Appeal court judge denies Trump’s third attempt this week to delay hush money trial – as it happened

The Arizona supreme court decision upended Donald Trump’s gambit on abortion, a day after the former president sought to neutralize the political issue by declining to support a national abortion ban.

Trump had hoped that his announcement on Monday would keep abortion rights mostly out of the conversation ahead of the November elections, but Tuesday’s ruling showed just how difficult it will be to do that, the Washington Post’s Dan Balz writes.

All abortion politics are national, not local. Abortion developments – new laws, new restrictions, new stories of women caught up in heart-wrenching and sometimes life-threatening decisions – are no longer confined to the geography where they take place. They are instantly part of the larger debate.

Trump is correct about the dangers to Republicans of continuing the debate about abortion rights, Balz says, but the former president has abandoned those whose interests he once vowed to serve.

There is no safe harbor for Trump and the Republicans at this point. The abortion issue is no less complex and no less difficult for many Americans than it was while Roe was in force. But politically the winds have shifted, and done so dramatically.

For more than a year, Donald Trump declined to say when in a pregnancy he would try to draw the line, even as Republican-led states have ushered in a wave of new restrictions and anti-abortion groups pressured him and other Republican presidential candidates to endorse a federal ban on the procedure.

In his statement on Monday, Trump did not say whether he would sign into law a national abortion ban if he were president and Congress passed a federal limit. Neither did he say how he, as a resident of Florida, would vote on a ballot measure that would enshrine abortion rights into that state’s constitution.

Democrats, who have made abortion a central issue of the election, said Trump supported laws in the more than two dozens states that have imposed outright bans or restrictions on the procedure since Roe v Wade was overturned.

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On the campaign trail, Trump has been ambivalent on abortion. He routinely takes credit for appointing the supreme court justices who set the stage for the elimination of Roe v Wade, which he has called a “moral and unconstitutional atrocity”. He has also called himself the “most pro-life president in American history”.

But he has repeatedly dismissed as too extreme fellow Republicans who oppose exceptions to abortion restrictions in cases of rape, incest and when the life of the pregnant person is at risk. And he has said being too hardline on the issue cost Republicans at the polls in the 2022 midterms and could do so again when he challenges Biden in November’s presidential election.

The Arizona state supreme court decision came a day after Donald Trump declined to endorse a national ban on abortion, saying that it should be left up to individual states.

Trump’s stated position on Monday dashed hopes of anti-abortion groups, which want a federal ban, and drew the ire of Democrats, who blame Trump for outright bans and severe restrictions already in place across the south and midwest.

In a four-minute video post on Truth Social, Trump said it was “up to the states to do the right thing” while also touting his work to confirm the conservative supreme court justices who ultimately overturned Roe v Wade in 2022. “States will determine by vote or legislation, or perhaps both,” Trump said.

Whatever they decide must be the law of the land, or in this case the law of the state.

“Many states will be different, many will have a different number of weeks, some will be more conservative than others,” he continued.

At the end of the day this is all about the will of the people. You must follow your heart, or in many cases your religion or faith.

He added:

Do what’s right for your family, and do what’s right for yourself.

Allen Weisselberg, a longtime lieutenant to Donald Trump, has been sentenced to five months in jail after pleading guilty last month to perjury in the former president’s recent civil fraud trial charges.

As the former chief financial officer in the Trump Organization, Weisselberg was key in helping Trump record his net worth. A defendant in the fraud trial, Weisselberg was accused of helping to inflate Trump’s net worth on government financial documents, misleading lenders.

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On the witness stand in October, Weisselberg, 76, was evasive, often saying he did not recall the real-estate valuations that were at the center of the trial. But a key moment of his testimony came when Weisselberg insisted he did not notice a discrepancy on Trump’s financial statements: that Trump’s triplex apartment was listed as being 30,000 sq ft when, in reality, it was closer to 11,000 sq ft.

Forbes magazine disputed the claim he made on the stand, saying it had emails and notes that proved Weisselberg had actively tried to convince the magazine for years that the triplex was bigger than it actually was, denying what was listed on real-estate documents. Weisselberg abruptly ended his testimony after Forbes published an article accusing him of lying on the stand.

While the long-term impact of the decision on abortion access in Arizona is not yet clear, a number of providers said on Tuesday that they will stay open as long as they can.

Planned Parenthood Arizona, which operates multiple locations in the state, intends to continue providing abortions as long as the procedure is legal. Thanks to a court order in a separate case, Planned Parenthood appears to be able to legally provide abortions beyond the 14-day window and potentially as late as into May.

“Regardless of today’s decision, what I can tell you is that our doors will remain open,” Angela Florez, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Arizona, told reporters on a call after the supreme court decision.

We will continue to provide what essential healthcare we can within the limitations of the law, and we hope that supporters will continue to support and that patients will still continue to feel safe in our care.

Dr Gabrielle Goodrick, a longtime abortion provider in Phoenix, also told the Guardian that her clinic will continue offering abortions, at least through the 14-day window. Goodrick said.

We are not closing. Ever. That’s not a question. I have reassurances from the governor and the attorney general that they’re not going to prosecute, but I need to investigate that further.

Voters in Arizona may be able to weigh in on the issue in November: abortion rights supporters in the state have spent months gathering signatures for a ballot measure to enshrine abortion rights into the state constitution, and the Tuesday decision raises the stakes for their efforts significantly.

If it succeeds, the ballot measure would declare that people in Arizona have a “fundamental right to abortion” and that the state will not try to curb that right before a pregnancy reaches fetal viability, which is generally pegged to about 24 weeks of pregnancy.

Although ballot measures need to amass 383,923 signatures by July to get on the ballot, the organizers behind the Arizona measure announced last week that they have gathered more than 500,000 signatures, and plan to collect more.

Hours after the Arizona’s supreme court ruling, Republicans in the state took a surprising stance for a party that has historically championed abortion restrictions – they denounced the decision.

Some of the criticisms of the Tuesday ruling came from politicians who had previously supported the 1864 ban or cheered the end of Roe v Wade.

Kari Lake, a Republican and loyalist of Donald Trump running to represent Arizona in the Senate, previously called the ban a “great law”, according to PolitiFact.

David Schweikert, an Arizona congressman who is facing one of the most competitive House races in the country this November, said he does not support the ruling, but in 2022 said the fall of Roe “pleased” him.

Juan Ciscomani, another Republican congressman for Arizona, said the ruling was “a disaster for women and providers” and that the law was “archaic”.

The speaker of the Arizona house, Ben Toma, and the president of the state senate, Warren Petersen, who are both Republicans, also released a joint statement saying that they would be “listening to our constituents to determine the best course of action for the legislature”.

In contrast, on the day Roe fell, the Republican-controlled state senate released a statement declaring that the 1864 ban was in effect immediately. That statement unleashed confusion and chaos among abortion providers in Arizona, prompting them to stop offering the procedure out of an abundance of caution.

Arizona’s Democratic attorney general, Kris Mayes, vowed not to prosecute any doctors or women under the 1864 ban.

Speaking in a news conference after the court’s decision was published, Mayes said:

No woman or doctor will be prosecuted under this draconian law … as long as I am attorney general. Not by me, nor by any county attorney serving in our state. Not on my watch.

Her office is looking to pursue options available to ensure the law is not implemented in the state, she added.

In a statement, Mayes described the state supreme court decision as “unconscionable” and an “affront to freedom”, and said the court had “risked the health and lives of Arizonans”. She continued:

Today’s decision to reimpose a law from a time when Arizona wasn’t a state, the Civil War was raging, and women couldn’t even vote will go down in history as a stain on our state.

The Arizona governor, Katie Hobbs, a Democrat, said Tuesday was a “dark day” for the state following the ruling and implored abortion rights supporters to make their voices heard in November.

Hobbs said the court decision was a sign that “the fight for our reproductive freedoms is far from over”. In a statement on Tuesday, she said:

I’ve personally experienced the anguish of losing a pregnancy and I know it’s outrageous to have the government tell you that the best decision for your health or future could now be considered a crime. I will not stop fighting until we have fully secured the right to reproductive healthcare in our state.

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The governor last year issued a sweeping executive order banning county attorneys from prosecuting women who seek abortions and doctors who perform them.

Speaking to CNN hours after the court ruling, Hobbs said she was confident that voters will have the opportunity to enshrine abortion rights in November and reverse the decision. She added:

This is a commonsense measure that is supported by the vast majority of Arizonans in terms of protecting access. And you know, certainly it’s going to motivate voters in November.

Good morning, US politics readers. The Arizona supreme court’s decision on Tuesday to let a 160-year-old abortion ban in the state go into effect pushed Republicans into a new political dilemma, coming as it did just a day after Donald Trump declared that abortion should be left to individual states.

First passed when Arizona was still a territory, the ban only permits abortions to save a patient’s life and does not have exceptions for rape or incest. “This decision cannot stand,” said Matt Gress, a Republican state representative.

I categorically reject rolling back the clock to a time when slavery was still legal and we could lock up women and doctors because of an abortion.

“I oppose today’s ruling,” said Kari Lake, a Republican running to represent Arizona in the Senate and a Trump loyalist. Lake called on the state legislature to “come up with an immediate commonsense solution that Arizonans can support”. David Schweikert, the most vulnerable Republican in the state, also denounced the ruling and said the issue “should be decided by Arizonans, not legislated from the bench”.

Republicans have struggled to find a way to talk about abortion since the US supreme court overturned Roe v Wade, leading the GOP to stumble in the 2022 midterms and abortion rights supporters to win a string of ballot measures. Their latest response to the Arizona ruling may mark their fastest and strongest rebuke of abortion bans since Roe fell. Some of the criticisms of Tuesday’s ruling came from politicians who had previously supported the 1864 ban or cheered the end of Roe v Wade.

Here’s what else we’re watching:

• 10am ET. USAID administrator Samantha Power will testify before the foreign relations committee.

• 10am. Joe Biden and the first lady, Jill Biden, will welcome the Japanese prime minister, Fumio Kishida, and his wife, Yuko Kishida, on the South Lawn.

• 12.30pm. Biden and Kishida will hold a joint press conference in the Rose Garden.