President-elect Donald Trump has asked a New York court to throw out his hush money conviction before Friday’s scheduled sentencing.

It has been set for 10 January, just 10 days before the presidential inauguration.

Trump was found guilty in May of 34 counts of falsifying business records, relating to an alleged scheme to hide a hush money payment to adult actress Stormy Daniels in the last weeks of his first campaign in 2016.

Latest updates: Trump speaking at second news conference since election win

Trump’s spokesperson has called the case “lawless” and a “witch hunt”.

Lawyers for the 78-year-old have previously pushed to dismiss the verdict and throw out the case on presidential immunity grounds, due to his impending return to the White House.

Their request to a state appeals court represents a last-ditch effort by Trump to block a lower court ruling on Monday to proceed with the sentencing.

In the ruling Judge Juan Merchan rejected a request from Trump’s lawyers to delay the sentencing while they appealed two of his previous rulings upholding the Manhattan jury’s guilty verdict on 34 felony counts of falsifying records in May.

Scheduling Trump’s sentencing for Friday, Judge Merchan said he was not inclined to send Trump to jail.

He said a sentence of unconditional discharge, which essentially puts a judgment of guilt on his record without a fine or probation, would be the most practical approach ahead of Trump’s inauguration.

Read more:
Hospital declares critical incident
French far-right politician Jean-Marie Le Pen has died
At least 95 killed in earthquake near Tibetan holy city

On Monday, Trump’s lawyers cited both presidential immunity and the demands of the impending inauguration, saying Judge Merchan’s intention not to penalise the president-elect was “of no moment”.

“Presidential immunity violations cannot be ignored in favour of a rushed pre-inauguration sentencing,” the lawyers said in a court filing.

Trump has always denied a sexual encounter with Daniels, but was convicted of falsifying business records over a $130,000 (£102,000) payment to allegedly keep her from publicising claims in the lead-up to the 2016 election.

The case made Trump the first US president to be charged with and convicted of a crime.

His lawyers have made two unsuccessful attempts to have the case dismissed, which they now say they plan to appeal.

US president-elect Donald Trump has had his victory certified by his defeated rival, Kamala Harris.

Under the tightest national security level, Ms Harris, who lost to Mr Trump following November’s election, presided over the certification of the 78-year-old Republican’s victory in Congress.

After Congress went through all the certificates for the 50 US states and Washington DC, it certified the election of Mr Trump and his running mate JD Vance.

Cheers broke out in the chamber as Ms Harris announced the tally of the electoral votes, with Mr Trump receiving 312, while her candidacy, launched following outgoing President Joe Biden’s decision in July to withdraw from the race, got 226.

It stood in stark contrast to the shocking scenes from the certification of Mr Trump’s defeat against Mr Biden four years ago, when the Republican’s supporters tried to block the democratic process by violently storming Capitol Hill.

Ms Harris smiled tightly as she announced her rival’s victory – and as Republicans gave a standing ovation.

She ended the process, which lasted less than 30 minutes, saying: “The chair declares this joint session dissolved.”

Ahead of senators and representatives gathering for the event, the outgoing vice president described her role in the certification as a “sacred obligation” to ensure the peaceful transfer of power.

Five people died in the hours and days following the riots on 6 January 2021, including a Trump supporter who was shot by Capitol police and one officer, Brian Sicknick, who was attacked as he responded.

His death was later attributed to the natural causes.

A further four police officers who responded to the riots took their own lives in the following months.

Ms Harris joined a short list of other vice presidents to oversee the ceremonial confirmation of their election loss as part of their role of presiding over the Senate.

In a video message earlier today, Ms Harris said: “As we have seen, our democracy can be fragile.

“And it is up to each of us to stand up for our most cherished principles.”

Read more from Sky News:
Mindy Kaling spills the beans on Meghan’s cooking skills
Calls for more research into flat head syndrome in babies

The president-elect, who will be sworn in for his second term in the Oval Office on 20 January, posted on his social media platform Truth Social earlier in the day: “Congress certifies our great election victory today – a big moment in history. MAGA!”

Mr Trump has said he plans to pardon some of the more than 1,500 people charged with taking part in the 6 January 2021 assault on the Capitol.

New Orleans attacker Shamsud-Din Jabbar wore smart glasses to film the city’s French Quarter while cycling, in the weeks before his deadly atrocity, the FBI has said.

Jabbar made two trips to the southern city in October and November last year, according to the bureau.

The US citizen, from Houston, Texas, killed 14 people, including Briton Edward Pettifer, when he rammed his rental white pick-up truck into a crowd celebrating New Year in Bourbon Street in the historic French Quarter early on 1 January.

The 42-year-old former US army soldier was then killed in a shootout with police at the scene of the deadly crash.

In a news conference on Sunday, the fourteenth victim was confirmed by Louisiana governor Jeff Landry as LaTasha Polk. He said she worked as a nursing assistant and was the mother of a 14-year-old.

It comes after a vigil was held on Saturday evening for those who died, with relatives among those who gathered on Bourbon Street.

The FBI said Jabbar’s first trip, when he stayed at a rental home, started on 30 October, and lasted at least two days, and he was also in New Orleans on 10 November.

It said he made the cycling video on his first visit using the hands-free glasses, which were developed by US tech giant Meta and are capable of recording or livestreaming. They are designed to look like normal glasses and come in a range of styles.

Jabbar was wearing a pair of Meta smart glasses while he carried out the 1 January attack, but he did not activate them to livestream his actions that day.

Around 30 other people were injured in the incident. Thirteen remain in hospital, with eight people in intensive care.

What happened in the hours before the attack?

The FBI said Jabbar was seen on 31 December at one of several gun shops he visited in Texas leading up to the ramming attack. He then stopped at a business in Texas where he bought one of the ice boxes he used to hide an improvised explosive device (IED).

He entered Louisiana around 2.30pm local time (8.30pm UK time) on 31 December – hours before the attack – and his rented vehicle was later seen in the city of Gonzales, Louisiana, about 9pm that evening.

By 10pm, home camera footage showed Jabbar unloading the white pick-up truck in New Orleans outside his rental home in Mandeville Street.

The FBI said that just under three hours later, at 12.41am on 1 January, Jabbar parked the truck and walked to the junction of Royal and Governor Nichols Street.

It said Jabbar placed one IED in a cooler box at the junction of Bourbon Street and St Peter Street at 1.53am on New Year’s Day.

A person on Bourbon Street, not believed to be involved in the attack, dragged the cooler about a block where authorities found it after the attack.

A second IED was placed by Jabbar in a “bucket-type cooler” at 2.20am at the junction of Bourbon Street and Toulouse Street.

At 3.15am, Jabbar carried out his deadly attack, where he “used the truck as a lethal weapon”, said the FBI.

Two IEDs left in coolers several blocks apart were made safe.

Shortly after 5am, a fire was reported at the Mandeville Street rental home in New Orleans, where emergency services found explosive devices.

The FBI believes Jabbar acted alone.

“We have not seen any indications of an accomplice in the United States, but we are still looking into potential associates in the US and outside of our borders,” Deputy Assistant Director Christopher Raia said at the news conference.

Read more:
Suspect’s half-brother speaks out
How the atrocity unfolded

Jabbar also travelled to Cairo, Egypt, between 22 June and 3 July 2023, and a few days later on 10 July he flew to Ontario, Canada, before returning to the US on 13 July.

But it was not yet clear whether those trips were connected to the truck attack.

“Our agents are getting answers to where he went, who he went with and how those trips may or may not tie into his actions here,” said Lyonel Myrthil, FBI special agent in charge of the New Orleans Field Office.

Jabbar proclaimed his support for the Islamic State militant group in online videos posted hours before he struck.

‘Very rare explosive compound’

He used a very rare explosive compound which was found in the two functional IEDs he placed in New Orleans and authorities are investigating how he knew how to make this homemade explosive, two officials close to the investigation told Sky’s partner network NBC News.

The explosive has never been used in a US terror attack or incident nor has it been used in any European terror attack, said the officials.