A New York judge delivered terrible news to former President Donald Trump on Friday.
Trump received a verbal lashing from Judge Arthur Engoron in his ongoing civil fraud trial brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James. Engoron excoriated the GOP front-runner in front of the court for “blatantly violating” the gag order by failing to remove a derogatory post about the judge's clerk from his campaign website. Engoron threatened Trump with jail time if it happened again.
Engoron's limited gag order bars Trump from speaking about court staff.
CNN further reports on the judge's remarks:
“Donald Trump has received ample warning from this Court as to the possible repercussions of violating the gag order. He specifically acknowledged that he understood and would abide by it,” Judge Arthur Engoron said in his order Friday.
“Accordingly, issuing yet another warning is not longer appropriate; this Court is way behind the ‘warning' stage.”
On the second day of the trial, October 3, Engoron issued a partial gag order on all parties not to speak about any members of the court staff after Trump posted on Truth Social attacking Engoron's clerk. The post claimed she was a “girlfriend” to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, showing a picture of the two of them together.
The post was removed from Truth Social right after the gag order was issued, but it was not erased from Trump's campaign website, DonaldJTrump.com.
Engoron admonished the 45th president and his legal team for keeping the post up on his website for 17 days, belatedly removing it “last night but only in response to an email.”
He finished his warning in no uncertain terms:
Make no mistake: future violations, whether intentional or unintentional, will subject the violator to far more severe sanctions, which may include, but are not limited to, steeper financial penalties, holding Donald Trump in contempt of court, and possibly imprisoning him.
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