Justice On Trial

President Trump is being whisked into Judge Merchan’s courthouse, beginning early Monday morning, before what is sure to be an unfair and biased proceeding implicating the presidential frontrunner. 

First, the venue – perhaps behind only Washington, DC — New York City boasts one of the most hostile jury pools in the nation to conservatives in general, and Trump supporters in particular.  If we were operating under a normal system of justice that upheld traditional standards of judicial ethics, no jury would be allowed to draw its members from Manhattan, the most left wing of the five boroughs in which over three in four residents voted for Biden over Trump in 2020.  If preserving the integrity of New York’s now deeply tarnished judicial system were an actual concern, Donald Trump’s counsel would have the ability to transfer venue to a district, such as upstate New York or Long Island (or out of state altogether), that would select from a more ideologically diverse pool of jurors – allowing him at least a fighting shot to convince them of his innocence in court. (Of course, if integrity were truly the driving consideration, this case would have been dead on arrival.) This would be preferable to being damned by a system overseen by bad-faith, Soros-funded actors, like Letitia James and Alvin Bragg, who predetermined the 45^th President’s guilty before he ever stepped foot in the courtroom.

Second, the judge. Judge Merchan is conflicted beyond repair.  In a case that rivals, maybe even surpasses, the improprieties of the Fani Willis debacle, Judge Merchan, through his immediate family connections, has proven himself incapable of presiding over a fair trial – even if he tried – because of the conflict of interest that exists between him, his court, and the Biden Regime.  For one, Biden’s Justice Department tapped Matthew Colangelo, a senior level political appointee, to work closely alongside far-left District Attorney, Alvin Bragg, to investigate Michael Cohen’s alleged payment to Stormy Daniels, the basis for the underlying indictment. 

Colangelo’s insertion into the investigation reeks of banana republic justice – and not just because of his direct ties to the Biden Regime, which is bad enough.  But, worse, his appointment came years after a series of district attorneys (including Bragg’s immediate predecessor, Cyrus Vance Jr.), special counsels, government agencies, and justice department officials evaluated the case, determined there was nothing to prosecute, and passed it over.  Stormy Daniels is not a new face – the public is already keenly aware of who she is, and all the major players (Michael Cohen and Michael Avenatti) involved.  News of the alleged hush money payment is ancient history.  Both Cohen and Avenatti have been proven time and again to be fraudsters: Cohen was sentenced to federal prison for lying to Congress, and Avenatti is currently serving a ten-plus year federal prison sentence for extortion.  In 2018, Daniels penned a letter which stated, “each party to this alleged affair denied its existence in 2006, 2011, 2016, 2017, and now again in 2018,” and that “I am denying this affair because it never happened.”

Only once Biden came to power and his goons were ordered to encourage the far-left Bragg, who himself was even long diffident about prosecuting the case – even going so far as to place the case on hold after telling the New York Times that “he had doubts about moving forward with a case” against President Trump, did the case get a lifeline.  This prompted the two radical far-left prosecutors in Bragg’s office: Cary Dunne and Mark Pomerantz (who also is permanently conflicted with major ties to Hillary Clinton), to resign in protest. 

Though a leftwing commie himself, Bragg has clearly been getting additional pressure from Clinton and Biden proxies to move forward with this prosecution – as bald-faced a political prosecution as there is, which has ratcheted up in recent weeks especially now that President Trump is the presumptive Republican nominee with poll numbers that consistently eclipse Biden’s in a general election matchup.

Then, there is the scandal involving Merchan’s daughter.  As brilliantly exposed by Laura Loomer, Merchan’s impartiality has been irreparably muddied by reports that his daughter, Loren, serves as President of an organization called “Authentic,” which describes itself as a “digital agency” that “partner[s] with clients to build award-winning programs for progressive causes and campaigns.”  The organization proudly boasts Kamala Harris and Adam Schiff, who pushed the debunked Steele dossier claiming Russian meddling in the 2016 election, as two of its most valued clients. 

Other clients featured on the organization’s website are the Biden Harris Campaign, Governor Gavin Newsom, Governor Kathy Hochul, and Rep. Ilhan Omar, among countless other far-left progressive Democrats.  To occupy such a high leadership role in a group whose client is, incredulously, the “Biden Harris campaign” is the paradigmatic example of a conflict of interest.  And not that further evidence to support a conflict would be needed, but Loomer’s research also uncovered that, per FEC public filings, Loren donated thousands of dollars directly to Democratic politicians.  Thus, there is no chance that impartiality could be established for Judge Merchan’s courtroom – even the appearance of impropriety is sufficient, under the American Bar Association’s Model Rules of Professional Conduct, to disqualify a Judge because of a conflict.

Clients of the Far Left activist group, Authentic, on which Judge Merchan’s daughter, Loren, based on myriad reports, serves as a Senior Executive.

Judge Merchan should be forced to recuse himself.  The venue situation alone would otherwise qualify as sufficient grounds, in conformance with the letter and spirit of the canons governing proper ethical behavior for judges.  The fact that Judge Merchan’s own personal and familial biases is compounded by his own daughter’s direct ties to a group supporting the Biden campaign, puts this conflict in a league of its own, without precedent for how grave it is.  Again, even the appearance of impropriety is sufficient grounds to disqualify judges from taking on cases. 

Judge Merchan shatters that standard by leaps and bounds.  His so-called “case” against President Trump is as blatant an act of election interference as one could possibly get.  He is teeing up a potentially 6–8-week trial smack dab in the middle of a critical election year, forcing President Trump to remain in a (relatively speaking) nonimportant state, just as the campaign season really shifts into high gear.  The fact pattern on which Merchan’s prosecution is based has long been known to the public – its major purveyors, like Avenatti and Cohen — have been long discredited and prosecuted – and served prison time – for fraud, perjury, and all sorts of ethical and criminal breaches.  

Furthermore, Merchan’s criminal case comes on the heels of two ludicrous civil cases, all based out of New York State, all attempts to bring down President Trump by weaponizing the levers of judicial power – in which President Trump has been handed the corporate death knell for run-of-the-mill business practices originally upwards of half a billion dollars.  Along the way, President Trump has been ignominiously stripped of foundational constitutional rights, as here with Merchan’s latest gag order, which denied him of his First Amendment rights to speak and criticize a deeply rigged judicial process.  President Trump would not otherwise have to plead his case so vigorously in the court of public opinion if he were given his constitutional right to a fair trial.  However, the judicial actors that have predatorily targeted him denied him that opportunity from the get-go.  Thus, the need to plead his case to the public, which is the only “court” that allows him something of a fair hearing, becomes even more necessary.

The gag order lodged against President Trump by Merchan epitomizes the recurrent breaches of judicial propriety – and longstanding norms — that have dogged President Trump in every criminal and civil case, since he was unceremoniously ousted from office.  Its scope is arbitrarily large and unduly burdensome – further depriving the 45^th President fundamental due process rights.  Moreover, that a President of the United States, someone who should be accorded a baseline level of respect for the office he occupied, is being subject to such grave indignities flouts every single custom and precedent for judicial conduct.  

President Trump did not, as the court duplicitously alleged, “attack” the members of Judge Merchan’s family – merely expose them for their biases that raises an extremely problematic conflict from a member of the Judge’s immediate family and President Trump’s likeliest opponent in the election being held a few short months down the line.  President Trump’s ability to speak freely about Judge Merchan’s daughter’s conflict is a very important distinction from an “attack,” a ridiculous assertion.

Furthermore, it bespeaks an unfortunate reality as well that President Trump must be his own advocate, for the mainstream media – including conservative media – is too often derelict in carrying out the kind of investigative reporting necessary to portray the proceeding in a fair and impartial light, one that is favorable to President Trump’s case, or at the bare minimum, does not needlessly impugn his case with preconceived biases, political narratives, propaganda, or gaslighting.

The bottom line is that President Trump, yet again, is being thrust into a New York courtroom – when he should be on the campaign trail, like any presidential candidate (let alone the frontrunner) pleading his case to the American people.  These tragic circumstances more deeply reflect a society in thrall to forces that would unwind the great handiwork of the Anglo-American legal system, one that once exalted the rule of law, due process, judicial impartiality, and the presumption of innocence — and destroy all that remains of the possibility of freedom in its wake.

Even in the most likely scenario that President Trump prevails in the courthouse, doubtlessly guided by the hand of Providence, his trials will have been a massive distraction from focus on more productive, constructive policies. Whereas focus at this juncture should be on putting together an administration of high quality, loyal, and competent staffers, who are prepared to tackle the gargantuan challenges, that seeming worsen by the day, instead our society’s attention is preoccupied by a senseless trial that is a colossal waste of time, energy, and resources.

The latter fact is an egregious disservice to the American people, who deserve competent governance, rather the kind of government we now face – childish, dumb, and petty – a government that prefers to attack political opponents instead of proposing and resolving the mounting crises at hand. From the border to inflation to a degenerating international order, the current Regime has engineered crisis upon crisis – all dangers that can and will bring down this republic for good if not swiftly put to rest with a dramatic course correction by a second Trump presidency. 

Those, simply put, are the uber high stakes of this election.  The responsibility to prevent further damage falls upon each and every one of us, to come together and expose the corruption and shine a light on the truth, or else, we face a grave risk of most assuredly, hanging separately – the same risk our Founding Fathers faced on the eve of the Revolution. 

Paul Ingrassia is a Constitutional Scholar; Communications Director of the NCLU; a two-time Claremont Fellow, and is on the Board of Advisors of the New York Young Republican Club and the Italian American Civil Rights League. He writes a widely read Substack that is regularly posted on Truth Social by President Trump. Follow him on X @PaulIngrassia, Substack, Truth Social, Instagram, and Rumble.

The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of AMAC or AMAC Action.