By: Jon Dougherty. Conservative Brief, April 8, 2023

A former prosecutor has spoken out following a report that the judge overseeing former President Donald Trump’s criminal case in Manhattan made political contributions to Democrats and left-wing organizations, calling them “troubling optics.”

The charges against Trump relate to hush-money payments made to adult film actress Stormy Daniels. However, the judge overseeing the case is under scrutiny due to previous political donations, Fox News reported.

According to Federal Election Commission records, Judge Juan Merchan made donations of $15 or less in 2020 to the Biden for President campaign committee, as well as to the Progressive Turnout Project and its subsidiary political action committee, Stop Republicans.

In an interview with MSNBC, former Southern California U.S. Attorney Carol Lam warned that those donations could harm the public’s perception of the trial and question Merchan’s alleged impartiality.
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MSNBC host Lindsey Reiser said, “We’ve also learned, during an FEC filing report, that Judge Juan Merchan, who presided over Trump’s New York arraignment, made a campaign donation to President Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign, it was for $15.”

Reiser went on to ask: “Are the optics problematic here?”

Lam responded: “I think the optics are a bit problematic,” while going on to note that political donations from judges are an ethical conundrum.

“To be clear, the donations were made in 2020, before Judge Merchan had either the Trump organization case assigned to him or, obviously, this case, but it is troubling optics, I think, for any judge to have made a political contribution, and then to have a party who is either the beneficiary or not the beneficiary of that political contribution before that judge in court,” she added, according to Fox News.

The former prosecutor went on to say that it wasn’t the amount of money donated, it was to whom the donations were made.

“Now, it was a trivial amount of money, and this is a trial-level judge. The judge, in this case, is not the ultimate trier of fact, the jury is, but the judge does call some balls and some strikes during the course of the trial, and if there’s a conviction, the judge is responsible for sentencing,” she said.

“That is all subject to review on appeal. However, it is probably not the best course of action for a judge to have made political contributions while a sitting judge, with the possibility that such cases can arise before him,” Lam said.

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