Everything happening in/around the courtroom of Judge Engoron in New York City has been ridiculous in the extreme.
Even left leaning pundits and political commentators have begun to retreat from the fevered pace of the NY civil case because they can see the appeals court intervening.
Yesterday appellate judge David Friedman finally intervened in the insufferable gag order and put some common sense back into the case putting a stay on the lower court order.
NEW YORK (AP) — A gag order that barred Donald Trump from commenting about court personnel after he disparaged a law clerk in his New York civil fraud trial was temporarily lifted Thursday by an appellate judge who raised free speech concerns.
Judge David Friedman of the state’s intermediate appeals court issued what’s known a stay — suspending the gag order and allowing the former president to freely comment about court staff while a longer appeals process plays out.
The trial judge, Arthur Engoron, imposed the gag order on Oct. 3 after Trump made a false comment about the judge’s law clerk on social media. He later fined Trump $15,000 for violations and expanded it to his lawyers after they questioned the clerk’s prominent role in the trial.
Ruling at an emergency hearing Thursday, Friedman questioned Engoron’s authority to police Trump’s speech outside the courtroom — such as his frequent gripes about the case on social media and in comments to TV cameras in the courthouse hallway.
Friedman said that while it’s true that judges often issue gag orders, they’re mostly used in criminal cases where there’s a fear that comments about the case could influence the jury. Trump’s civil trial doesn’t have a jury.
Trump lawyer Christopher Kise said after Friedman ruled that the appellate judge “made the right decision and allowed President Trump to take full advantage of his constitutional First Amendment rights to talk about bias in his own trial, what he’s seeing and witnessing in his own trial — which, frankly, everyone needs to see.”
Another Trump attorney, Alina Habba, indicated she has no plans to advise the former president to stay quiet about the clerk. (read more)
The temporary pause in Engoron’s gag orders comes as a separate, more sweeping gag order on Trump in his criminal case in Washington, D.C. has also been lifted pending oral arguments before an appeals court scheduled for Monday.
