President-elect Donald Trump was sentenced in New York on Friday morning in the “hush money” case.
Judge Juan Merchan has sentenced Trump to an “unconditional discharge,” which Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office did not oppose.
Under New York state law, it’s a sentence imposed “without imprisonment, fine, or probation supervision.”
According to the law, such a sentence can be appropriate when the judge “is of the opinion that no proper purpose would be served by imposing any condition upon the defendant’s release.”
It is essentially a way to resolve the hush money case without Judge Merchan having to jail Trump or impose any penalties that could hinder his potential return to the White House.
At the end of the hearing, Judge Merchan issued words of encouragement to Trump.
“Sir, I wish you godspeed as you assume your second term in office,” Merchan said in his final statement to Trump.
BREAKING: After sentencing Donald Trump virtually, Judge Juan Merchan concluded with, “Sir, I wish you Godspeed as you prepare to assume your second term in office.”
Before that, he said in part, “The protections afforded the office of the president are not a mitigating factor.… pic.twitter.com/TSj6eAteuN
— Simon Ateba (@simonateba) January 10, 2025
Prosecutor Joshua Steinglass told the judge in court that the DA’s office is recommending a sentence of “unconditional discharge.”
The DA’s office wanted a sentence of unconditional discharge so they could preserve Trump’s status as a convicted felon while he pursues his appeals.
After Steinglass finished speaking, Trump spoke and did not pull any punches.
“This has been a very terrible experience and a setback for the New York court system,” Trump said, appearing virtually from Mar-a-Lago.
Trump attorney Todd Blanche says it’s a “sad day” for the US.
“It’s a very sad day. It’s a sad day for President Trump, for his family and friends, but also in counsel’s view, a sad day for this country. A lot of what the government just said presupposes that this case is legally appropriate,” Blanche said.
Blanche noted that Trump’s lawyers intend to appeal the verdict.
“A majority of the American people also agree that this case should not have been brought,” Blanche added.
“I very, very much disagree with much of what the government just said about this case, about the legitimacy of what happened in this courtroom during the trial, and about President Trump’s conduct fighting this case,” Blanche declared.
“It’s been a political witch hunt; it was done to damage my reputation,” Trump said.
Trump also discussed his 2024 election victory, saying he won the popular vote by “millions and millions of votes” and noting that he won all seven swing states.
“They’ve been watching your trial, so they understood it,” Trump said of the voters.
“The fact is, I’m totally innocent. I did nothing wrong,” Trump declared in court.
Following DA Bragg’s investigation, a jury found the now-president-elect guilty of first-degree falsification of business records.
Merchan scheduled Trump’s sentencing in New York v. Trump for January 10. Trump entered a not-guilty plea to all of the charges and appealed the decision, but Merchan denied his appeal last week.
Trump responded on Wednesday night after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to stop his sentencing on Friday morning in his New York “hush money” case.
The nation’s highest court ruled 5-4 against Trump, with conservative Justices John Roberts and Amy Coney Barrett siding with the liberals on the court.
But Trump reflected on the “lawfare” that he has been victim of, saying that it “was an attack on the Republican Party.”
“This was an attack on the Republican candidate who just won an election by record numbers—the highest number of Republican votes by far ever gotten, and we won all the swing states, we won the popular vote by millions of people,” he said. “They tried to stop that from happening—they tried to stop this election from happening or to bloody somebody up so badly they couldn’t win.”
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