Former United States President and Republican front-runner Donald Trump on Wednesday (Oct 25) was abruptly and briefly called to the witness stand and fined $10,000 after allegedly breaking a gag order and seemingly passing critical comments at a law clerk.
This was the second time that the former president was penalised for his out-of-court comments amid the ongoing fraud trial where Trump and his two eldest sons Donald Jr and Eric have been accused of inflating the value of the assets of the Trump Organization to receive more favourable bank loans and insurance terms.
What happened?
Judge Arthur Engoron who is presiding over Trump’s civil fraud trial imposed another fine on the former president after summoning him from the defence table to testify about the comments he made to reporters hours earlier during a break about “a person who’s very partisan sitting alongside” the judge.
The remarks were seen as a violation of the partial gag order issued three weeks ago. This comes after the judge had already ordered all participants in the trial not to comment publicly about his staff.
The latest fine came after Trump said Engoron is a “very partisan judge with a person who’s very partisan sitting alongside him, perhaps even much more partisan than he is.” The former president and his lawyers insisted the comment was about Michael Cohen, a former Trump attorney who had been testifying.
However, the judge said that “the defendant was not credible” before imposing a fine. Subsequently, according to AFP, Trump abruptly left the courtroom. The former president has also repeatedly called Engoron, calling him a “Trump-hating judge.”
About the partial gag order
The gag order was issued after Trump on October 3 insulted the judge’s principal law clerk in a post on his Truth Social platform. The offensive post has since been removed from the social media platform for which the former president was fined $5,000 last week.
Notably, the partial gag order does not stop the former president from attacking the judge but only orders a halt to attacks on court staff. On the witness stand, Trump told the judge that the remark was aimed at “you and Cohen,” as per the Associated Press.
He added, “I think she’s very biased against us. I think we’ve made that clear,” said Trump during his roughly two minutes on the stand, while referring to the clerk. Lawyers from the former president’s legal team have since objected to the $10,000 fine.
The trial springs up from a lawsuit by Democratic New York Attorney General Letitia James which claimed that Trump boosted the value of his properties by billions of dollars in statements to banks to ensure more promising loan terms.
(With inputs from agencies)
