Trump says he will appeal historic conviction

NEW YORK — Donald Trump said on Friday he would appeal the guilty verdict that made him the first U.S. president convicted of a crime, though he will have to wait until after his sentencing on July 11 before taking that step.

In rambling remarks at the Trump Tower lobby in Manhattan where he announced his first presidential run in 2015, Trump repeated his complaints that the trial was a “rigged” attempt to hobble his comeback White House bid and warned that it showed no American was safe from politically motivated prosecution.

“If they can do this to me, they can do this to anyone,” Trump, 77, said in an unscripted 33-minute speech. Applauded by supporters, Trump, the Republican candidate in the 2024 election took no questions from reporters.

“We’re going to be appealing this scam,” he said.

Trump will have 30 days from the date of his July 11 sentencing to file a notice of appeal.

Democratic President Joe Biden, who will face Trump in the Nov. 5 election, said Trump had been given an opportunity to defend himself in the same justice system that applies to all Americans.

“It’s reckless, it’s dangerous, it’s irresponsible for anyone to say this was rigged just because they don’t like the verdict,” Biden, 81, said at the White House.

Thursday’s guilty verdict catapults the United States into unexplored territory.

The charge Trump was convicted of, falsifying business records, carries a maximum sentence of four years in prison. Others convicted of that crime often receive shorter sentences, fines or probation.

But Trump’s public criticism of jurors and witnesses during the trial, which prompted Justice Juan Merchan to impose a $10,000 fine, could push the judge to impose a tougher penalty, said Rebecca Roiphe, a former New York prosecutor.

Any sentence would likely be suspended until the appeals process plays out. A close ally, House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson, predicted the U.S. Supreme Court would eventually overturn the verdict.

“I think they’ll set this straight, but it’s going to take a while,” he said on Fox News.

Incarceration would not prevent Trump from campaigning, or taking office if he were to win.

Trump’s July 11 sentencing comes just days before the Republican Party is due to formally nominate him as its presidential candidate at its convention in Milwaukee.

Trump was found guilty of 34 criminal counts of falsifying documents to cover up a hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels to illegally influence the 2016 election, in which he defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton.

Trump still faces three other criminal prosecutions – two for his efforts to overturn his 2020 defeat to Biden – but the New York verdict could be the only one handed down before Americans vote, as the other cases have been tied up in legal wrangling. Trump has pleaded not guilty in all four cases, which he says are politically motivated.

A source familiar with his campaign’s inner workings said the verdict was expected to prompt him to intensify deliberations on picking a woman as his vice presidential running mate.

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WHAT DO VOTERS THINK?

Ten percent of Republican registered voters say they are less likely to vote for Donald Trump following his felony conviction for falsifying business records to cover up a hush money payment to a porn star, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll that closed on Friday.

The two-day poll, conducted in the hours after the Republican presidential candidate’s conviction by a Manhattan jury on Thursday, also found that 56% of Republican registered voters said the case would have no effect on their vote and 35% said they were more likely to support Trump, who has claimed the charges against him are politically motivated and has vowed to appeal.

The potential loss of a tenth of his party’s voters is more significant for Trump than the stronger backing of more than a third of Republicans, since many of the latter would be likely to vote for him regardless of the conviction.

Among independent registered voters, 25% said Trump’s conviction made them less likely to support him in November, compared to 18% who said they were more likely and 56% who said the conviction would have no impact on their decision.

The verdict could shake up the race between Trump, who was U.S. president from 2017-2021, and Democratic President Joe Biden ahead of the Nov. 5 election. U.S. presidential elections are typically decided by thin margins in a handful of competitive swing states, meaning that even small numbers of voters defecting from their candidates can have a big impact.

Biden and Trump remain locked in a tight race, with 41% of voters saying they would vote for Biden if the election were held today and 39% saying they would pick Trump, according to the poll, which surveyed 2,556 U.S. adults nationwide.

Biden’s marginal lead was within the online poll’s roughly 2 percentage point margin of error for registered voters, in line with a Reuters/Ipsos poll from earlier in the month that showed Trump and Biden each with 40% support. In both polls, about one in five voters said they are undecided, leaning toward a third-party candidate or might not vote at all.

The election is still more than five months away, meaning much could change between now and Nov. 5, and some Republican strategists say they believe the news of Trump’s conviction will have little influence on voters’ thinking by then.

Trump is due to be sentenced on July 11, and the poll showed the electorate divided on whether he should go to prison for his crimes, with 53% of registered voters saying he should not be jailed over the hush money case and 46% saying he should serve time.

Incarceration would not prevent Trump from campaigning, or taking office if he were to win. His sentencing hearing will come just days before the Republican Party is due to formally nominate him as its presidential candidate at its convention in Milwaukee.

Voters are split on whether the hush money case against Trump was politically motivated, with 52% saying the prosecution was mainly about upholding the rule of law and 46% saying it was about trying to prevent Trump from returning to the White House.

Trump has been indicted in three other criminal cases but legal wrangling could keep those trials from occurring before the November election. Legal scholars consider the pending trials – which involve charges Trump engaged in electoral fraud and that he mishandled classified documents after leaving office – to be more serious than the hush money case. Trump has pleaded not guilty to all the charges against him.

Some 60% of registered voters said it was important the three pending trials take place before the election, compared to 39% who said it was not important and 1% who didn’t answer the question.