A New York judge says former President Donald Trump’s hush-money trial will go ahead as scheduled with jury selection starting on March 25.
Judge Juan Manuel Merchan said Thursday that he made the decision after speaking with the judge in Trump’s now-delayed federal election interference case in the nation’s capital.
Trump entered the courthouse shortly before 9 a.m.
It was Trump’s first return visit to court in the New York criminal case since that historic indictment made him the first ex-president charged with a crime. Since then, he has also been indicted in Florida, Georgia and Washington, D.C.
In recent weeks, he’s blended campaign events with court appearances, attending on Monday a closed hearing in a Florida case charging him with hoarding classified records.
Judge Juan Manuel Merchan has taken steps in recent weeks to prepare for a trial.
Over the past year, Trump has lashed out at Merchan as a “Trump-hating judge,” asked him to step down from the case and sought to move the case from state court to federal court, all to no avail. Merchan has acknowledged making several small donations to Democrats, including $15 to Trump’s rival Joe Biden, but said he’s certain of his “ability to be fair and impartial.”
Thursday’s proceeding was part of a busy, overlapping stretch of legal activity for the Republican presidential front-runner, who has increasingly made his court involvement part of his political campaign.
The recent postponement of a March 4 trial date in Trump’s Washington, D.C. election interference case removed a major hurdle to starting the New York case on time.
Just as the New York hearing got underway, a judge in Atlanta is set to hear arguments Thursday over whether Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis should be disqualified from Trump’s Georgia election interference case because of a “personal relationship” with Nathan Wade, a special prosecutor she hired for the case.
Trump is also awaiting a decision, possibly as early as Friday, in a New York civil fraud case that threatens to upend his real estate empire. If the judge rules against Trump, who is accused of inflating his wealth to defraud banks, insurers and others, he could be on the hook for millions of dollars in penalties among other sanctions.
