A lawyer for Donald Trump told Newsmax on Friday that "the future of the American Republic" might be at stake after a guilty verdict in the former president's fraud case in New York City, saying "Democrats have opened a Pandora's box that may never be closed."
Attorney Will Scharf, appearing on "Wake Up America," said he's "deeply concerned" about such a scenario, though "not so much for the future of this case."
"I think we will end up winning" on appeal, he said.
"The fear here, [is] that the Democrats have opened a Pandora's box, which may never be closed, and it may lead to an endless cycle of recriminations and prosecutions, the likes of which our country has never seen before," Scharf said. "So I'm deeply concerned not so much for the future of this case … but for the future of the American Republic."
Scharf said in the appeal, Trump's legal team will address "a judge who essentially, with his jury instructions, guided the jury to a guilty verdict instead of guiding the jury to an evenhanded deliberation of the actual facts and evidence. That's a real problem."
Scharf was asked about a possible prison sentence for Trump.
"I think it would be an absolute travesty," he said of a severe sentence in the fraud case, calling it one that would "really pull down the veil and show the world that this is all about election interference."
"So we certainly don't think that's going to happen. If it does, I think it will propel Donald J. Trump back [into] the White House. And we'll have to pull him out of prison to get him to the White House.
"It's just crazy that these are the conversations that we're having. But no, we're not expecting a sentence of imprisonment — that would be deeply unjust and deeply out of touch with the way that these charges and these sorts of cases are typically handled in New York."
Ultimately, Scharf said, "justice will win and President Trump will be back in the White House where he belongs come next January."
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