(Headline USA) Prosecutors in Donald Trump’s New York hush-money criminal case asked a judge Monday to impose a gag order on the former president ahead of next month’s trial.
“Self-regulation is not a viable alternative, as defendant’s recent history makes plain,” prosecutors wrote in court papers.
Trump, they said, “has a longstanding and perhaps singular history” of using social media, campaign speeches and other public statements to “attack judges, jurors, lawyers, witnesses and other individuals involved in legal proceedings against him.”
In a statement, Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said: “Today, the 2-tiered system of justice implemented against President Trump is on full display, with the request by another Deranged Democrat prosecutor seeking a restrictive gag order, which if granted, would impose an unconstitutional infringement on President Trump’s First Amendment rights, including his ability to defend himself, and the rights of all Americans to hear from President Trump.”
The order reportedly would not extend to George Soros-backed Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who has come under harsh criticism for his far-left, soft-on-crime policies lately, and whose case against Trump was likewise slammed for stretching the law beyond its breaking point after he upgraded a misdemeanor to a felony to circumvent the statute of limitations.
Bragg’s office said it was seeking what it described as a “narrowly tailored” order that would bar Trump from making or directing others to make public statements about potential witnesses and jurors, as well as statements meant to interfere with or harass the court’s staff, prosecution team or their families.
A gag order would add to restrictions put in place after Trump’s arraignment last April that prohibit him from using evidence in the case to attack witnesses. Prosecutors also proposed that the names of jurors be kept from the public to “minimize obstacles to jury selection, and protect juror safety.”
Without limits, prosecutors said, Trump’s rhetoric would “create a significant and imminent threat to the trial by distracting personnel, diverting government resources, and delaying the administration of justice.”
The judge, notorious leftist Juan Manuel Merchan, didn’t rule immediately. Jury selection is scheduled to start March 25. Barring a last-minute delay, it will be the first of Trump’s four criminal cases to go to trial.
A spokesperson for Trump’s presidential campaign called the gag order request “election interference pure and simple” and called the hush-money case a “sham orchestrated by partisan Democrats desperately attempting to prevent” Trump from returning to the White House.
Trump lawyer Susan Necheles said the defense will respond in court papers later this week.
The Manhattan case centers on allegations that Trump falsified internal records kept by his company to hide the true nature of payments made to his former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen.
The lawyer paid porn actor Stormy Daniels $130,000 as part of an effort during Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign to bury claims he’d had extramarital sexual encounters.
Trump is charged with 34 counts of falsifying business records, punishable by up to four years in prison, though there is no guarantee that a conviction would result in jail time.
The Republican presidential front-runner has lashed out about the case repeatedly on social media, warning of “potential death & destruction” before his indictment last year, posting a photo on social media of himself holding a baseball bat next to a picture of Bragg and complaining that Merchan was “a Trump-hating judge” with a family full of “Trump haters.”
The gag order request Monday mirrored portions of an order imposed on Trump in October in his separate Washington federal case, where he was charged for his efforts to challenge the disputed outcome of the 2020 election.
A federal appeals court panel in December largely upheld Judge Tanya Chutkan’s gag order but narrowed it in an important way by freeing Trump to criticize Special Counsel Jack Smith, who brought the case. Manhattan prosecutors echoed that ruling by excluding Bragg from their proposed gag order.
Last May, Merchan issued what’s known as a protective order, warning Trump and his lawyers they risked being held in contempt if they disseminated evidence from the hush-money case to third parties, used it to attack witnesses or posted sensitive material to social media.
Merchan, noting Trump’s “special” status as a former president and current candidate, tried to make clear at the time that the protective order shouldn’t be construed as a gag order, saying: “It’s certainly not my intention to in any way impede Mr. Trump’s ability to campaign for the presidency of the United States.”
Adapted from reporting by the Associated Press
