Manhattan prosecutors are urging the judge overseeing Donald Trump’s criminal trial to maintain a gag order that bars the former president from criticizing jurors, court staff or members of the prosecution who convicted him.
They agreed that a provision of the silence order, which prevented Donald Trump from attacking trial witnesses in the case, could be lifted.
In court papers filed Friday, prosecutors from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office argued that parts of the silencing order remained necessary given Trump’s “peculiar history of making inflammatory and threatening public statements.” as well as his supporters’ efforts to “identify jurors and threaten them with violence.”
“Since the verdict in this case, the defendant has not excused jurors from his alarming rhetoric that he would have every right to seek retaliation as president against participants in this trial following his conviction, because sometimes revenge can be justified,” the filing states.
The silence order since March prohibited Donald Trump from making or ordering others to make public statements about witnesses, jurors and others connected to the case.
He does not, however, restrict comments on the judge, Juan M. Merchan, or on the Manhattan District Attorney, Alvin Bragg, who is prosecuting the case.
Donald Trump’s lawyers asked the judge to lift the order following his trial, which ended last month with his conviction on 34 counts of falsifying documents to cover up a potential sex scandal . The famous defendant, who has denied any wrongdoing, is due to stand trial on July 11.
Defense lawyers argue the ex-president should be free to speak publicly about the trial as he campaigns to try to return to the White House, pointing to comments made by President Joe Biden and continued public criticism of his ex-lawyer Michael Cohen and pornographic actress Stormy Daniels, both of whom are key witnesses in the case.
“Now that the trial has concluded, the concerns expressed by the Government and the Court do not justify continued restrictions on First Amendment rights,” Donald Trump’s lawyers wrote earlier this month.
In their letter, prosecutors argued that the provision barring statements about witnesses at trial no longer needs to be enforced.
They said restrictions on statements about prosecutors in the case – with the exception of Mr Bragg – as well as court staff and their family members should remain in place.
Judge Merchan is expected to make his decision soon, perhaps even before the debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden, scheduled for June 27.
Earlier this week, New York’s highest court declined to hear Donald Trump’s appeal of the silencing order, ruling that it did not raise “substantial” constitutional questions that would warrant immediate intervention.