Donald Trump’s lawyers filed a motion seeking the recusal of New York Judge Arthur Engoron from the former president’s civil fraud trial, arguing he had an improper conversation with an outside attorney.
“Allegations have surfaced revealing this Court may have engaged in actions fundamentally incompatible with the responsibilities attendant to donning the black robe and sitting in judgment,” Trump’s attorneys wrote in their motion filed with the New York Supreme Court Thursday.
The filing stems from a Feb. 16 NBC News interview in which the lawyer admitted to approaching Engoron three weeks before his $364 million ruling against Trump, offering unsolicited advice which the judge accepted.
“I saw him in the corner [at the courthouse] and I told my client, ‘I need to go.’ And I walked over and we started talking. … I wanted him to know what I think and why … I really want him to get it right,” attorney Adam Leitman Bailey said during the broadcast.
The discussion, Trump’s attorneys argued, flies in the face of a court spokesperson’s comments that the multi-million dollar ruling “was his alone, was deeply considered and was wholly uninfluenced.”
In a response to NBC New York last month, court spokesman Al Baker denied any impropriety, writing, “No ex parte conversation concerning this matter occurred between Justice Engoron and Mr. Bailey or any other person. The decision Justice Engoron issued February 16 was his alone, was deeply considered, and was wholly uninfluenced by this individual.”
Ultimately, the former president’s lawyers argue the conversation violates the New York Code of Judicial Conduct, which “expressly provides that a judge must avoid even the appearance of impropriety.”
“While this Court has purportedly denied being influenced by Mr. Bailey, the appearance of impropriety engendered by Mr. Bailey’s apparent communications with this Court, its obfuscation until three months after entry of Judgment, and the pendency of a Commission investigation remains,” wrote Trump attorneys Alina Habba and Clifford Robert.
“It is incumbent on this Court, as an elected representative of the people of this State and this County, to recuse itself in light of the demonstrable appearance that it allowed itself to be influenced by and relied upon the biased opinions, conveyed in secret, of an unelected nonparty attorney who has previously sued President Trump multiple times.”
Read the Trump attorneys’ filing below:
