OPEN LETTER: To American justice — Trump's hush money case is not over

OPEN LETTER: To American justice — Trump's hush money case is not over

Introduction: two years since the conviction, and the wheel keeps turning

May 30, 2024: a historic verdict Trump is trying to erase

On May 30, 2024, for the first time in the history of the United States, a former president was found guilty in a criminal court. Donald Trump received a guilty verdict on 34 counts of falsifying business records related to a payment of $130,000 to actress Stormy Daniels to buy her silence before the 2016 election. That moment — no legal maneuver can undo it. It is engraved in American judicial history.

And yet, two years after that verdict, the case lingers in limbo. Appeals are stacking up. The 2nd Circuit is demanding clarifications. The New York Court of Appeals is examining other aspects. And Trump, now serving a second term, is deploying every resource at his disposal — his power and his lawyers — to act as if that verdict simply does not exist.

An open letter to those who keep justice standing

This column is addressed to the judges, clerks, prosecutors, and lawyers who persist in advancing this case despite political pressures, intimidation, and the hostility of an administration that views every legal prosecution of its leader as a weapon of political warfare. You are not their enemies. You are the guardians of a fundamental idea: that the law applies to everyone.

I am writing to you also because I recognize how thankless your task has become. In a country where factual truth has itself become a political weapon, holding the line on procedure is an act of institutional courage that too few acknowledge.

The 2nd Circuit and the question of federal jurisdiction

Why Trump wants to transfer his case to federal court

The strategy of Trump's lawyers is transparent: transfer the conviction from a New York state court to the federal justice system. The goal is clear — place the case under federal jurisdiction and invoke presidential immunity in the context of the Supreme Court's ruling of July 2024. In November 2025, the 2nd Circuit ordered federal judge Alvin Hellerstein to reconsider the transfer request in light of that immunity ruling.

That is an opening for Trump's lawyers, but not a victory. Reconsideration is not approval. Judge Hellerstein must now apply the framework of the July 2024 ruling to the specific facts of the hush money case. Each step in that process can produce new decisions, new appeals, new delays.

Presidential acts versus personal acts

The central question is this: did the payments to Stormy Daniels, orchestrated by Michael Cohen and fraudulently recorded in the Trump Organization's books, constitute official acts of the president, or personal acts by a candidate seeking to protect his image? These payments occurred before the 2016 election, before Trump was president, for electoral and personal reasons, with no connection to any executive function.

But the law does not always track the obvious. Trump's lawyers have developed arguments about the connection between Stormy Daniels's silence and the interests of the presidency. Those arguments were rejected by the New York courts, but the Supreme Court's 2024 ruling created new openings that every judge must now carefully evaluate.

The appeal before the New York Court of Appeals

The question of evidence linked to presidential acts

While the debate over federal jurisdiction unfolds before the 2nd Circuit, a parallel appeal is underway before the New York Court of Appeals. That appeal examines whether certain evidence used at trial — notably testimony and documents related to Trump's governmental activities — should have been excluded under the July 2024 immunity ruling.

It is a complex procedural question. The jury deliberated in May–June 2024, before the Supreme Court's ruling. Some evidence that was then admissible could be reassessed in light of the new doctrine. If the appeals court concludes that important evidence should have been excluded, it could annul the verdict and order a new trial.

The implications of a potential new trial

A new trial in the hush money case would be a tactical victory for Trump, but not necessarily a permanent one. The core evidence — the 34 falsified records, the payments, the reimbursements disguised as legal fees — remains solid. What is certain is that every appeal, every remand, every reconsideration extends the proceedings by months, sometimes years.

The strategy of exhaustion is well-worn: if the case never reaches a final outcome before Trump's term ends, the lawyers arguing for extinction of the prosecution will have other obstacles to invoke. It is a form of victory through abdication that any democratic society should refuse.

Trump versus his New York pursuers: total war

Truth Social as a court of opinion

On June 2, 2026, Trump posted a lengthy message on his social network Truth Social demanding the dismissal of all his civil and criminal cases in New York. He claimed his former attorney Michael Cohen had been "coerced" into testifying against him, and called for sanctions against Attorney General Letitia James and District Attorney Alvin Bragg.

Such messages serve multiple functions: they mobilize the electoral base, they potentially intimidate witnesses and magistrates, and they embed every legal proceeding in a narrative of political persecution. It is a use of the presidency as a pressure platform against the justice system — a practice that democratic norms have always condemned.

The prosecutors under growing pressure

Attorney General Letitia James and District Attorney Alvin Bragg have both been subjected to threats, personal attacks, and attempts to discredit them politically. Judge Arthur Engoron, who issued the ruling in the civil fraud case, was also targeted. Enhanced security measures were put in place around these magistrates.

This pressure is documented, real, and deeply troubling. When representatives of the executive branch single out magistrates and prosecutors by name, it is judicial independence that is being directly attacked. The resistance of these officials to that pressure deserves to be recognized and supported.

The May 30, 2024 verdict: facts established without ambiguity

The 34 counts of falsifying records: one by one

The New York jury found Trump guilty on 34 counts of first-degree falsifying of business records. Each count corresponded to a specific document — invoices, checks, accounting entries — that the Trump Organization had falsified to conceal the fact that payments to Michael Cohen were not legitimate legal fees but reimbursements for the payment to Stormy Daniels.

These facts were established by a jury of twelve New York citizens, who deliberated for several days following a trial lasting several weeks. They are not invented. They are not a political fabrication. They are the product of an ordinary, rigorous, and fully legitimate judicial process.

What the conviction reveals about Trump's corporate culture

Beyond the specific case, the conviction reveals something about the corporate culture of the Trump Organization: a culture where documents are falsified without hesitation, where employees obey orders without question, where illegal transactions are normalized. That is the culture Trump brings to the presidency.

The verdict of May 30, 2024 is not merely about a payment to an actress. It documents a way of running things, a way of treating the law as an obstacle to circumvent rather than a rule to respect. It is a judicial portrait that speaks with an eloquence no political speech can erase.

The resistance of American judicial institutions

Life-tenured judges who hold firm

One of the paradoxes of the American situation is that the most effective resistance to the Trump administration often comes from life-tenured federal judges — including some appointed by Trump himself during his first term. The irremovability of federal judges, guaranteed by the Constitution, is a bulwark that even a powerful president cannot easily dismantle.

In the hush money case, it is this principle that protects the magistrates who continue to apply the law without regard to political pressures. The district judge, judge Hellerstein at the federal level, the members of the New York Court of Appeals — all are doing their jobs in a hostile environment, and they continue.

The role of the legal community

Organizations like the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights, publications like Lawfare, thousands of lawyers engaged in proceedings — together they form a network of democratic vigilance that survives political cycles. That network is imperfect, but it exists and acts in every proceeding, every brief, every deposition.

The American legal community has understood something essential: in a context of extreme polarization, procedural rules, standards of evidence, and obligations of impartiality are the last lines of defense of constitutional democracy. To abandon them would be to renounce the very idea of the rule of law.

Outlook: where is this case heading

The possible scenarios in 2026 and beyond

Several scenarios are possible in the months ahead. If judge Hellerstein again rejects the transfer of jurisdiction, the proceedings remain in the state of New York. If the 2nd Circuit concludes that the transfer is warranted, the file shifts to the federal system. And if the New York appeals court annuls the verdict because of inadmissible evidence, a new trial would be ordered.

I cannot predict which of these scenarios will materialize. What I can say is that the conviction of May 30, 2024 remains, at this writing, an established judicial fact. No appeal has annulled it. No court has invalidated it. It exists, in the archives, for history.

What this case says about America in 2026

How the hush money case is resolved — or not — will say something essential about what America is in 2026: a democracy that applies its laws to everyone, or a two-tier democracy where power buys exemption. That question goes far beyond the person of Trump. It concerns the future of the American democratic model for generations to come.

And that is why I continue following this case with an attention many may find excessive. This is not obsession. It is civic vigilance. In a democracy, that is a duty.

The hush money case in the context of democratic rights

A symbol beyond the person of Trump

Over the months, the hush money case has become far more than a matter of falsifying business records. It has become a symbol of a question all Western democracies are asking themselves: does political power confer de facto immunity from ordinary justice? America's institutional answer to that question will establish a precedent that reaches far beyond the country's borders.

In Ukraine, soldiers are dying to defend the idea that the law must prevail over brute force. Across Europe, democracies are fortifying their institutions against authoritarian temptations. When Washington hesitates to enforce its own rules, the entire West appears to falter. The hush money case, however trivial it may seem, is a test of American democratic consistency.

What the West is watching with concern

America's allies — Europe, Canada, Japan, Australia — are watching American judicial proceedings with a mix of attention and anxiety. An America that cannot hold its own leaders accountable for their actions is an America whose model loses its drawing power. And in a world where authoritarian regimes — Putin, Xi Jinping, the Iranian regime — contest the liberal democratic order, that credibility is more precious than ever.

The hush money case is not a domestic American quarrel without consequences. It is a public demonstration, visible to the entire world, of the United States' ability or inability to live up to its own founding principles: equality before the law, judicial independence, accountability of rulers.

Conclusion: justice does not capitulate before power

A verdict that holds against time and pressure

Two years after the historic conviction of Donald Trump on 34 counts of falsifying business records, the hush money case remains unresolved, but it is not dead. The ongoing appeals — before the 2nd Circuit on federal jurisdiction, before the New York Court of Appeals on evidence — are legitimate proceedings that must run their course, whatever political pressure bears down on them.

What cannot be erased is the judicial fact itself: a jury of twelve citizens deliberated and delivered a verdict. That verdict exists. It speaks. And it will tell history what this man was when American democracy most needed moral clarity.

The final message of this open letter

To you, magistrates, prosecutors, clerks, attorneys who persevere in this case: keep going. Democracy is not a state, it is a practice. It is lived in every decision that says no to arbitrariness, in every proceeding that refuses to bend before political pressure, in every ruling that affirms the law stands above power.

This letter is not a political opinion. It is a declaration of faith in an imperfect system that is nonetheless worth defending — for American democracy, but also for all the democracies that take their inspiration from it, from Ukraine to Europe and every country that looks to Washington as a compass.

Columnist's transparency note

My declared biases and my position

I consider the conviction of Donald Trump on 34 counts of falsifying business records to be a legitimate verdict rendered by an ordinary jury in the context of a normal proceeding. This editorial bias is declared and acknowledged. I favor the application of the law without regard to the accused's political status. My position does not erase the reality of the judicial facts, but it informs how I present them.

My limits and my method

I cannot predict the outcome of ongoing appeals. I do not have access to the confidential files of the proceedings. My analysis rests on public sources: news articles, published court decisions, analyses by recognized jurists. Where real uncertainty exists, I flag it. I do not claim to know what the courts will decide, and I manufacture no testimony or unverified quotes.

By Maxime Marquette, columnist

Sources

Primary sources

Washington Examiner — Where the Trump hush money appeal stands two years since conviction — May 30, 2026

Presidential Prayer Team — 2nd Circuit vacates lower court ruling in the president's NY criminal case — November 7, 2025

Lawfare Media — The trials of the Trump administration — June 22, 2026

Secondary sources

Washington Times — Trump demands New York civil and criminal cases dismissed — June 2, 2026

Colorado Politics — District court judges and appellate courts — June 22, 2026

Washington Examiner — Hush money appeal: a two-year review — May 2026