Judge Juan Merchan sentenced Donald Trump to an ‘unconditional discharge’ in the ‘hush money’ case on Friday. Convicted in May, Friday’s sentence to the 34 counts of falsifying business records gives the incoming President the status of convicted felon, however it does not impose any jail, prison or probation time. Trump is now the first President to be sentenced on criminal charges.
“Unconditional discharge has been affirmed as appropriate. I impose it,” Merchan said Friday.
“This has been a very terrible experience,” Trump told the court Friday.
The 47th President also touched on the political nature of the case which ran throughout his 2024 campaign, the ruling of which happening just 10 days before he is to be sworn into office.
“It was done to damage my reputation so I would lose the election,” he said.
Trump reaffirmed his innocence.
“I am totally innocent,” he said. “I did nothing wrong.”
The judge described the case with words such as ‘remarkable’ and ‘extraordinary’.
“Never before has this court been presented with such a unique and remarkable set of circumstances,” Judge Merchan said before doling out the sentence. “This has been a truly extraordinary case.”
Trump hit back on his social media platform Truth Social by blasting the political witch hunt against him.
“THERE IS NO CASE, THERE WAS NEVER A CASE, and this whole Scam fully deserves to be DISMISSED,” Trump wrote Friday. “As the American People have seen, this ‘case’ had no crime, no damages, no proof, no facts, no Law, only a highly conflicted Judge, a star witness who is a disbarred, disgraced, serial perjurer, and criminal Election Interference.”