On Tuesday, Judge Juan Merchan and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg delayed the “Trump hush money” case for another week. However, their next logical step should be to dismiss the case entirely. In an ideal world, they would admit the charges were unfounded from the start, drop the verdicts, and vow never to misuse the law in this manner again.
Even without the recent Supreme Court ruling casting doubt on the case, the legal flaws are glaring. The charges hinge on proving that Trump committed another crime, which no official entity ever filed charges for, and then using that as a basis to turn minor bookkeeping errors (which were already beyond the statute of limitations) into a felony. All of this is supposedly tied to actions from 2017 that are claimed to have interfered with the 2016 election.
Additionally, Merchan instructed the jurors to independently decide which of three different federal or state violations Trump might have committed, without requiring them to agree on what specific crime was involved. The primary aim seemed to be securing a guilty verdict to allow Democrats to brand Trump as a “convicted felon” during the campaign—though it failed to persuade enough voters to derail his comeback in last Tuesday’s election.
If Merchan and Bragg continue with this case, it’s likely to be dismissed on appeal, leading to a showdown with the incoming president. The sensible course of action would be to drop the charges now. To save face, they could blame the Supreme Court for complicating the case, with Bragg even claiming he’s doing the right thing by saving taxpayer money on a case that has become increasingly difficult to win.
Ultimately, it’s time for Merchan and Bragg to end this debacle before they embarrass themselves and the city any further.