One month after trial, the Supreme Court unequivocally recognized an immunity prohibiting the use of such acts as evidence at any trial of a former president.' A White House spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. If Trump's case is ultimately reviewed by federal courts, that would not change his state law conviction into a federal conviction. Trump would not be able to pardon himself just because a federal court reviews the case. Bragg's office countered that it's too late for federal courts to intervene. Federal officials facing prosecution in state courts may move their cases to federal court in many circumstances under a 19th century law designed to ensure states don't attempt to prosecute them for conduct performed 'under color' of a US office or agency. A federal government worker, for instance, might seek to have a case moved to federal court if they are sued after getting into a car accident while driving on the job. But in this case, Bragg's office argued, Trump has already been convicted and sentenced. That means, prosecutors said, there's really nothing left for federal courts to do. 'Because final judgment has been entered and the state criminal action has concluded, there is nothing to remove to federal district court,' prosecutors told the 2nd Circuit in January. Even if that's not true, they said, seeking testimony from a White House adviser about purely private acts doesn't conflict with the Supreme Court's ruling in last year's immunity case. Bragg's office has pointed to a Supreme Court ruling as well: the 5-4 decision in January that allowed Trump to be sentenced in the hush money case. The president raised many of the same concerns about evidence when he attempted to halt that sentencing before the inauguration. A majority of the Supreme Court balked at that argument in a single sentence that, effectively, said Trump could raise those concerns when he appeals his conviction. That appeal remains pending in state court. 'The alleged evidentiary violations at President-elect Trump's state-court trial,' the Supreme Court wrote, 'can be addressed in the ordinary course on appeal.'
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Business Standard
3 days ago
- Politics
- Business Standard
Appeals court to hear Trump's bid to overturn hush money conviction
President Donald Trump 's quest to erase his criminal conviction heads to a federal appeals court Wednesday. It's one way he's trying to get last year's hush money verdict overturned. A three-judge panel is set to hear arguments in Trump's long-running fight to get the New York case moved from state court to federal court, where he could then try to have the verdict thrown out on presidential immunity grounds. The Republican is asking the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals to intervene after a lower-court judge twice rejected the move. As part of the request, Trump wants the federal appeals court to seize control of the criminal case and then ultimately decide his appeal of the verdict, which is now pending in a state appellate court. The 2nd Circuit should determine once and for all that this unprecedented criminal prosecution of a former and current President of the United States belongs in federal court," Trump's lawyers wrote in a court filing. The Manhattan district attorney's office, which prosecuted Trump's case, wants it to stay in state court. Trump's Justice Department now partly run by his former criminal defence lawyers backs his bid to move the case to federal court. If Trump loses, he could go to the US Supreme Court. Trump was convicted in May 2024 of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records to conceal a hush money payment to porn actor Stormy Daniels, whose affair allegations threatened to upend his 2016 presidential campaign. Trump denies her claim and said he did nothing wrong. It was the only one of his four criminal cases to go to trial. Trump's lawyers first sought to move the case to federal court following his March 2023 indictment, arguing that federal officers including former presidents have the right to be tried in federal court for charges arising from conduct performed while in office. Part of the criminal case involved checks he wrote while he was president. They tried again after his conviction, arguing that Trump's historic prosecution violated his constitutional rights and ran afoul of the Supreme Court's presidential immunity ruling, which was decided about a month after the hush money trial ended. The ruling reins in prosecutions of ex-presidents for official acts and restricts prosecutors in pointing to official acts as evidence that a president's unofficial actions were illegal. US District Judge Alvin Hellerstein denied both requests, ruling in part that Trump's conviction involved his personal life, not his work as president. In a four-page ruling, Hellerstein wrote that nothing about the high court's ruling affected his prior conclusion that hush money payments at issue in Trump's case were private, unofficial acts, outside the bounds of executive authority. Trump's lawyers argue that prosecutors rushed to trial instead of waiting for the Supreme Court's presidential immunity decision, and that prosecutors erred by showing jurors evidence that should not have been allowed under the ruling, such as former White House staffers describing how Trump reacted to news coverage of the hush money deal and tweets he sent while president in 2018. Trump's former criminal defence lawyer Todd Blanche is now the deputy US attorney general, the Justice Department's second-in-command. Another of his lawyers, Emil Bove, has a high-ranking Justice Department position. The trial judge, Juan M. Merchan, rejected Trump's requests to throw out the conviction on presidential immunity grounds and sentenced him on January 10 to an unconditional discharge, leaving his conviction intact but sparing him any punishment. Appearing by video at his sentencing, Trump called the case a political witch hunt, a weaponisation of government and an embarrassment to New York. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Yahoo
14-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Sarah Palin libel case against New York Times to start
A retrial is set to begin for Sarah Palin's libel lawsuit claiming The New York Times libelled her in an editorial eight years ago. The onetime Republican vice presidential candidate and ex-governor of Alaska gets another chance to prove to a federal jury that the newspaper defamed her with the 2017 editorial falsely linking her campaign rhetoric to a mass shooting. Palin said it damaged her reputation and career. The Times has acknowledged the editorial was inaccurate but said it quickly corrected an "honest mistake". The trial, expected to last a week, comes after the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals restored the case last year. Jury selection is scheduled to begin on Monday morning. In February 2022, Judge Jed S Rakoff in Manhattan rejected Palin's claims in a ruling issued while a jury deliberated. The judge then let jurors deliver their verdict, which went against Palin. In restoring the lawsuit, the 2nd Circuit said Rakoff's dismissal ruling improperly intruded on the jury's work. It also cited flaws in the trial, saying there was erroneous exclusion of evidence, an inaccurate jury instruction and an erroneous response to a question from the jury. The retrial occurs as President Donald Trump and others in agreement with his views of news coverage have been aggressive toward media outlets when they believe there has been unjust treatment. Trump sued CBS News for $US20 billion ($A32 billion) over the editing of a 60 Minutes interview with his 2024 opponent, former Vice President Kamala Harris, and also sued the Des Moines Register over an Iowa election poll that turned out to be inaccurate. ABC News settled a lawsuit with Trump over its incorrect claim the president had been found civilly liable for raping writer E Jean Carroll. Kenneth G Turkel, a lawyer for Palin, did not return a request for comment. Charlie Stadtlander, a spokesperson for the Times, said Palin's claim stemmed from "a passing reference to an event in an editorial that was not about Sarah Palin". "That reference was an unintended error, and quickly corrected. We're confident we will prevail and intend to vigorously defend the case," Stadtlander said in a statement.
