President Donald Trump's attorneys have launched a fresh attack on the federal judge who oversaw a case involving the president's New York criminal conviction, criticizing his handling of the ongoing legal proceedings in a court filing submitted one day after the judge's death. Hellerstein died of natural causes on Wednesday morning, aged 92. On Thursday, a 43-page court filing that Trump's legal team submitted to the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit took aim at Hellerstein's previous decisions in the case. The filing did not mention Hellerstein's death but accused him and the New York County District Attorney's Office (DANY) of repeatedly finding "meritless reasons" to prevent Trump from moving his criminal case from state to federal jurisdiction following the Supreme Court's ruling on presidential immunity. "Throughout this litigation, both DANY and the district court (Hellerstein, J.) have grasped for different, meritless reasons to wrongly deny President Trump—the chief federal officer—a federal forum to adjudicate his substantial federal defenses," the filing said.
"In erroneously denying removal in September 2024, the district court said nothing about President Trump's supposed delay or any purported waiver of removal," it added. The brief—filed on October 29 and signed by attorneys such as Robert J. Giuffra Jr., a co-chair of Sullivan and Cromwell—challenges Hellerstein's decision to reject Trump's latest attempt to move his New York criminal case into federal court.
Trump's legal team is relying on a federal-officer removal statute, which allows certain criminal prosecutions involving federal officers to be transferred from state to federal court. His attorneys argue that the prosecution relates to Trump's official presidential acts and that he has at least one colorable federal defense. A central part of their argument concerns the Supreme Court's July 2024 ruling in Trump v.
United States, which established protections against criminal prosecution for certain presidential conduct. Trump's lawyers have said the ruling changed the legal position and gave the president grounds to seek removal of his case in 2024. "President Trump has demonstrated 'good cause' for seeking to remove in late August 2024.
That was less than two months after the Supreme Court in Trump recognized an evidentiary immunity that—as DANY never denies—changed the controlling law and, thus, enabled the President's second removal notice," the document said. They argue that Hellerstein wrongly rejected the application in September 2024 and that the district court made another error when it rejected Trump's request again following a later appeal. The filing also takes issue with prosecutors' argument that Trump waited too long to seek removal and effectively waived his right to do so by continuing to argue his case in state court.
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