A top congressional ally of Donald Trump has filed an ethics complaint against Manhattan Superior Court Judge Arthur Engoron, who is presiding over the former president’s civil fraud trial in New York, alleging “inappropriate bias and judicial intemperance.”
Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) ripped Engoron, who has been at times openly hostile to Trump and his attorneys, in a letter to the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct this week.
“This judge’s bizarre behavior has no place in our judicial system, where Judge Engoron is not honoring the defendant’s rights to due process and a fair trial,” Stefanik wrote, asserting that those “serious concerns” are amplified by Trump’s status as the front-runner in the 2024 GOP presidential primary.
According to The Hill, the letter repeats several arguments made by the former president’s legal team as the case, brought by state Attorney General Letitia James, has progressed, including that there were “no victims” in Trump’s myriad of business dealings and that Engoron has unfairly prejudged the case.
The Hill adds:
Before the trial began, Engoron ruled that Trump, the Trump Organization and several executives — including Trump’s adult sons — were liable for fraud. The decision stripped Trump’s business licenses and put some of his iconic properties at risk, though a New York appeals court paused the cancellation of the business licenses until after it hears Trump’s case.
Trump’s behavior toward Engoron began to significantly break down after the judge issued a limited gag order barring the former president or other parties from speaking about the judge’s principal law clerk, whom Trump and his team have decried as biased and “Trump-hating.”
The New York Republican’s letter talks about the clerk at some length, including the fact that she made political donations to Democratic candidates and causes while also being critical of the gag order.
“If anyone in America must have the constitutional right to speak out against the judge, his staff, the witnesses, or the process, it’s a defendant going through a process he believes is politicized and weaponized against him,” Stefanik wrote. “To gag a defendant is un-American.”’
James is seeking a $250 million civil penalty and wants to bar Trump and company executives from doing any business in the state.
Stefanik is a rising star in the party and has the full support of Trump.
After then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) ordered committees to launch an official impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, Trump spoke with Stefanik.
Stefanik, chairwoman of the House Republican Conference, said they had spoken shortly after McCarthy’s announcement at the Capitol about the impeachment inquiry, according to a source familiar with the conversation.
“I speak to President Trump a lot. I spoke to him today,” Stefanik told reporters, adding that she believes the Biden family’s business dealings are “the biggest political corruption scandal of our lifetime.”
When Donald Trump was in the White House, his Administration brokered historic Middle Eastern peace deals and brought stability to the world.
The Biden Administration has brought nothing but chaos and destruction because of their weakness and incompetence.
— Elise Stefanik (@EliseStefanik) October 7, 2023
Stefanik is a senior member of the Republican leadership in the House, and her meeting with Trump demonstrates the former president’s continued sway over conservative Republicans, The Hill reported.
The New York Republican has been one of the most consistent advocates for Trump in the House, and he has even been mentioned as a possible running mate for Trump in 2024. She was also an early supporter of impeachment proceedings against Vice President Biden among House Republican leadership.
Trump recently praised Stefanik’s meteoric rise in the party, even teasing that she may be the president in the near future.
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