New York

Takeaways from Trump’s Criminal Sentencing

Published

1 year ago

January 12, 2025

Takeaways from Trump’s Criminal Sentencing

Unlike Donald J. Trump’s criminal trial, which lasted seven dramatic weeks, his sentencing Friday was brief.

One day after Mr. Trump sat with other former presidents at Jimmy Carter’s funeral, he appeared in court via a video screen in front of two American flags. About thirty minutes later, he was officially deemed a felon.

The president-elect was convicted in May of 34 counts of falsifying business records related to a scheme to cover up a sexual encounter with a porn star, a salacious story that threatened to derail his 2016 presidential campaign.

Here are five takeaways from Mr. Trump’s sentencing:

Dramatic trial, subdued sentencing.

Mr. Trump’s trial, which culminated in a guilty verdict in May, was a dramatic affair complete with the intimate details of a scandal, tearful testimony from a former aide and ruthless cross-examinations, including that of Mr. Trump’s former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen.

But on Friday, the sentencing was largely symbolic and predictable. Mr. Trump received an unconditional discharge, a rare sentence in New York courts that doesn’t subject him to jail time or any other requirements.

While the events were not surprising, they were without precedent: Mr. Trump will be the first felon to occupy the Oval Office when he is inaugurated in 10 days.

The election was treated as a trump card.

Joshua Steinglass, a prosecutor with the Manhattan district attorney’s office, said he was only recommending the unconditional discharge because of Mr. Trump’s status as president-elect.

“The defendant sees himself as above the law and won’t accept responsibility for his actions,” Mr. Steinglass said, quoting a presentencing report that would normally carry significant importance.

Trump’s lawyer, Todd Blanche, was staid, a marked contrast to the showmanship he displayed during the trial. Mr. Blanche — who has been tapped to become deputy attorney general — took aim at the mere existence of the trial, arguing that the jury’s verdict “presupposes that the case is legally appropriate.”

“The majority of the American people also agree that this case should not have been brought,” Mr. Blanche said, referring to Mr. Trump’s election victory.

Trump remained defiant until the end.

Mr. Trump’s frustration with the prosecution remained on full display on Friday. He shook his head as the court reiterated his conviction and crossed his arms in defiance when Mr. Steinglass referred to his “disdain” for the rule of law.

Mr. Trump then addressed the court for just over six minutes, maintaining his innocence and claiming that he was targeted by political opponents and that the Justice Department had somehow propelled the case. He also got in a final jab at Mr. Cohen — the prosecutor’s star witness — whom he called “a totally discredited person.”

“It was an injustice of justice,” said Mr. Trump before he was formally sentenced, adding, “I was treated very, very unfairly.”

Justice Merchan got the last word.

There was a lot that Justice Merchan could have said.

During the seven-week trial, the judge was accused by Mr. Trump of being “biased” and “corrupt.” Mr. Trump violated a gag order, resulting in $10,000 in fines. The judge’s daughter, a Democratic political consultant, received a multitude of threats after Mr. Trump complained about her.

Instead, Justice Merchan used his final time addressing Mr. Trump to justify his punishment. Calling an unconditional discharge the “only lawful sentence” he could hand down, he distinguished Mr. Trump the individual from Mr. Trump the president-elect. The office of the president shielded him, Justice Merchan said.

As Justice Merchan left the bench, the judge wished the soon-to-be president “godspeed.”

It isn’t over.

Mr. Trump had already filed motions challenging the case through a constellation of courts and began a civil action against Justice Merchan.

But now that he has been sentenced, he can mount a formal appeal attacking the merits of the prosecutor’s case and the judge’s rulings.

The process could take months or years and will continue well into his second term in office.

Related Topics:Decisions and Verdicts Donald J Featured Juan M Merchan New York State Criminal Case Against Trump (71543-23)trump

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New York

18 Days, 20 Lives: New Yorkers Who Didn’t Survive the Cold

Published

7 hours ago

February 14, 2026

Press Room

18 Days, 20 Lives: New Yorkers Who Didn’t Survive the Cold

Tuesday, Jan. 27

Philip Piuma, 47, left his home on Jan. 26 around 1:30 p.m. to pick up a prescription for his uncle at CVS. The next morning, he was found dead on a bench outside a Key Food supermarket a mile away.

Mr. Piuma’s stepfather, John Sandrowsky, said detectives told him that Mr. Piuma had fallen twice, possibly from the bench outside Key Food, broken his nose and injured his eye socket.

At around 6 p.m. on Jan. 26, Mr. Piuma entered the store and lurched unsteadily in the aisles, said a manager, Luis Polanco, who assumed he was drunk. Mr. Piuma bought two jars of peanut butter, went outside and sat on the bench.

At 9 p.m. when Mr. Polanco was closing up, Mr. Piuma was still there. “I asked, ‘Everything OK?’ He said ‘yes,’” Mr. Polanco said.

Security footage shows that sometime after 10 p.m., Mr. Piuma toppled over, sprawling across the bench. When Mr. Polanco arrived around 6 a.m. to open the store, Mr. Piuma did not stir when he greeted him. He called 911.

Mr. Sandrowsky said detectives told him that someone had given his stepson tissues for his bleeding face at some point. “You offered some help, that’s great,” he said. “But if you’re bleeding out there and it’s that cold, I would question whether or not you’re OK.”

Mr. Piuma, who worked two jobs — as a dispatcher for an alarm company and an ambulette service — was a devoted volunteer at a nearby church, Mr. Sandrowsky said. “He had a good heart,” he said.

New York

How a Florist Lives on $23,000 a Year in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn

Published

7 days ago

February 7, 2026

Press Room

How a Florist Lives on ,000 a Year in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn

How can people possibly afford to live in one of the most expensive cities on the planet? It’s a question New Yorkers hear a lot, often delivered with a mix of awe, pity and confusion.

We surveyed hundreds of New Yorkers about how they spend, splurge and save. We found that many people — rich, poor or somewhere in between — live life as a series of small calculations that add up to one big question: What makes living in New York worth it?

Ever since she was a child growing up in Guilford, Conn., Molly Culver wanted to live in New York City, “come hell or high water,” as she remembers it.

She was never under any illusion that it would be easy, but for years, she was managing well. She spent nearly a decade running an urban farm, teaching classes on farming and growing her floral business, which meant she was bringing in about $50,000 a year.

A few years ago, Ms. Culver, 44, turned her floral business, Molly Oliver Flowers, into a full-time job.

She sells flowers sourced from nearby farms for events, and also runs a subscription service in which customers sign up for weekly flower deliveries. When weddings and parties started back up after the Covid pandemic, she was able to pay herself as much as $62,000 before taxes one year. But then the economy soured, and clients pulled back on nonessentials.

Last year, Ms. Culver put nearly all the money she earned back into her business. She paid herself a salary of about $23,000 and took roughly $22,000 from her savings, more than half of her nest egg, to stay afloat.

Ms. Culver said she is comfortable with the trade-offs that come with living on a tight budget so she can run her business. “It’s been a saving grace to learn that I can be happy with less,” she said. Anna Watts for The New York Times

Priced out of the housing market

After the pandemic, Ms. Culver was newly single and no longer splitting rent with her former partner. She soon realized she could no longer afford to pay market rent.

As she searched for housing, she said, “I was looking for the miracle that only happens through word of mouth in this city.”

First, Ms. Culver spent a few years renting a 150-square-foot room with a twin bed in a friend’s home for $40 a night, which did not include cooking privileges. (She typically spent a few nights a week there, and the rest of the week at her mother’s house in Connecticut.)

Last year, after her friend said she needed the room back, a different friend mentioned she had a spare room to rent out in her home in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn.

It was $600 a month, more than Ms. Culver was used to paying, but much cheaper than anything else she could find.

Ms. Culver’s housing setup shows what it takes for many people to afford housing in New York: The family that owns the home lives downstairs with their two small children. Ms. Culver and three other tenants rent rooms on the two top floors.

The group often gathers for Shabbat dinners on Friday nights, and Ms. Culver said the “funky” configuration has helped her accept a different version of life in New York City than she once thought she’d have.

“I’ve come to let go of that perfectionist idea of what home, success and happiness looks like,” she said. “That’s totally changed the game for me.”

In her new home, Ms. Culver has an induction burner, a sink and a microwave on a landing outside her bedroom. She shops for food at the nearby Flatbush food co-op and keeps her grocery bill to about $100 a week.

Spending half the week outside the city

Ms. Culver often spends a few nights a week in her childhood bedroom in Connecticut, where she helps her mother around the house and looks after her two cats, adopted from the streets of Brooklyn.

She bought a used Prius, with a car payment of about $270 a month, which she uses to shuttle between the city and her mother’s home.

Ms. Culver wonders from time to time whether it would be easier to do her job in a smaller, less expensive city, but she keeps running up against the same problem: How would she find success selling her floral arrangements in a less dense, less wealthy market? And then there are the relationships with the farmers, venues and clients she has spent years cultivating.

“Multiple things can be true at once: I love New York, I love my job and I wish rent was still at prepandemic levels,” she said.

“If the only people who can afford to pursue a dream are very wealthy,” she said, “what does New York become?”

Ms. Culver understands the trade-offs that come with doing something you love that doesn’t generate a lot of money, so she invests most of her money into her company.

She recently found a new floral studio with room for a professional cooler for flowers, which cost $10,000.

She signed a seven-year lease to keep the rent down, and brought in two studiomates, but still had to put $20,000 toward moving in, including a $15,000 security deposit. Her share of the rent is $2,800 a month.

Learning to live on a budget

Ms. Culver has never had a gym membership in New York City, opting for long walks in Prospect Park for exercise. She does not shop for clothes unless her winter boots or coat are really falling apart.

She does not need to live like the younger New Yorkers she sees on her Instagram feed, determined to live an extravagant life in an expensive city.

Ms. Culver loves the city’s museums, but typically visits them only a few times a year, when there’s an exhibition she really wants to see. She eats out with friends occasionally, which she sees as an investment in holding onto those relationships.

Her goal is to one day make her business successful enough that she could take home $75,000 a year, her dream salary.

But for now, Ms. Culver said, “I’m just another person trying to make it work.”

We want to hear from you about how you afford life in one of the most expensive cities in the world. We’re looking to speak with people of all income ranges, with all kinds of living situations and professions.

New York

Read David A. Ross’s Statement About Jeffrey Epstein

Published

1 week ago

February 5, 2026

Press Room

Read David A. Ross’s Statement About Jeffrey Epstein

I was introduced to Jeffrey Epstein in the mid 1990’s when I was director of the Whitney. He was a member of the Museum’s Drawing Committee. I knew him as a wealthy patron and a collector, and it was part of my job to befriend people who had the capacity and interest in supporting the museum. I retired from museum work in 2001.
In 2008 he was arrested and jailed in Florida, I emailed him to find out what the story was because this did not seem like the person I thought I knew. I emailed him when he got out of jail. He told me that he had been the subject of a political frame-up because of his support of former President Clinton. At the time, I believed he was telling me the truth.
Though I’d had no further contact with him, when years later I read that was being investigated again on the same charges, I reached out to him to show support. That was a terrible mistake of judgement. When the reality of his crimes became clear, I was mortified and remain ashamed that I fell for his lies. Like many he supported with arts and education patronage, I profoundly regret that I was taken in by his story. I continue to be appalled by his crimes and remain deeply concerned for its many victims.

David A. Ross