President-elect Donald Trump was unsuccessful in his effort to halt sentencing in his hush-money case after a New York appellate court ruled that the sentencing could proceed as scheduled on Friday.

With his lawyer arguing that the president-elect is entitled to full immunity from prosecution, Mr Trump had hoped to shut down the case before returning to the White House in less than two weeks, but the attempt has proven unsuccessful.

According to the New York Times, Mr Trump had filed an emergency application to halt Friday’s sentencing, and the motion fell to a single appellate court judge, Ellen Gesmer.

Following a brief hearing on Tuesday grilling Mr Trump’s lawyer, Todd Blanche, about whether he had “any support for a notion that presidential immunity extends to presidents-elect?” Ms Gesmer denied the application after 30 minutes.

When Mr Blanche tried to hold on to the immunity argument, Ms Gesmer quickly cut him off with a correction, noting that Mr Trump was currently the president-elect.

Mr Blanche subsequently conceded, stating there has never been a case of immunity for the president-elect.

Meanwhile, this is not the ultimate end for Mr Trump as he can proceed to file an emergency appeal to a federal court and go up to the Supreme Court to stay off the sentencing if the federal court’s decision is unfavourable to him.