Here’s the latest on the hearing.
Federal prosecutors and lawyers for former President Donald J. Trump will square off on Monday over whether a gag order should be put on Mr. Trump to restrict his often threatening statements about his federal indictment on charges of conspiring to overturn the 2020 election.
Gag orders limiting what trial participants can say outside of court are not uncommon. But Mr. Trump’s status as the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination, and his decision to portray the gag order request as part of an effort by the Biden administration to stifle a political rival, makes this request by prosecutors especially fraught and complex.
The prosecution and defense are scheduled to gather at 10 a.m. in Federal District Court in Washington. They will argue their positions on the order to Judge Tanya S. Chutkan, who was assigned to the case when Mr. Trump was charged in August. It is possible Judge Chutkan could rule from the bench by the end of the hearing.
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Judge Chutkan will have to choose how to enforce a gag order if she imposes one, and how that looks is unclear. The penalties could include fines or even jail time.
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The prosecutors working for the special counsel, Jack Smith, first proposed putting a limited gag order on Mr. Trump last month, asserting that his “near-daily” social media attacks on people involved in the case were a menace to witnesses and threatened to taint the pool of jurors who would ultimately sit in judgment of the former president.
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Some of the former president’s more outrageous statements seem to have had real-world consequences. One day after he posted a message on his social media platform that read, “IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I’M COMING AFTER YOU!” a Texas woman left a voice mail message for Judge Chutkan, saying, “If Trump doesn’t get elected in 2024, we are coming to kill you, so tread lightly.” The woman has since been arrested.
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Mr. Trump’s lawyers have reacted with outrage to the gag order request, saying that any attempt to “muzzle” him during his presidential campaign would grossly violate his First Amendment rights. “The prosecution would silence President Trump, amid a political campaign where his right to criticize the government is at its zenith, all to avoid a public rebuke of this prosecution,” one of the lawyers, Gregory M. Singer, wrote.
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Mr. Trump was placed under a very limited gag order early this month by the New York State judge overseeing his civil trial in Manhattan, where he is accused of inflating the value of his properties. That order restricts Mr. Trump from speaking about any people who work on the judge’s staff. The order Judge Chutkan is considering could be significantly broader.
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