Supreme Court rejects longshot effort by Missouri to block Trump sentencing in New York case

Washington — The Supreme Court on Monday rejected a longshot bid by the state of Missouri to halt former President Donald Trump’s impending sentence and lift the gag order imposed in the New York “hush money” case until after the November presidential election.

The high court denied Missouri’s request to bring its case against New York, and dismissed a separate motion to pause Trump’s sentencing in an unsigned order. There were no noted dissents. Justices Clarence and Samuel Alito said they would have granted the state’s request to file a bill of complaint, but would not have granted the other relief Missouri sought. 

Trump was convicted by a New York jury in May of 34 felony counts for falsifying business records to cover up a $130,000 payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels before the 2016 election. 

He has vowed to appeal the conviction, and his sentencing, while initially set for July 11, was delayed to Sept. 18. The New York judge overseeing the case, Justice Juan Merchan, lifted part of the gag order in June, but Trump is still restricted from talking about prosecutors, court staff and their families.

Merchan is also set to decide by Sept. 6 whether to set aside Trump’s guilty verdict based on the Supreme Court’s ruling that he is entitled to immunity from federal prosecution for official acts taken while in the White House. Trump’s lawyers have argued that under the court’s decision, prosecutors shouldn’t have been allowed to offer evidence at trial of the former president’s official acts. Manhattan prosecutors disagree with their assertions.

In the request to halt Trump’s sentence and temporarily lift the gag order, Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey, a Republican, claimed that New York prosecutors are attempting to interfere with Trump’s campaign by using their “coercive power” in the form of the gag order and forthcoming sentence.

“Allowing New York’s actions to stand during this election season undermines the rights of voters and electors and serves as a dangerous precedent that any one of thousands of elected prosecutors in other states may follow in the future,” he wrote. “The public interest stands firmly with Missouri and the protection of the electoral process from this type of partisan meddling.”

Bailey told the court that New York has interfered with Missouri’s election process by impairing presidential electors’ and voters’ ability to see Trump on the campaign trail and hear him speak. Even if Trump could schedule events in September and October, after his scheduled sentencing, the gag order would restrict what he could say at those rallies, Bailey claimed.

“Whether Trump is being unfairly targeted for prosecution by his general-election opponent and allies of that opponent is of course highly relevant to Trump’s pitch about which candidate voters should support in November,” he said.

Bailey said that while a criminal sentence or gag order would generally not interfere with voters’ choice to elect their preferred candidate when he has no chance of prevailing in the election, Trump is the Republican presidential nominee and ahead in some states. He also said that Trump was found guilty not of committing a violent crime, but rather “mere bookkeeping offenses.”

“There is no urgent need to press forth with an immediate sentence and gag order,” the Republican attorney general wrote. “There is an urgent need for the American people to hear from the major candidates without one state hampering one candidate’s campaign.”

New York officials urged the Supreme Court to deny Missouri’s attempt to halt Trump’s sentence, arguing that the state is attempting to further Trump’s individual interests, and that there is no role for the nation’s highest court to play.

“Allowing Missouri to file this suit for such relief against New York would permit an extraordinary and dangerous end-run around former President Trump’s ongoing state court proceedings and the statutory limitations on this Court’s jurisdiction to review state court decisions,” Attorney General Letitia James wrote in a filing.

James, a Democrat, argued that the actions Missouri challenges are not attributable to the state of New York, but rather the Manhattan district attorney, who is elected by voters in the county.

“Allowing Missouri to invoke this court’s jurisdiction to interfere with the enforcement of criminal law in New York is contrary to these foundational principles and undermines New York’s proud tradition of preserving the independence of local DAs,” she wrote.

James also warned that Missouri’s requested relief risks undermining the integrity of the courts and inviting a flood of similar litigation, which she called “unmeritorious.”

Missouri’s effort to pursue relief that would benefit Trump is one of several attempts by Republicans to impact the criminal proceeding. GOP Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York filed a misconduct complaint against Merchan with the state court system in May. The House Judiciary Committee, led by Republican Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, also investigated Trump’s prosecution in Manhattan.

Four GOP-led states supported Missouri’s bid before the Supreme Court, calling the allegation that New York is using its criminal process to interfere with the 2024 presidential election a “serious one.”

“Missouri contends that this court should step in to delay this politically motivated prosecution until after the election to thwart its apparent purpose to interfere with the election,” Republican officials from Florida, Iowa, Alaska and Montana said in a filing. “That is a serious contention, and this Court has a constitutional and statutory obligation to adjudicate it.”