Nov. 17 (UPI) — A $250 million civil fraud trial against former president Donald Trump will proceed after a New York Supreme Court judge Friday denied a request for a mistrial.
Justice Arthur F. Engoron rejected the mistrial motion, which contended he had shown bias against Trump.
Lawyers for Trump filed the motion in court Wednesday. The 30-paged document accused Engoron, a Democrat, of having “tainted” the legal proceedings he is overseeing.
“I stand by each and every ruling, and they speak for themselves,” Engoron wrote in the six-page decision released Friday.
Trump has testified during the trial that the judge is biased against him.
“Such argument is disingenuous and made in bad faith, as defendants omitted what I said immediately after that sentence, which is ‘I’m here to hear him answer questions,'” Engoron wrote.
“Indeed, those are precisely the roles of the witness and the finder of fact.”
The case was filed by New York Attorney General Letitia James, and contends the former president, several of his adult children and the Trump Organization committed fraud by misreporting financial statements and other documents that inflated Trump’s wealth by $2.2 billion.
Trump has repeatedly accused James of conducting a “witch hunt.”
Trump lawyers also attacked the judge’s clerk Allison Greenfield, in the mistrial motion, arguing she was acting as a “co-judge.”
“My rulings are mine and mine alone,” Engoron countered Friday in his ruling.
“There is absolutely no ‘co-judging’ at play. That I may consult on the trial record, the law, and the facts, before issuing any respective ruling is within my absolute discretion.”
The news comes the same day A U.S. District Court judge in Washington, D.C. denied a motion from Trump’s legal team to prohibit some Jan. 6 language in one of the legal proceedings against the former president.
