A last-minute legal challenge by Donald Trump’s lawyers could disrupt a trial scheduled for next month in the New York attorney general’s business fraud lawsuit against the former president and his company.
A state appeals court judge on Thursday ordered a potential postponement of the non-jury trial, scheduled to start October 2, after Trump’s lawyers filed a lawsuit accusing the trial judge, Arthur Engoron, of repeatedly abusing his authority.
Justice David Friedman, a judge on the state’s intermediate appellate court, granted an interim stay of the trial and ordered the full appeals court to consider the lawsuit on an expedited basis. The court indicated it would issue a decision the week of September 25, meaning the trial could still start on schedule depending on how it rules.
Among the issues raised by Trump’s lawyers were Engoron’s terse refusal to grant their recent request for a three-week trial delay, which he ruled as “completely without merit,” and lingering uncertainty about the trial’s scope because he has yet to comply with a June appeals court’s order that he determine which claims in the fraud lawsuit are barred by the statute of limitations.