M.L. Nestel joined Raw Story in 2023. An award-winning writer and editor, his work has been published in New York Magazine, Los Angeles Magazine and The Guardian, among other titles. He also produces and writes for true-crime genre TV shows. Prior to that, he served on the Newsweek masthead as a senior writer, wrote as a correspondent at ABC News and held the titles of West Coast bureau chief and senior writer at The Daily Beast. Priors also include working as senior national correspondent at The Daily Mail and investigative reporter at all three NYC tabloids: The New York Post,The New York Daily News and Newsday. He traveled around the country as a national correspondent at The Daily. M.L. published hundreds of stories about underground music and cinema — most notably as a critic for Box Office Magazine and the New York editor at Soma Magazine. He also headed development at Fountainhead Films. M.L. splits his time between Los Angeles and New York.
New York judge Juan Merchan dismissed efforts by former President Donald Trump to bow out of Trump's hush money case. And now a former federal prosecutor is saying that may have been the wrong decision.
"In my view, he absolutely should have recused himself. He should have removed himself," Honig said. "I mean, it's minuscule, but judges are not supposed to give any amount. He violated the rules by giving $2 forget about $35."
Trump’s legal team aggressively pushed before the trial began to buck Merchan off the bench, claiming he was biased against the 45th president, who remains the presumptive nominee in this year's general election.
"Under these circumstances, Your Honor has an interest in this case that warrants recusal, there is an unacceptable risk that the Court's family relationships will influence judicial conduct, and the Court's impartiality 'might reasonably be questioned,'" he wrote as part of a motion in support of recusal.
They also noted that Merchan was the judge in a case against the Trump Organization in 2022 which ended in conviction on tax fraud charges.
But Merchan had what Honig called a "C-Y-A memo."
On May 4, 2023, the New York State Judicial Ethics Advisory Board reviewed Merchan and determined he had no potential conflicts.
"We see nothing in the inquiry to suggest that the outcome of the case could have any effect on the judge's relative, the relative's business, or any of their interests," the committee found.
"Judge Merchan did get himself what we would technically call a 'C-Y-A memo'," Honig said. "He went to the ethics board and gave them the facts and they said, you can stay on."
He then offered a hypothetical: "What if the judge had donated a tiny amount, $35 to Trump 2020?"
For Honig, he is convinced that "people would be going nuts about that." Still, he admitted he wasn't sure it "quite rises to the level of reversal."
