More Than 50 Potential Trump Jurors Dismissed

Newser ^ | 04/15/2024 | John Johnson

[Responsibility2nd]

They said they couldn't be fair or impartial

 

Developments on the first day of Donald Trump's historic criminal case in New York:

• Dozens of potential jurors dismissed. More than 50 of the 96 potential jurors brought in for a preliminary round of questioning were immediately excused after raising their hands to indicate they couldn't be fair or impartial, reports the New York Times. The fail rate was "surpassingly rare," the Times reports. Before the trial ended for the day, Judge Juan Merchan questioned nine potential jurors, CNN reports. He dismissed a woman who said she had strongly held beliefs about Trump and excused a man who said his child is getting married on June 8.

Earlier in the day:

• A Trump loss: Merchan rejected another request from the former president to recuse himself from the hush-money trial, reports the Hill. Merchan said Monday the new motion was based on "a series of references, innuendos, and unsupported speculation." Trump has previously railed against the judge as "highly conflicted & corrupt" on Truth Social.
• A Trump win: Merchan rejected prosecutors' request to bring up before the jury years-old accusations of sexual assault against Trump, describing them as "rumors" and "complete gossip," per the Times.

[Lurker]

This entire thing is horrifying for the future of American jurisprudence. These leftist judges are doing permanent damage to our entire legal system.

And no one is doing a single damned thing to stop it.

L

[roving]

I was called for jury duty. How is the missed? Because I said the state police should be writing tickets and not investing crimes. I blame them for my brother’s murder. Incompetent.

[Scott from the Left Coast]

“ And no one is doing a single damned thing to stop it.”

Who is there to do anything about it. You live under a fascist federal government and New York has a fascist state government. Where is the person in authority to do anything about it? You could have states that don’t agree secede, I suppose. You could have people who don’t agree start bombing infrastructure and burn down cities. But those are pretty big actions and require a ton of funding and willing parties all acting together. When you live in a tyranny, those resources aren’t available.

To stop the fascist Left, you have to physically stop them from breathing. Short of that, they are going to do their thing, because there is no one to stop them.

[wiseprince]

Republicans are cowards and will get us all killed. Southern hospitality and all that B.S. no one is ready for battle on the Republican side.

[Saintgermain]

Too bad that some of these jurors didn’t claim indifference and then vote in favor of Trump. I would not have hesitated for a split second. Cheating is a two way street.

[tina07]

He’s got 5 kids, four are sons. Alex might be the most like him.

[zeugma]

50 of 96 were abject Trump haters.

How many remaining were just liars?

[Repealthe17thAmendment]

These are the jurors who have admitted a bias before even being questioned. I would expect that many more will be excused once the lawyers have a chance to probe a little deeper.

The judge is obviously on the "Get Trump" team, but he'll have to know that the Trump team will be very alert to noting any reversible errors from the bench.

While there's little doubt that any conviction would be overturned on appeal, I'm not sure if that's a real concern to the prosecution or judge. They just want that first win.