Trump’s lawyers file another appeal in hush money case

Just a few minutes ago, we learned that the former president

file

d

another

appeal

in his

hush

money

case

. CNN's Kara Scannell joins us from New York with her new report. What can you tell us about this new presentation, this latest presentation? Kara. Yes, well, if this latest filing is

another

attempt to

appeal

some of the rulings of Judge Juan Mershon, who is overseeing the

hush

money

criminal

case

in this new filing, Trump's

lawyers

will go to the appeals court to challenge the denial of the judge of his motion for that fight over presidential immunity. They wanted the judge to postpone the trial until the Supreme Court decided the question of presidential immunity.

The judge denied it, saying it was untimely. It was too late before the trial to bring this up. They also want to question his oversight of the case, saying he should recuse himself from the case based on the work his daughter does for a political firm that works for Democrats. In reality, the judge has not formally ruled on that recusal ruling, but they are already taking this matter to the appeals court. Now, the documents are still being uploaded to the docket, but right now, what we could see before it was sealed is that they are requesting a hearing in May.

Now, we saw the other day, earlier this week, that they also

file

d a petition, but then they made an emergency motion to have it filed with the appeals court. That hasn't happened yet, but we're watching closely to see if they try to bring him in. The appeals court will try today to have a judge stop the trial. It's unclear at this time if that will happen, but because this is still developing, it would be the third attempt this week to try to derail the trial, which is scheduled to begin Monday. Earlier this week they tried to get a judge to stop the case so they could argue that there was too much pretrial publicity to have this case in Manhattan that was denied.

They also tried to stop the trial due to a gag order that the judge imposed to limit what Donald Trump could say about the witnesses, about the prosecutors and the judge's family, and about the jurors in this case, which was also quickly denied. But, you know, this is now the latest attempt to try to throw sand in the wheels of this trial. Now we are just a few days away from jury selection which begins on Monday. Now, let's discuss this and more with our senior legal analyst, former federal prosecutor Ali Hoenig. First of all, Ali, what's your reaction to this latest call from Trump to DeLay?

Well, Wolf, I don't think Trump has much chance of succeeding in this appeal or using it to cause a delay in the April 15 trial start date. So the new issue that Trump is raising now in the appeal, as I said, relates to his presidential immunity claim, but first of all, there's a procedural issue that, as Kara said, it's too late. He was supposed to do this. And secondly, if we look at the substance of the matter, remember that the crime here relates to the money that was paid to Stormy Daniels to maintain her silence before the 2016 election.

So Donald Trump wasn't even president yet. Now, part of the refund has been extended to the first weeks and months while Trump was president. But I don't think there's any way he can realistically claim immunity in this particular trial. As you know, Ali, jury selection is scheduled to begin next Monday in the New York hush money case. Is this appeal a measure of the Trump team's desperation to simply try one more time and repeatedly fail to delay, delay, delay? Well, we've been seeing that all week, Wolf. As Kara pointed out, I think this is at least the third appeal in three days.

Sometimes you see this: It is not uncommon to see a defendant in the days before trial try anything to derail the process. This is taking it to a new level, maybe a new level. I don't think Trump has any merit in these arguments. Once again, he has missed his chance. There was a time to present these arguments. The fact that they're so late and so far off deadlines and everyone's in this kind of emergency procedural posture, I think speaks to a certain level of desperation. I don't think it's taking hold. We have not seen any of these last-minute motions to get traction before either Judge Mershon or the appeals court.

And I don't expect that to change in the coming days. I want to ask you about the hush money trial, because for Donald Trump, this will happen in a few days. I mean, it's coming on Monday. Yesterday, an appeals court rejected their attempts to delay the start. And I'm just curious, what do you think will happen next? I mean, what rabbits can he still pull out of the hat? What cars do you still have up your sleeve? I mean, one of the questions that was on my mind, Karen, could you just not show up on Monday?

I guess he can't do that. But it kind of makes you wonder what he'll try next. Yes, many of us have been wondering if he's going to try to go to the Supreme Court and get a stay because ten days into the trial, they're hearing presidential immunity arguments and that's already fast-tracked. . And he has also argued that in this case there was presidential immunity for the right in this first case of electoral interference. So that's something he could still do, although the clock is ticking and if he doesn't do it today or tomorrow, I think he will be executed and have to appear in criminal cases.

It's not like civil cases where you can just go back and forth or choose what to go or not go to. In criminal cases, there are many rights that are ascribed during a criminal trial and for which the defendant must be present or explicitly waive. And that is why you will be asked to attend. And then we'll see if I don't think he's going to run away, as they say, and I'm not sure he can. It's pretty easy to find. Yeah. I mean, and Karen, I mean, just to follow up on that, you just said that for her, maybe you could go to the Supreme Court.

Could the Supreme Court somehow delay a secret money case in New York? Is that so feasible because they can't do it? I mean, yeah, it's the Supreme Court of the United States, obviously. And they are the Supreme Court of the country. And there's something called federalism, which means they can definitely pause the press if they want. I don't think they will, because this is very different from the presidential immunity case, since you're hearing that this particular case involves his personal life. Good. Even though he was president when he wrote some of the checks at the time he was doing this, he was candidate Trump and he was trying to prevent this from reaching the electorate.

So it's personal. It's not presidential in nature, but you never know, so it's just one of the things he possibly could have done. He's been making moves all week trying to slow it down. And he is understanding it. That hasn't happened. But we'll see if he does this. Yeah, I mean, it's all in the kitchen sink, leaning against the wall, everything, whatever. Okay, Karen, thank you very much for your time this morning. We really appreciate it.