A New York City judge placed former president Donald Trump under a gag order after Trump made “disparaging” comments about a court clerk on social media.
“One of the defendants posted on [a] social-media account a disparaging, untrue, and personally identifying post about a member of my staff. Although I have since ordered the post deleted, and apparently it was, it was also emailed out to millions of other recipients,” Judge Arthur Engoron said in court on Tuesday. “Personal attacks of any member of my court staff are unacceptable, inappropriate, and I will not tolerate them.”
The presidential hopeful claimed on Truth Social that Engoron’s clerk is Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s (D., N.Y.) girlfriend. Trump posted, “Why is Judge Engoron’s Principal Law Clerk, Allison R. Greenfield, palling around with Chuck Schumer?” and said that Greenfield was “running this case against” him.
Trump is in court right now for a New York civil trial over a $250 million lawsuit filed by the state’s attorney general, Letitia James, who has accused Trump of fraudulently inflating his assets.
Embroiled in multiple lawsuits and court proceedings, it’s not the first time Trump has faced gag orders. Prosecutors asked a judge to authorize a limited gag order on Trump in his federal election-interference case last week. Trump’s “sustained campaign of prejudicial public statements regarding witnesses, the Court, the District, and prosecutors” makes such gag orders necessary, prosecutors wrote in their filing. A Georgia judge in September banned Trump from intimidating witnesses or co-defendants on social media.
The former president’s attorneys claim that lawyers are trying to muzzle Trump ahead of the 2024 presidential election.
Although almost half of Americans thought in 2021 that Trump should be permanently banned from social media, according to a Pew Research Center poll, most Republicans said that Trump should remain on social-media platforms.
“Consider this statement an order forbidding all parties from posting, emailing, or speaking publicly about any members of my staff,” Engoron said on Tuesday. “Failure to abide by this . . . will result in serious sanctions.”