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.

    • blindbunny@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      Fucking right?! Can we just lock him up just this once? I’m sick of him dominanting the discourse. I just want universal healthcare/ basic income.

      • some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org
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        You just want things that our current overlords will never give us. Don’t worry, I’m on your side. We’ll get there, eventually.

        Vote.

        • blindbunny@lemmy.ml
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          Better happen sooner then later. America is just asking for a John Q moment.

          • Z3k3@lemmy.world
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            Can you indulge a non American idiot. What’s a John q moment. All I’m finding when searching is a denzel Washington movie with the synopsis not giving quite enough context to fit

            • blindbunny@lemmy.ml
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              It’s essentially what took place in that movie. Health care wouldn’t cover a life saving procedure for Denzel Washington’s character’s child. So he held up the hospital until his child got care. I honestly forgot how it ended. But if I had to guess he gets shot and his kid gets to live.

              Edit:

              John is ultimately acquitted of attempted murder and armed criminal action, but convicted of kidnapping and false imprisonment. His lawyer assures him that he will likely serve no more than two years. As John is escorted from the courthouse, Lester proclaims him as a hero, and a now-healthy Michael gains eye contact with his father, saying “Dad!” and then, “Thank you”.

              https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Q.#:~:text=John is ultimately acquitted of,of kidnapping and false imprisonment.

          • Cosmonauticus@lemmy.world
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            I honestly think there’s going to be a mass shooting at an insurance or pharmaceutical company. Someone’s eventually going to go after a CEO out of spite

    • 【J】【u】【s】【t】【Z】@lemmy.world
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      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.

      • El Barto@lemmy.world
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        Which is a quite reasonable move.

        “Dude continues with his threats? Alright, let’s get this over with. And add his threats to the pile of evidence.”

    • spider@lemmy.nz
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      the consequences when he breaks this order

      Probably another huge influx of campaign cash.

      • FlowVoid@lemmy.world
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        No, this is a jury trial for the crimes of Jan 6.

        The bench trial is the one for civil fraud in NY, in which Judge Arthur Engoron issued a more limited gag order.

      • Treczoks@lemmy.world
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        “That were three more violations in yesterdays speech, so we will move the trial back another three weeks. See you in court next Tuesday, Mr. Trump.”

    • Crikeste@lemm.ee
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      Same thought here.

      This ultimately means nothing if he doesn’t face any consequences for breaking the court order.

      • TheSanSabaSongbird@lemdro.id
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        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.

    • sunbytes@lemmy.world
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      I think for people with a reputation for not paying bills, this kind of thing should be held as a deposit.

      Just so they can’t delay paying it for years.

      It’s just gone the moment the judge decides it, and he has to appeal it back

      I mean, it’s an awful precent for everyone else, but for him and Rudy and Alex Jones there’s really no other way to get the cash out of them.

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        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.

        • TheSanSabaSongbird@lemdro.id
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          She’s threatened to move up the trial date if he violates the order as a way of limiting the effect his words can have on court officers and potential witnesses. This would be terrible for him since his whole strategy is to delay until after the election when he believes he will become president again and can make it all go away.

          I really like Judge Chutkan so far.

      • Echo Dot@feddit.uk
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        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.

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    “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%.”

    oooooooo someone is getting yelled at today

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    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 ;-)

    • Seagull@lemmy.ca
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      Trump will soon be telling his cult that the judge said “‘my prosecution is politically motivated”.

  • N0body@sh.itjust.works
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    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.

    • Kbin_space_program@kbin.social
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      My bet is that he’ll screw up on Pence. It’s a narrow target at Pence and it’s functionally the only thing he can call him out on.

      Other than Pence would lose a personality contest to Stephen Harper.

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    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?

    • HipPriest@kbin.social
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      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

    • Everythingispenguins@lemmy.world
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      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.

  • Rhoeri@lemmy.world
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    History has proven that he does. Gag orders don’t do shit to him.

    • nfh@lemmy.world
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      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.

  • erranto@lemmy.world
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    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

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      His goal was to remove trust in any institution. We are not Russia, the proper way is to let the institutions to do their work if we want to have democracy. Assassinating him would only further the distrust and make him a martyr.

        • enki@lemm.ee
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          The majority of Americans care…at least they should. Jan 6th is nothing compared to what his cultists would do if he was assassinated.

          • Honytawk@lemmy.zip
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            It would prevent him from entering in any future election though.

            And we would finally be rid of his constant antics.

            Not saying this should happen of course, but US presidents have been assassinated for less …

            • enki@lemm.ee
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              Yeah, he’d just be replaced by another MAGA figurehead. His cult needs to be deprogrammed first. There’s a bunch of 2A “good guys with guns” thinking killing liberals is the solution, and assassinating their God-Emperor is just gonna reinforce their insane beliefs.

            • enki@lemm.ee
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              What they’re already doing, but on a much larger scale…shooting up schools and gay night clubs.

    • kibiz0r@lemmy.world
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      We have an entire movement in the US that says:

      • Democracy doesn’t work, because people will never be heard through the bureaucratic institutions like the DOJ…
      • …and rule of law ought to be administered with a gun instead of a gavel.

      I don’t think you defeat that movement by assassinating its political leader. Especially out of a belief that his crimes will never be prosecuted lawfully.

    • afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world
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      This site is surprisingly tolerant of advocating murder. Thought it was supposed to be the friendly alternative to reddit. Not comments in nearly every big thread pushing for whose lives to end with violence.