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Former President Donald Trump and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg
CNN
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The Manhattan District Attorney's Office is set to delay Donald Trump's criminal hush money investigation for up to 30 days. According to court filings.
The trial is now scheduled to begin on March 25.
The potential delay calls into question the date of the former president's first criminal trial, a surprise turn that represents a major boost for Trump — whose security teams have employed a strategy of consistently trying to delay all of his trials since the election. .
Trump faces criminal charges in four separate cases, but as of Thursday, the New York case was the only one with a clear trial date. While Trump's lawyers have urged him to delay, the federal election tampering case has been put on hold until the Supreme Court hears Trump's immunity claims next month. An investigation into the mishandling of classified documents Until August or even beyond the election in Florida.
In Georgia, a judge is set to rule within days on whether to disqualify the Fulton County district attorney who is suing the former president over his alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
Last year Trump was charged by District Attorney Alvin Bragg's office with falsifying 34 business records. The charges stem from payments to former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen for payments he made to an adult film actor who accused him of having an affair with Trump before the 2016 election. The former president has pleaded not guilty and has denied the affair.
The proposed delay in the New York trial is to give Trump's lawyers time to review new material turned over by federal prosecutors this week, the DA's office said.
The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York sent out about 31,000 pages of discovery materials Wednesday and has more to share, according to a new filing.
“However, even if the People are willing to proceed with the trial on March 25, we do not object to an adjournment with plenty of caution and to ensure that the defendant has sufficient time to rehearse new material,” the filing said.
The documents were produced in response to a mid-January subpoena from Trump's legal team, according to the district attorney's letter. According to the filing, the US Attorney's Office has turned over 73,000 pages of records since March 4.
According to the district attorney's letter, Trump's attorneys asked for a 90-day delay in the trial — or dismissal of the case entirely — based on recent records produced by federal prosecutors over the past 10 days.
Bragg's office says it did not violate discovery protocol to dismiss the case, but says it is willing to postpone the hearing based on new records developed by federal prosecutors.
The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York declined to comment.
Separately, Trump asked Judge Juan Mercant to delay the hearing until the U.S. Supreme Court weighs his presidential immunity request. The court is not scheduled to hear that case until April 25, and a ruling will not come until the end of the court's term in late June or early July.
This story has been updated with additional details.
