NEW YORK – Donald Trump asked a federal court late Thursday to intervene in his New York hush money criminal case, seeking a pathway to overturn his felony conviction and indefinitely delay his sentencing scheduled for next month.

Lawyers for the former president and current Republican nominee asked the federal court in Manhattan to seize the case from the state court where it was brought and tried, arguing that the historic prosecution violated Trump’s constitutional rights and ran afoul of the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling on presidential immunity.

Trump’s lawyers said moving the case to federal court following his May 30 conviction will give him an “unbiased forum, free from local hostilities” to address those issues. If the case is moved to federal court, Trump lawyers wrote, they will then seek to have the verdict overturned and the case dismissed. If it remains in state court, with sentencing proceeding as scheduled, it could amount to election interference, they said.

“The ongoing proceedings will continue to cause direct and irreparable harm to President Trump — the leading candidate in the 2024 Presidential election — and voters located far beyond Manhattan,” Trump lawyers Todd Blanche and Emil Bove wrote in a 64-page U.S. District Court court filing.