What Judge Merchan Knows About Trump

TThe first former U.S. president to face a criminal trial and the judge overseeing that process are both sons of Queens. Donald Trump grew up in a faux-Tudor house in Jamaica Estates, and Juan Merchan was raised a few miles off Grand Central Parkway in Jackson Heights.

Merchan knows more about Trump than their shared geography.

The New York Supreme Court judge, appointed to that position in 2009, also presided over the case that found the Trump Organization guilty of criminal tax fraud for failing to pay taxes on compensation to senior executives. That trial resulted in a $435 million judgment that Trump appealed, and a prison sentence for Trump’s chief financial officer, Alan Weisselberg, who pleaded guilty to perjury.

It also familiarized Merchan with the players in Trump’s orbit – many of whom like Eric Trump and Don. Jr. are potential witnesses in the hush money case – and with Trump’s already used judicial tactics to deny, divert and delay legal proceedings.

Trump has gone after Merchan in public, calling him a “certified Trump hater” and saying he is biased because his daughter worked in campaign marketing for Democratic campaigns.

People who have watched Merchan for years paint a different picture. He is known for being soft-spoken, well-prepared and efficient and has a reputation for not allowing his court to be dominated by wild antics.

“He’s just a no-nonsense individual,” says Alberto Ebanks, a criminal defense attorney who argued cases before Merchan and graduated a year before him from Hofstra Law. Merchan is “fair” and “in complete command of the courtroom,” he says Ebanks.

This approach has been demonstrated as Trump’s trial in New York gets underway.

During jury selection, Merchan rebuffed Trump when he exclaimed in court about a potential juror who posted videos of people celebrating after Trump lost the 2020 election. Merchan told Trump’s lawyer, Todd Blanche, that he could hear Trump speaking and saw him gesture, and warned him to make Trump stop. “He was speaking toward the juror,” Merchan said brusquely. “I will not tolerate this. I will not tolerate any juror being intimidated in this courtroom.”

Not all of Merchan’s decisions were against Trump. He told prosecutors on Monday that they would not be allowed to show footage from Trump’s Access Hollywood tape depicting the grabbing of women’s genitals. (Prosecutors will be able to tell jurors what Trump said.)

But Merchan has signaled he has limited patience with Trump’s tactics.

This week, Merchan warned Trump’s lawyers not to prolong jury selection as a way to delay the trial. So far, Merchan and other judges in New York have rejected Trump’s repeated efforts to delay the trial, including a failed attempt to transfer the case to federal court, two failed attempts to get Merchan to recuse himself from the case and a dozen other efforts. delay the process.

Days before Trump’s trial was set to begin, Merchan rejected Trump’s request for a delay due to complaints about how the case was being portrayed in news reports. In his decision, Merchan warned Trump’s team against “presenting inflammatory, unsubstantiated or outright false allegations in sworn records,” telegraphing that he would not tolerate many more motions filled with unproven accusations. this Court, once again, to express its continued and growing alarm about the practice of lawyers making serious allegations and representations that have no apparent basis in fact,” Merchan wrote.

Trump repeatedly criticized Merchan in a calculated effort to turn public opinion against the judge and paint him as politically motivated. Coming out of the second day of court on Tuesday, after Judge Merchan had assembled 7 jurors, Trump described Merchan as “a conflicted judge” who is “rushing this trial.” “This is a Biden-inspired witch hunt and it must end,” Trump told reporters outside the courtroom.

Trump has repeatedly highlighted Merchan’s daughter, Loren Merchan, who worked as a leader at Authentic Campaigns, a company that does marketing work for Democratic campaigns such as web design, digital fundraising and mobile messaging. Judge Merchan sought an ethical opinion on whether or not she should step aside. In August 2023, Merchan rejected an earlier motion by Trump to recuse himself, writing that he concluded “that recusement would not be in the public interest” and that “this Court has examined his conscience and is assured of his ability to be fair and impartial.” ”

Merchan served as a judge for nearly two decades. He migrated from Colombia with his family to the US at the age of six and, while living in Queens, studied business administration at New York’s Baruch College, eventually graduating from Long Island’s Hofstra University School of Law. He began working as a lawyer in 1994, first as an assistant district attorney in the Manhattan district attorney’s trial division and later in the state attorney general’s office. In 2006, Republican New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg appointed Merchan to family court in the Bronx. Three years later, Democratic Governor David Paterson appointed Merchan to the New York Court of Claims. Also in 2009, Merchan was named acting judge of the New York Supreme Court, the state court that has broad jurisdiction over criminal and civil matters.

In addition to the Trump trial, Merchan is also a judge in a case against former Trump White House strategic adviser Steve Bannon over allegations of criminal fraud in a fundraising effort called “We Build The Wall.” This case is expected to go to trial later this year.