Donald Trump's attorneys have filed for a mistrial in the $250 million fraud case against his family business.
The former president's defense team filed a 30-page motion Wednesday morning focused on Judge Arthur Engoron's chief clerk Allison Greenfield, whom Trump has been forbidden to attack in a gag order after he claimed she was the "girlfriend" of Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer and was secretly directing the trial, reported The Daily Beast.
“This appearance of bias threatens both Defendants’ rights and the integrity of the judiciary as an institution,” the filing states. “Greenfield’s unprecedented role in the trial and extensive, public partisan activities, would cause even a casual observer to question the court’s partiality. Thus, only the grant of a mistrial can salvage what is left of the rule of law.”
Trump's attorneys also complained that Engoron, who must now rule on the request, had allegedly shared links to newspaper stories about the case in a newsletter he contributes to The Wheatley School from which he graduated — but they focused most of their ire on the clerk.
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“The Principal Law Clerk is given unprecedented and inappropriate latitude,” they wrote. “Indeed, before the Court rules on most issues, the Court either pauses to consult with her on the bench or receives from her contemporaneous written notes.
"While a Justice of the Court no doubt has ample discretion to consult with his or her Law Secretaries, this unprecedented arrangement exceeds the outer limits of such discretion.”
