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Former President Donald Trump returns to the courtroom after a break before testifying in his civil fraud trial in New York State Supreme Court on November 6 in New York.
© Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post
Hush money and falsification of documents: Donald Trump is facing two hearings in his trials.
His political future depends on the outcome.
Washington – Donald Trump is expected at the defendant's table in a Manhattan courtroom on Thursday (February 15).
The hearing could confirm that he will go on trial next month for allegedly falsifying documents about the repayment of hush money.
It would be the first criminal trial against a former US president.
At the same hour, a team of Trump's lawyers will appear in Atlanta with some of his co-defendants for a hearing in a separate indictment accusing Trump and others of a sweeping scheme to overturn Georgia's 2020 election results.
This hearing will focus on alleged prosecutorial misconduct.
The two court sessions could help clarify the timing and feasibility of two of the four criminal cases against Trump.
Shortly before the nomination for the US election: Donald Trump is back in court
Lawyers for Trump, who is running again for president in the 2024 US election and is close to being nominated by the Republicans, have tried to delay the court hearings until after the election, stressing that it would be impossible to be in court at the same time and being on the campaign trail.
Another wild card in the court docket is Trump's federal trial in Washington DC for allegedly obstructing the 2020 election results. The case is frozen until the Supreme Court decides whether it will resolve the question of presidential immunity after a lower court ruled that former Presidents – including Trump – cannot be protected from prosecution.
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Trials against Trump: Lawyers are playing for time
If the judges decide quickly to continue the trial in Washington, legal experts say it could begin in late May or June.
New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan may then consider postponing his trial date so as not to complicate preparations for the federal trial in Washington, which involves sweeping national questions of election integrity and disruption of the peaceful transfer of power takes place.
"If the Supreme Court doesn't take up the case, there's a good chance the case could be heard in Washington in late spring - depending on when the Supreme Court rejects the case," said Mary McCord, a former federal prosecutor who is now executive director from the Institute for Constitutional Law and the Protection of the Constitution at Georgetown Law.
“If that is the case, it is possible that Merchan may not want to begin the [New York] trial at the end of March.”
Just a few weeks ago, the fate and timing of all Trump trials seemed uncertain.
The Washington judge had removed a March 4 hearing from her calendar because of the ongoing immunity appeal.
In Florida, another federal judge signaled in November that she would likely postpone Trump's trial in May.
The case involves allegations that the former president allegedly withheld classified documents and hindered government efforts to obtain them.
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Prosecutors and defense attorneys have been waiting for the Florida judge's decision ever since - and they will likely get at least some answers at the March 1 hearing.
News York and Giorgia: The judges are waiting for clear signals
In New York, the trial has been largely on hold since Trump's indictment last April, as Merchan appeared to want to wait for the schedule of other trials before deciding whether to make his March 25 appointment.
And Georgia's election interference trial is also dragging on as defense lawyers sought to disqualify prosecutors over an alleged improper romantic relationship between District Attorney Fani T. Willis and her top deputy in the case.
Hush money to Stormy Daniels: The Trump trial in New York is considered the weakest
Meanwhile, in New York, the case is on the docket, which some legal experts have dismissed as the “weakest” of Trump’s four criminal charges.
The former president faces 34 counts of falsifying business records in connection with an alleged hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels during his 2016 presidential campaign.
Trump is accused of improperly classifying his reimbursements to his former lawyer Michael Cohen, who made the hush money payment, as business expenses rather than campaign expenses.
He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
In addition to confirming a trial date, Merchan is also expected to decide on Trump's long-held request to stop the proceedings for various reasons.
These include allegations that there is insufficient evidence of wrongdoing and that the case is motivated by an abuse of prosecutorial power.
In a lengthy September brief, Trump's lawyers said the five-year investigation by the Manhattan district attorney's office had resulted in a "convoluted package of politically motivated allegations, marred by legal deficiencies, procedural errors, disclosure violations and a stubborn refusal to provide meaningful information on his theory of If this is to be done, it is marked”.
For their part, lawyers on Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's trial team argued that Trump committed multiple crimes when he tried to circumvent campaign finance disclosure laws by classifying the refunds as legal fees, providing a solid basis for an indictment for a capital crime.
Trump is expected to attend the hearing in Manhattan on Thursday along with his defense team.
This gives a taste of what the busy courthouse will be like during his trial, when a crush of news reporters interrupts the normal routine of lawyers, defendants and court staff busy with other matters there.
Giorgia trial: Trump lawyers question the accuser
At the same time, other Trump lawyers will be in Georgia, where the former president and 14 other co-defendants are charged in a sprawling election interference case that also includes charges of conspiracy to falsify statements and documents.
Four other co-defendants have pleaded guilty.
Trump has denied any wrongdoing.
The hearing will focus on the allegations made by one of Trump's remaining co-defendants, former campaign aide Mike Roman.
He has alleged that Willis and lead investigator Nathan Wade had a personal relationship that benefited Willis financially after she hired him.
Roman's attorney, Ashleigh Merchant, claimed Willis may have broken the law when she hired Wade and then allowed him to use her to pay for "vacations around the world" that were unrelated to her work on the case.
Her request to disqualify Willis and her office was later joined by Trump and several other co-defendants, including former Georgia GOP Chairman David Shafer, Atlanta attorney Bob Cheeley, former Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark and Cathleen Latham , a 2020 Trump voter.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee has said Thursday's hearing will focus on whether Willis benefited financially from hiring Wade, when the relationship began and whether it is ongoing.
Wade has claimed the relationship began after Willis hired him, but Merchant said she has a witness - Wade's former partner and former divorce lawyer - who will dispute that.
To the authors
Perry Stein
covers the Justice Department and FBI for The Washington Post.
She previously covered education in Washington.
Before joining the Post in 2015, she was a staff writer at the Washington City Paper and wrote for the Miami Herald.
Amy Gardner
has worked at the Post since 2005 and currently covers elections on the Democracy team.
She is part of the team that won the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service for their coverage of the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1990 and lives in Arlington, Virginia with her husband, Bob.
They have two sons.
Shayna Jacobs
is a federal courts and law enforcement reporter on the national security team at The Washington Post, where she covers the Southern and Eastern Districts of New York.
We are currently testing machine translations. This article was automatically translated from English into German.
This article was first published in English on February 14, 2024 at the “Washingtonpost.com” - as part of a cooperation, it is now also available in translation to readers of the IPPEN.MEDIA portals.