Former U.S. President Donald Trump may miss his son Barron’s high school graduation next month due to his upcoming hush money trial.
tJury selection for the trial began this Monday in a Manhattan court. New York Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan received a request from Trump’s legal team to excuse him from the trial on May 17, the day of his son’s graduation.
Judge Merchan has said he will not make a decision about this request yet, noting that the trial’s schedule will influence his decision: “It really depends on if we are on time and where we are in the trial.”
Selecting jurors may take as long as two weeks, and while Trump will be informed of the jurors’ identities, their names will not be announced to the public to protect their safety.
Trump expressed his frustration to the media after the court adjourned on Monday.
“As you know, my son is graduating from high school and it looks like the judge will not let me go to the graduation of my son, who has worked very, very hard,” Trump said to reporters. “He was looking forward, for years, to that graduation with his mother and father there, and it looks like the judge isn’t going to allow me to escape this scam.”
🚨President Trump just released a new statement following Day 1 of his Trial in NYC. Today Judge Merchan said President Trump can’t go to his son Barron’s high school graduation and that he will have President Trump arrested if he doesn’t show up for court.
Judge Merchan is an… pic.twitter.com/fF9l0RLBq7
— Laura Loomer (@LauraLoomer) April 15, 2024
Trump has been charged with 34 felony counts for allegedly falsifying business records to hide payments made to adult film star Stormy Daniels through his attorney, Michael Cohen, to ensure her silence about an alleged 2006 encounter ahead of the 2016 election.
“It’s a scam trial,” Trump told the media.
“If you read all of the legal pundits, all of the legal scholars today, there’s not one that I see that said this is a case that should be brought to a trial. It’s a scam. It’s a political witch hunt. It continues, it continues forever, and we’re not gonna be given a fair trial. It’s a very, very sad thing. In addition, as you know, next Thursday we’re before the United States Supreme Court in a very big hearing on immunity. And this is something that we’ve been waiting for a long time and the judge, of course, is not going to allow us, he’s a very conflicted judge and he’s not going to allow us to go to that,” Trump continued.
