NEW YORK Donald Trump was held in contempt of court Tuesday and fined $9,000 for repeatedly violating a gag orderthat barred him from making public statements about witnesses, jurors and some others connected to his New York hush money case. If he does it again, the judge warned, he could be jailed.
Prosecutors had alleged 10 violations, but New York Judge Juan M. Merchan found there were nine. Trump stared down at the table in front of him as the judge read the ruling, frowning slightly.
It was a stinging rebuke of the presumptive Republican presidential nominees insistence that he was exercising his free speech rights and a reminder that hes a criminal defendant subject to the harsh realities of trial procedure. And the judges remarkable threat to jail a former president signaled that Trumps already precarious legal standing could further spiral depending on his behavior during the remainder of the trial.
Merchan wrote that he iskeenly aware of, and protective of,Trumps First Amendment rights, particularly given his candidacy for the office of President of the United States.
It is critically important that defendants 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.
Still, he warned that the court would not tolerate “willful violations of its lawful orders and that if necessary and appropriate under the circumstances, it will impose an incarceratory punishment.
With that statement, the judge drew nearer the specter of Trump becoming the first former president of the United States behind bars.
This gag order is totally unconstitutional, Trump said as court adjourned after a day that included testimony from a Hollywood lawyer who negotiated two of the hush money deals at issue in the case. Im the Republican candidate for president of the United States … and Im sitting in a courthouse all day long listening to this stuff.
Trump is used to having constant access to his social media bullhorn to slam opponents and speak his mind. After he was banned from Twitter followingthe Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol by his supporters, Trump launched his own platform, where his posts wouldnt be blocked or restricted. He has long tried to distance himself from controversial messages hes amplified to his millions of followers by insisting theyre only retweets.
But he doeshave experience with gag orders, which were also imposed in other legal matters. After he was found to have violated ordersin his civil fraud trial,he paid more than $15,000 in fines.
Trump also is subject to a gag order in his federal criminal election interference case in Washington.That order limits what he can say about known or reasonably foreseeable witnesses in the case and about court staff and other lawyers, though an appeals court freed him to speak about special counsel Jack Smith, who brought the case.
Tuesday’s ruling in New York came at the start of the second week of testimony in the historic case, which involves allegations that Trump and his associates took part in an illegal scheme to influence the 2016 presidential campaign by purchasing and then burying seamy stories. The payouts went to a doorman with a torrid yarn; ex-Playboy model Karen McDougal, who had accusations of an affair; and to porn performer Stormy Daniels, who alleged a sexual encounter with Trump. He has pleaded not guilty and says the stories are all fake.
Trump deleted, as ordered, the offending posts from his Truth Social account and campaign website and has until Friday to pay the fine. The judge was also weighingother alleged gag-order violations by Trumpand will hear arguments Thursday. He also announced that he will halt the trial on May 17 to allow Trump to attend his son Barron’s high school graduation.
Of the 10 posts, the one Merchan ruled was not a violation came on April 10, a post referring to witnesses Michael Cohen and Daniels as sleaze bags.” Merchan said Trumps contention that he was responding to previous posts by Cohen is sufficient to give him pause on whether the post was a violation.
Merchan cautioned that the gag order not be used as a sword instead of a shield by potential witnesses and that if people who are protected by the order, like Cohen, continue to attack Trump it becomes apparent they dont need the gag orders protection.
Cohen, Trumps former attorney, has said he will refrain from commenting about Trump until after he testifies. On Tuesday, he said in a text message to The Associated Press: Judge Merchans decision elucidates that this behavior will not be tolerated and that no one is above the law.”
In other developments, testimony resumed Tuesday with a banker who helped Cohen open accounts, including one used to buy Daniels’ silence. Trumps attorneys have suggested that the payments were aimed at protecting his name and his family not influencing the outcome of the presidential election.
Jurors also beganhearing from Keith Davidson, a lawyer who represented McDougal and Daniels in their negotiations with the National Enquirer and Cohen. He testified that he arranged a meeting at his Los Angeles office during the summer of 2016 to see whether the tabloid’s parent company was interested in McDougals story. At first they demurred, saying she lacked documentary evidence of the interaction, Davidson testified.
But the tabloidat the behest of publisher David Peckereventually bought the rights, and Davidson testified that he understood and McDougal preferred it would never be published. Asked why the tabloid’s parent company company, American Media Inc., would buy a story it didnt intend to run, Davidson said he was aware of two reasons.
One explanation I was given is they were trying to build Karen into a brand and didnt want to diminish her brand, he said. And the second was an unspoken understanding that there was an affiliation between David Pecker and Donald Trump and that AMI wouldnt run this story, any story related to Karen, because it would hurt Donald Trump.
As for Daniels, the October 2016 leak ofTrumps 2005 Access Hollywood tape in which Trump bragged about grabbing women sexually without asking permission had tremendous influence on the marketability of her story. Before the video was made public, there was very little if any interest in her claims, Davidson told jurors.
A deal was reached with the tabloid for Daniels story, but the Enquirer backed out. Though Pecker testified that he had agreed to serve as the Trump campaigns eyes and ears by helping to squelch unflattering rumors and claims about Trump and women, he drew the line with Daniels afterpaying out $180,000to scoop up and sit on stories. Davidson began negotiating with Cohen directly, hiked up the price to $130,000, and reached a deal.
But Daniels and Davidson grew frustrated as weeks passed and instead of the money, she got excuses from Cohen about broken computers, Secret Service firewalls and the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur.
I thought he was trying to kick the can down the round until after the election, Davidson said.
While Cohen never explicitly said he was negotiating the deal on Trumps behalf, Davidson felt the implication was clear.
Every single time I talked to Michael Cohen, he leaned on his close affiliation with Donald Trump, Davidson said. Plus, he figured that Trump was the beneficiary of this contract.
The GOP presidential hopeful is charged with34 felony counts of falsifying business recordsin connection with the hush money payments. The detailed evidence on business transactions and bank accounts is setting the stage for testimony from Cohen, who went to federal prison afterpleading guilty in 2018 to campaign finance violationsand other crimes.
The trial the first ofTrump’s four criminal casesto come before a jury is expected to last for another month or more.
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