Report: Judge Allows Juror Who ‘Celebrated Trump’s Loss in 2020’ to Stay

New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan reportedly allowed a juror who celebrated former President Donald Trump’s 2020 loss on social media to remain in the jury pool.

Trump’s unprecedented trial began Monday morning with jury selection, the first day of a process that could span two weeks. The trial could last until June.

During Tuesday’s jury selection, Trump’s defense attorneys tried to prevent a potential juror from staying on the case because she celebrated Trump’s 2020 loss, Fox News reported.

“They wanted to have a peremptory challenge to excuse the juror because they thought that she said she could be impartial, but had social media posts that apparently had her celebrating Trump’s loss in 2020,” Trace Gallagher reported, “and so they challenged her. The judge said, ‘Nope, she can be impartial. She stays.'”

Six jurors were seated Tuesday. A total of 18 jurors will be selected before the trial begins. 

Merchan is calling in the first 6 jurors to be sworn in. He’s going to ask them to plan to return on Monday, but subject to change. To recap:

B-400
FOREPERSON – Juror No. 1

B280
Juror No. 2

B381
Juror NO. 3

B89
Juror No. 4

B74,
Juror No. 5

B297
Juror No. 6

— Tyler McBrien (@TylerMcBrien) April 16, 2024

Thirty-four of the 96 potential jurors remain from the first pool in the juror selection process for Trump’s criminal trial, courtroom journalists reported Monday.

The remaining potential jurors progressed to the next stage on Tuesday of filling out a questionnaire, which asks what media they consume, where they live, and their political activities.

After the questionnaire, lawyers for both sides will scrutinize the potential candidates. The lawyers will likely investigate the jurors’ social media and ask more personal questions to screen for biases.

Judge Merchan has so generously granted the defense request to strike the juror in seat 2 for cause. From WSJ pool report: Before granting the request, he read the language of the social media post in question into he record. It is, in part:
“Good news!! Trump lost his court…

— Miranda Devine (@mirandadevine) April 16, 2024

“The rapid disqualification of at least 50 possible jurors underscores the difficult reality of finding a dozen New Yorkers to form the jury in one of the most high-profile cases in U.S. history,” Axios reported:

• “I just couldn’t do it,” one prospective juror said in the hallway outside of the courtroom, per the pool.
• Of the jurors who said they couldn’t be fair or impartial in the case, over two dozen were white women, 1 Hispanic woman, and 4 women of Asian descent. Fourteen were white men and 1 man of Asian descent. Six other jurors were unknown.