Prosecutors say Trump gag order needed in 2020 election subversion case because he’s targeting potential witnesses again
By Hannah Rabinowitz, CNN
(CNN) — Prosecutors with special counsel Jack Smith’s team urged a federal judge on Wednesday to reinstate the gag order she issued on Donald Trump in the former president’s 2020 election subversion criminal case, citing his social media posts railing against a potential trial witness: Trump’s former chief of staff.
US District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who is overseeing the case, issued a limited gag order on the former president last week, restricting Trump’s ability to publicly target court personnel, potential witnesses, the special counsel and his staff.
Trump has appealed the order, and Chutkan issued a short administrative stay while Smith’s team and Trump’s attorneys litigate whether the order should be paused indefinitely while the appeals process plays out.
In a filing Wednesday evening, prosecutors asked Chutkan to end that stay, arguing that Trump has already resumed posting about potential witnesses in the case on his social media accounts.
“In the few days since the administrative stay has been in place, the defendant has returned to the very sort of targeting that the Order prohibits, including attempting to intimidate and influence foreseeable witnesses, and commenting on the substance of their testimony,” prosecutors wrote.
In one such post highlighted by prosecutors, Trump addressed reports that former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows is cooperating with Smith’s investigation.
“I don’t think Mark Meadows would lie about the Rigged and Stollen 2020 Presidential Election merely for getting IMMUNITY against Prosecution (PERSECUTION!) by Deranged Prosecutor, Jack Smith,” Trump wrote in the post.
The post continued, “Some people would make that deal, but they are weaklings and cowards, and so bad for the future our Failing Nation. I don’t think that Mark Meadows is one of them, but who really knows? MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!”
Trump used the post, prosecutors wrote, to “capitalize” on the gag order’s pause and to “send an unmistakable and threatening message to a foreseeable witness in this case.”
Prosecutors also urged Chutkan to “clarify” Trump’s release conditions to make clear that prohibitions on his communications with potential witnesses in the case includes “indirect messages to witnesses made publicly on social media or in speeches.”
Smith’s team argued that the order still leaves Trump “entirely free” to criticize the prosecution as unfair or political, and that the former president merely wants to “continue using disparaging and inflammatory language that would never be put in a court filing.”
“His failure to explain why such language is necessary only supports the inference that his objections to the Order do not stem from a legitimate concern with informing the public about his positions (which he is free to do), but rather with retaining his ability to target his perceived adversaries in a way that will foreseeably subject them to harassment, intimidation, and threat,” they said.
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