A federal judge on Monday issued a gag order on former President Donald Trump, limiting what he can say about special counsel Jack Smith’s federal prosecution into his alleged attempt to subvert in the 2020 presidential election.
A federal judge on Monday issued a gag order on former President Donald Trump, limiting what he can say about special counsel Jack Smith’s federal prosecution into his alleged attempt to subvert in the 2020 presidential election.
The order restricts Trump’s ability to publicly target court personnel, potential witnesses, or the special counsel and his staff. The order did not impose restrictions on disparaging comments about Washington, DC, – where the jury will take place – or certain comments about the Justice Department at large, both of which the government requested.
“This is not about whether I like the language Mr. Trump uses,” Judge Tanya Chutkan said. “This is about language that presents a danger to the administration of justice.”
“His presidential candidacy does not give him carte blanche to vilify public servants who are simply doing their jobs,” the judge added.
For some reason no media seem to have linked to a copy of the gag order, but prior reporting suggests that the judge's threat if Trump violates the order is to do one thing he really doesn't want the court to do, which is move up the trial date.
Maybe there won't be any immediate consequences, but according to Legal Eagle, this is a bench trial. Meaning there are no jurors deciding his fate and instead you guessed it... It's the judge that Trump might piss off.
It's been widely reported that she will move up the trial date which is the last thing he wants since his strategy is to delay until after the election at which time, if he wins, none of this will matter. The theory is that doing so gives him less time to intimidate witnesses and officers of the courts.
Time will tell - this judge doesn't seem to lack the guts to do so if necessary. But my understanding is that jail time is a 'last resort' after fines and other punishments. I'm under no delusion that Trump will be thrown in Jail in the near future.
He is being given a rope, it's his choice whether he hangs himself with it. You can't go straight to throwing him in prison you at least have to demonstrate ill intent.
I wouldn't worry, he will definitely violate these terms, if you gave Donald Trump a button that said do not press under any circumstances, pressing this button will result in the destruction of the universe he'd press it before you could finish reading the sign. The man has no self-control.
“He does not have the right to say and do exactly what he pleases. Do you agree with that?” she asked Trump attorney John Lauro, who responded: “100%.”
She added: “If the message Mr. Trump wants to express is ‘my prosecution is politically motivated,’” he can do so without using “highly charged language.”
That hurts. That would be sentences with words of four and five syllables! He will fail to pronounce them, or his followers won't understand them. Win-Win.
I wonder what pictures his "speech writers" will draw on his cue cards for a sentence like that ;-)
I doubt Trump will be able to resist attacking Jack Smith, but I'm 100% certain he's going to violate the rule against targeting "potential witnesses." That's a very, very long list of people who are targeted regularly.
hello, I'm not a native english speaker and I know two distinct meaning of the word "gag" and neither of them make sense in this context. so what does "gag order" mean?
I'm guessing the 2 uses you already know are 'joke' and 'to retch/nearly vomit'?
Another meaning of 'gag' is to physically tie something around their mouth to stop them from speaking (like in films when people get material or tape in their mouths to muffle their cries for help in a kidnap scene? That material would be the 'gag')
Obviously in this instance it's not a literal gag, although I'm sure there's plenty of people who wish it could be. A 'gagging order' is a metaphor for not being able to speak about things
Think of it as a "you cannot talk about something" order. So a gag is something put in a person's mouth to keep them from talking. So he is not allowed to talk about a specific subject (in this case parts of the case specifically things he has said that could be considered threatening or attempting to influence witnesses or jurors) so he has been "gaged"
And in case you are wondering how the fuck you get him to shut up. If he violates the order he can be "held in contempt of court" which means that you were legally told to do something and you didn't. It can be punished with fines and/or jail time. Which may not deter him.
It all depends what the judge is willing to do about violations. If they really threaten the administration of justice, fines are probably the first step, but imprisonment is on the table though it seems unlikely to go that far. A new judge may treat these differently, or take previous gag order violations into account.
For a voter base that believes the other side is using all means including DOJ to get put down their candidate. it is going to energize even those who are on the fence to jump to the republican side