TOI correspondent from Washington: Donald Trump will become the first US President in history to enter the White House as a convicted felon on January 20. A New York judge on Friday sentenced him for falsifying business records to conceal payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels but discharged him unconditionally without jail time, fine, or probation, recognizing the people’s mandate that elected him as a president for a second term.
The office of the president bestows “far-reaching protections to the officeholder,” Justice Juan Merchan told Trump, who heard the ruling remotely, before noting that the “citizenry of this nation” had returned him to the White House and a sentence of unconditional discharge was the only appropriate sentence available “without encroaching on the highest office of the land.”
“Sir, I wish you Godspeed as you pursue your second term in office,” Merchan said, even as Trump’s MAGA warriors unloaded on the judge for the infamy he inflicted on their supremo, calling the sentencing “third world tactics from third world trash.” Merchan was born in Bogota, Colombia, and his family emigrated to the US when he was six.
In his remarks, Trump insisted that the case was a “political witchhunt” aimed at defeating him in theelections, while noting “The real Jury, the American People, have spoken, by Re-Electing me with an overwhelming MANDATE in one of the most consequential Elections in History.” He said he will appeal the sentencing.
“I just want to say I think it’s an embarrassment to New York,” he said in a familiar assault on liberal states, cities, and enclaves in the US that are political opposed to him, before posting “THERE IS NO CASE, THERE WAS NEVER A CASE.”
The US President insists that the alleged $ 130,000 pay off to Stormy Daniels to buy her silence before the 2016 elections was actually a “legal expense” and not a pay off.
Judge Merchan got the green light for the no-punishment-other-than-historical-infamy sentencing after the US Supreme Court on Thursday declined in a 5-4 ruling to intervene in the case despite having a 6-3 conservative majority, including three justices handpicked by Trump.
The court said Trump could address his issues with the verdict through appeals, and that “the burden that sentencing will impose on his responsibilities is relatively insubstantial in light of the trial court’s stated intent to impose a sentence of ‘unconditional discharge’ after a brief virtual hearing.”
Effectively, the conservative-majority SC allowed a liberal New York judge to proceed with the sentencing ostensibly to demonstrate the majesty of the law while recognizing the mandate of the people.
Trump’s MAGA base though vented against Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Amy Coney Barrett — a Trump appointee — who joined the three liberal justices — Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagal, and Ketanji Jackson Brown, all women — in delivering the 5-4 ruling.
Barrett, 52, who has lately become a swing vote in many cases, was savagely pilloried by MAGA radicals, who called her Amy “Commie” Barrett and a “closet liberal” who should be impeached.
Trump himself was more restrained about a SC where he has manufactured a conservative majority, saying he appreciated the time and effort ‘to remedy the great injustice done to me” but the case should never have been brought up.
“This was nothing other than Weaponization of our Justice System against a Political Opponent. It’s called Lawfare, and nothing like this has ever happened in the United States of America, and it should never be allowed to happen again,” he said.
