Trump aims to delay hush money trial, move case out of Manhattan

Former U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday formally asked to move his criminal case on New York state charges stemming from hush money paid to a porn star out of Manhattan, a last-ditch effort to put on hold a trial scheduled for April 15.

Former U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday formally asked to move his criminal case on New York state charges stemming from hush money paid to a porn star out of Manhattan, a last-ditch effort to put on hold a trial scheduled for April 15. Emil Bove, a lawyer for Trump, made a request to Associate Justice Lizbeth Gonzalez with a mid-level New York state appeals court known as the Appellate Division to stay the case pending Trump's application to move the trial on the charges brought by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.

A lawyer from Bragg's office, Steven Wu, countered that Trump waited too long to object to being tried in Manhattan, where he once lived. The charges were brought in April 2023. Trump, the Republican candidate challenging Democratic President Joe Biden in the Nov. 5 U.S. election, has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records.

Bove during a hearing did not specific where Trump's team would like for the trial to be held. Bove said a survey taken by Trump's legal team of residents in heavily Democratic Manhattan, one of New York City's five boroughs, found that 61% of respondents thought Trump was guilty, and 70% had a negative opinion of him. "There is real potential prejudice here to moving forward," Bove said. "Jury selection cannot proceed in a fair manner starting next week in this county."

Wu said biased jurors can be weeded out during the jury selection process, and that Trump cannot cite media attention as a reason to move the trial. "He himself has been responsible for stoking that publicity," Wu said.

Gonzalez did not indicate when she would rule on Trump's request. A criminal trial would be the first for a former U.S. president.

Trump is accused of covering up his former lawyer Michael Cohen's $130,000 payment to porn star Stormy Daniels in exchange for her silence before the 2016 presidential election about a sexual encounter she said she had with Trump a decade earlier. Trump has denied any such encounter with Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford. It is one of four criminal cases he faces. The others stem from his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss to Biden, and his handling of sensitive government documents after leaving the presidency in 2021. Trump has pleaded not guilty to all charges.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)