The Daily Fuckup

A federal judge on Thursday rejected Donald Trump’s latest effort to shift his New York hush-money case into federal court and throw out the conviction on presidential-immunity grounds. The ruling leaves the state case where it has been and does not change the conviction itself, but it does close off another avenue Trump had been using to try to relitigate the matter.

U.S. District Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein said the new filing did not give the court a reason to revisit earlier rulings. He again concluded that the case was not removable to federal court and that the conduct at issue did not become protected official conduct simply because Trump later returned to the presidency. The underlying case stems from payments tied to an effort to conceal damaging information during the 2016 campaign.

Trump’s lawyers had argued that the case belonged in federal court and that presidential immunity should bar it. Hellerstein rejected that theory, keeping the dispute in state court and leaving Trump to continue pressing his arguments through the state appellate process. The decision is another setback in a legal fight Trump has repeatedly tried to recast as a constitutional issue.

The ruling also underscores a basic limit that has run through Trump’s immunity claims elsewhere: the presidency does not automatically convert private or campaign-related conduct into official duties. Here, the judge said the bid to move the case and undo the conviction did not clear that line. For Trump, it is another failed attempt to turn a criminal case into a federal shield.