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Fact check: What convictions or indictments against Donald J. Trump have been overturned on appeal or vacated and when did those rulings occur?
Executive Summary
The core claim asks which convictions or indictments against Donald J. Trump have been overturned on appeal or vacated and when those rulings occurred. Based on the provided materials, no recorded criminal convictions against Trump were overturned on appeal, but several federal criminal indictments were dismissed after the 2024 election and a New York civil penalty was reduced or voided by an appeals court in August 2025; the New York criminal conviction for falsifying business records remained contested in filings as of December 2024 and early 2025 [1] [2] [3].
1. What the original claim asserts and what the sources actually say about reversals
The original statement asks specifically about convictions or indictments being overturned on appeal or vacated. The supplied sources do not document any appellate court vacatur of a criminal conviction of Donald J. Trump. Instead, the documents show dismissals of federal criminal cases after the 2024 election attributed to prosecutorial decisions, not appellate reversals, and an appellate decision in New York that voided or substantially reduced a civil monetary judgment in the state attorney general’s fraud suit. The December 2024 reporting describes Special Counsel actions to dismiss federal cases, which is a prosecutorial dismissal rather than an appellate vacatur of a conviction [1] [3]. The New York appeals court ruling concerned the civil fraud penalty and was published in August 2025 [2].
2. The dismissals after the 2024 election — factual specifics and timing
The materials indicate that following President Trump’s 2024 election victory, certain federal criminal prosecutions were dismissed in December 2024 by prosecutors, including actions by Special Counsel Jack Smith to drop charges. Those dismissals are reported as prosecutorial decisions rather than appellate court reversals and therefore do not represent convictions being overturned on appeal; they terminate pending indictments through dismissal [1] [3]. The available reporting frames these events as occurring in December 2024 and lists them among the major shifts in the post-election legal landscape for Trump, emphasizing that the federal charges were not the product of appellate courts overturning guilty verdicts but of prosecutorial discontinuance [1].
3. The New York civil fraud decision — what was vacated and when
An appeals court in New York issued a ruling in August 2025 that voided or substantially reduced an approximately $500 million civil judgment entered against Donald J. Trump in the state attorney general’s fraud case. The appellate court concluded that the penalty as imposed was excessive, leaving unresolved elements of liability while eliminating or trimming the monetary sanction. This is a civil appellate decision, not a criminal appellate vacatur of a conviction. The same corpus of sources shows the separate New York criminal case (People v. Trump) concerning falsifying business records and related criminal pleadings, but the August 2025 ruling pertains to civil relief in the attorney general’s suit [2] [4].
4. Remaining criminal convictions and appeals — contested but not overturned in the record
One source summarizes the trials and convictions through early 2025, noting a 34-count misdemeanor/ felony conviction in New York for falsifying business records reported after trial; subsequent legal filings sought to overturn or vacate that verdict, including motions by defense counsel to dismiss or vacate on post-election grounds, but the materials do not document an appellate court overturning that conviction as of the latest entries. The Lawfare and Ballotpedia-style timelines list indictments and convictions through January 2025 and describe dismissals in federal matters, but they do not provide a record of appellate vacatur of any criminal conviction in Trump’s favor [3] [5].
5. How to read the difference: dismissals, vacaturs, reversals, and civil voidings
The supplied materials illustrate three distinct actions that are often conflated: prosecutorial dismissals of indictments (December 2024 federal dismissals), appellate vacatur or reduction of civil monetary judgments (New York appellate decision August 2025), and motions to vacate criminal convictions that remained pending or unresolved in the record provided. Only the first two categories appear in these sources with dates: federal dismissals in December 2024 (prosecutorial) and a New York appeals court voiding a large civil fraud penalty in August 2025 (civil appellate). No source here shows a criminal conviction of Trump being overturned on appeal or vacated by an appellate court within the provided timeline [1] [2] [3].