âť“WHAT HAPPENED: President Donald J. Trump’s legal team filed an appeal against his Manhattan criminal conviction stemming from a so-called “hush money” case.
👤WHO WAS INVOLVED: President Trump, his attorneys, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, and Stormy Daniels.
đź“ŤWHEN & WHERE: The appeal was filed on Monday, October 28, 2025, in New York.
đź’¬KEY QUOTE: “This case should have never seen the inside of a courtroom, let alone resulted in a jury conviction.” – Robert Giuffra Jr., Trump’s attorney.
🎯IMPACT: The appeal is a critical step in President Trump’s efforts to overturn his felony conviction and challenge what his team describes as politically motivated charges.
President Donald J. Trump‘s lawyers on Monday finally filed their appeal of the Manhattan “hush money” criminal case that resulted in his felony conviction. In the appeal, the America First leader’s legal team reiterated their arguments that the case should not have been brought, citing the judge’s prior donations to Democratic causes as a conflict of interest and referencing a Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity from July 2024, which rendered part of the prosecution’s evidence inadmissible.
The appeal also challenges the jury’s decision, arguing that the conviction should be overturned. “This case should have never seen the inside of a courtroom, let alone resulted in a jury conviction,” wrote Robert Giuffra Jr., one of Trump’s attorneys, in the 96-page filing.
The case centers on allegations that President Trump authorized payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels during the 2016 presidential election campaign to prevent her from publicizing claims of an alleged affair. Prosecutors argued that Trump falsified business records to cover up reimbursements to his then-lawyer, Michael Cohen, for the $130,000 payment.
The trial, which lasted seven weeks in the spring of 2024, coincided with Trump’s third—and ultimately victorious—presidential campaign. His legal team has accused Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg of pursuing the charges for political purposes. “The DA, a Democrat, brought those charges in the middle of a contentious presidential election in which President Trump was the leading Republican candidate,” Trump’s attorneys stated in their filing.
While President Trump received a no-jail sentence days before returning to the White House in January, the conviction remains unless overturned. His legal team continues to fight the charges, with a spokesman calling the appeal a “powerhouse” and asserting that “President Trump will keep defeating Democrat weaponization at every turn as he focuses on his singular mission to Make America Great Again.”
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