Former president Donald Trump, the frontrunner in the 2024 presidential race, on Monday yet again filed to remove New York County Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan from the hush money case, citing a potential conflict of interest. Former Department of Justice Attorney Andrew Weissmann weighed in on the development in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
What Happened: “Trump’s latest repetitive recusal motion in NY criminal case is just the tired ploy of attacking the umpire in advance of the game — same thing he did in the presidential election,” Weissmann said. “In Trump world: it’s rigged, unless he wins,” he added.
The former president made a similar request for recusing Merchan last year and the judge denied the bid after an ethics panel found that his daughter’s work did not pose reasonable questions about his impartiality, he added.
The hush money case is a criminal lawsuit pending against Trump for falsifying accounts regarding payments made to adult movie star Stormy Daniels for covering up his purported sexual encounter. He has been charged with 34 felony counts.
Why It’s Important: Justice Merchan imposed a gag order on the ex-president last week. The presidential candidate violated the order over the weekend by going on a rant against Merchan and his daughter on the Truth Social platform. Since then, the judge has expanded his limited gag order to cover the family members of the judge and the district attorney.
The first-ever criminal trial of a former US president is scheduled to begin on April 15.
Trump’s niece and psychologist Mary Trump said in a recent post that the hush money case is shaping up to be a “worst-case scenario” for him, as it “forces him to be in a courtroom during the height of the campaign and his historically rude and entitled in-court behavior will be on full display before the media, and the rest of the country.”
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