New York’s highest appeals court declines to block Trump’s sentencing in hush money case

New York’s highest court has declined to block Donald Trump’s upcoming sentencing in his hush money case, leaving the U.S. Supreme Court as the president-elect’s likely last option to prevent the hearing from taking place Friday

ALBANY, N.Y. — New York’s highest court declined to block Donald Trump’s upcoming sentencing in his hush money case Thursday, leaving the U.S. Supreme Court as the president-elect’s likely last option to prevent the hearing from taking place Friday.

One judge of the New York Court of Appeals issued a brief order declining to grant a hearing to Trump’s legal team.

Trump has asked the Supreme Court to call off Friday’s sentencing in the hush money case. His lawyers turned to the nation’s highest court on Wednesday after New York courts refused to postpone the sentencing by Judge Juan M. Merchan, who presided over Trump’s trial and conviction last May on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. Trump has denied wrongdoing.