The New York Court of Appeals declined to hear the former president on Tuesday Donald Trump‘s appeal against the gag order in the hush money case in which he was convicted last month.
The court said it dismissed the appeal “on the grounds that no substantial constitutional issue arises.”
This means the silence order imposed on Trump by the state judge Juan Merchan is still in force. A court spokesperson did not immediately respond to NBC News’ request for more information about the decision.
Trump first asked the appeals court in mid-May, before he was found guilty of 34 felony counts of falsifying company records, to lift the gag order that prevented Trump from making comments about jury members, witnesses, court staff and prosecutors .
Trump repeatedly protested the silence order during the trial, which lasted about a month and a half. The former president was found to have violated the order multiple times, leading to Merchan fining Trump $10,000 and threatening to put him in jail if it happened again.
In early June, Trump attorney Todd Blanche sent a letter to Merchan requesting that the silence order be terminated, arguing that “because the litigation has concluded, the stated bases for the silence order no longer exist.” The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, which prosecuted the case, opposed the Trump legal team’s request.
The jury in the case found Trump guilty on May 30 of all 34 counts of falsifying corporate records, marking the first time a former US president has been convicted of a crime.
After the conviction, Trump may have further violated the silence order by making comments about two witnesses in the case: Robert Costello, who testified for the defense, and Michael Cohen, the prosecution’s key witness and Trump’s former lawyer, although Trump did not explicitly did. name him.
The former president is expected to be sentenced in the case on July 11. On June 10, he met virtually with a New York probation officer for a pre-sentencing interview.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
