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N.Y. judge issues a limited gag order on Trump ahead of hush money trial

NPR | By Ximena Bustillo
Published March 26, 2024 at 4:14 PM EDT
Former President Donald Trump speaks to the press in a hallway outside the courtroom at the end of a hearing to determine the date of his trial for allegedly covering up hush money payments linked to extramarital affairs, at Manhattan Criminal Court in New York City on March 25.
Justin Lane
/
Pool/AFP via Getty Images
Former President Donald Trump speaks to the press in a hallway outside the courtroom at the end of a hearing to determine the date of his trial for allegedly covering up hush money payments linked to extramarital affairs, at Manhattan Criminal Court in New York City on March 25.

A New York judge has issued a new gag order on former President Donald Trump that specifically bars him from making public statements about witnesses, prosecutors or jurors in his first criminal trial.

The gag order also prevents Trump from directing others to make public statements about potential jurors, court staff or family members of staff.

This decision was made in response to a request for an order by District Attorney Alvin Bragg's legal team to limit extrajudicial statements made specifically by Trump for the duration of the trial.

The decision comes a day after a new date was set to begin the criminal trial, which is now expected to kick off with jury selection on April 15. It would be the first criminal trial featuring a former or sitting U.S. president.

Trump has previously been issued fines in civil trials in New York for making public statements about legal staff and their political affiliations that violated other gag orders. Earlier in the day, Trump went after the judge, Juan Merchan, and his daughter, on the former president's social media site, accusing them of political bias.

Last April Trump pleaded not guilty to a 34-count indictment accusing him of multiple counts of falsifying business records to keep an alleged affair secret at the end of the 2016 campaign.

Copyright 2024 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

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Ximena Bustillo
Ximena Bustillo is a multi-platform reporter at NPR covering politics out of the White House and Congress on air and in print.
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