Former President Donald Trump violated a gag order in his New York state hush-money trial by using his social media platform and campaign website to attack potential witnesses, according to the ruling of Judge Juan M. Merchan on Tuesday.
As a result, Trump has been fined $9,000 for nine violations of the order, which prohibited him from making public statements about foreseeable witnesses or prospective jurors in the case.
The judge also ordered the removal of the offending posts by 2:15 p.m. Eastern Tuesday. Trump, who is the presumptive GOP nominee for president, had made comments about adult film star Stormy Daniels and his former attorney Michael Cohen, who allegedly facilitated a payment to Daniels.
Both Cohen and Daniels are expected to testify for the prosecution in this historic criminal trial involving a former U.S. president. While Trump did not deny posting the items, he claimed they were in response to political attacks from Cohen and Daniels.
Judge Merchan’s order did allow Trump to respond to political attacks, and he chose not to fine Trump for the first post in question, which could be seen as a response to Cohen’s tweets.
Merchan stated that he interpreted political attacks broadly to respect Trump’s First Amendment right to free speech, which he deemed particularly important as Trump seeks re-election to the White House.
“It is critically important that Defendant’s legitimate free speech rights not be curtailed, that he be able to fully campaign for the office which he seeks and that he be able to respond and defend himself against political attacks,” Merchan wrote. “For that reason, this Court exercised discretion when it crafted the Expanded Order and delayed issuing it until the eve of trial.”
Trump also argued that “reposts” from other accounts should not count as his own speech.
Merchan roundly rejected that argument, noting Trump has bragged about the size of his audience on Truth Social and fully controlled its content.
“There can be no doubt whatsoever, that Defendant’s intent and purpose when reposting, is to communicate to his audience that he endorses and adopts the posted statement as his own,” Merchan said. “It is counterintuitive and indeed absurd, to read the Expanded Order to not proscribe statements that Defendant intentionally selected and published to maximize exposure.”
Tuesday’s order also warns Trump “that the Court will not tolerate continued willful violations” of the gag order and warned that Merchan may impose jail time for further violations.
U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat who is the ranking minority member on the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, told reporters in Washington Tuesday that he did not expect the ruling to lead Trump to change his behavior.
“I don’t think he’ll take it seriously, unless he’s going to be held overnight or something like that,” Raskin said. “He acts with utter contempt towards the rule of law.”
