The judge presiding over the $250 million fraud trial against Donald Trump and his company fined the former president $10,000 on Wednesday for violating an order not to talk about his court staff.
Judge Arthur Engoron handed down the penalty after calling Trump to testify under oath about who he was talking about when he told reporters earlier in the day that the person sitting next to the judge was “very partisan.”
Trump said he was referring to the witness testifying for the New York attorney general’s office, Michael Cohen.
The judge asked if he’d previously referred to his law clerk as “partisan” and Trump said, “maybe” he had referred to her as not fair because she’s “very biased.”
But, Trump insisted, he was referring to Cohen when he told reporters earlier that Engoron is “a very partisan judge with a person who’s very partisan sitting alongside him, perhaps even much more partisan than he is.”
Engoron’s law clerk sits next to him and has been the subject of complaints from Trump’s team, including earlier Wednesday, when Trump lawyer Alina Habba asked that there be no eye-rolling or whispers from the bench during her questioning of Cohen.
Engoron said he found Trump’s testimony “not credible.” He fined Trump for violating the gag order he issued after the former president had smeared his law clerk on social media.
Trump stormed out of the courtroom a short time afterwards, after the judge denied a motion from his lawyers on a legal issue. The abrupt departure appear to catch even his attorneys by surprise.
This is the second time Engoron has fined Trump for violating the gag order.
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Engoron issued the order on the second day of the trial after Trump posted on Truth Social a different user’s Instagram post showing the law clerk at an event where she posed with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. In his post, Trump insinuated that she had a personal relationship with Schumer, and then pointed out it to reporters during a break in the trial.
“You saw what was just put out about Schumer and the principal clerk? That is disgraceful,” Trump said.
The judge ordered Trump to take the “disparaging” and “untrue” post down.
“Consider this a gag order on all parties with respect to posting or publicly speaking about any member of my staff,” Engoron said
“Personal attacks on members of my court staff are unacceptable, inappropriate and I won’t tolerate it,” he added.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
