Trump campaign blasts DOJ gag order during New York fraud trial

The Trump campaign sent a fundraising email blast Wednesday criticizing the Department of Justice (DOJ) for its request to place a gag order on former President Trump — a separate attempt to bar him from intimidating witnesses and those overseeing the case than the one a judge in New York placed on all parties a day earlier.

Trump’s campaign has embarked on a coordinated effort to counterprogram his legal problems while he sits in a New York courtroom this week in a fraud trial involving the illegal inflation of the value of some of his most famed properties, part of a sprawling business empire that helped catapult him to fame and ultimately to the White House in 2016.

But several other cases loom, including a federal indictment over his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss at the center of the fundraising email.

“A sham trial in New York was not enough to satisfy these tyrants’ thirst for power. Now the Biden Department of Justice is once again requesting a gag order against me,” the email from the campaign read that later asks for donations.

“In other words, in just a few short weeks, Crooked Joe’s weaponized DOJ may very well get away with stripping Biden’s leading opponent (ME) of his First Amendment right to freedom of speech in the 2024 presidential election.”

The campaign email was citing a DOJ request last month to limit what Trump can say publicly. Prosecutors in seeking the request cited Trump’s history of attacking those who “present an obstacle” to him.

The federal case centers on Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election as well as his role on Jan. 6, 2021. Trump has frequently targeted the judge in that case despite warnings not to intimidate witnesses, prompting the gag order request by the DOJ. A hearing on that gag order is scheduled for Oct. 16.

Meanwhile, Trump is marking his third day in a row sitting at a defendants desk at the New York Supreme Court, where tensions are running high during cross-examination of the Trump Organization’s accountant Donald Bender, who has been on the stand since Monday.

The New York case involves an investigation of financial statements prepared by the company that falsely overvalued some of Trump’s properties, including Trump Tower in New York and Mar-a-Lago in Florida, in order to secure business loans and insurance policies on better terms.

Trump drew the ire Tuesday of New York Judge Arthur Engoron after a Truth Social post went up that took aim at the judge’s principal clerk while she was sitting a few feet away in the courtroom.

The trial judge, without naming Trump, addressed the court on the matter, saying “one of the defendants” posted a “disparaging, untrue and personally identifying post” about his staff, and though the judge ordered it deleted, it had been emailed out to “millions of other recipients.”

“Personal attacks on members of my court staff are not appropriate, and I will not tolerate it under any circumstance,” Engoron said.