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GOP
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There wasn't much Trump legal news of interest on Tuesday, but Judge Tanya Chutkan did issue the written version of the gag order she imposed on the former president on Monday. You can read it here, if you wish (it's only three pages).
Despite intimating that the order would spell out the penalties for any violations, it does not do so. And so, we will not learn the answer to that question until Trump crosses the line. As he is clearly getting angrier and angrier with Chutkan, we presume it's only a matter of time. And there are many others who agree with us (see here, here, here and here for examples).
Also, as long as we are on the subject, Rolling Stone had an interesting piece yesterday on Trump's legal "strategy" in his ongoing New York fraud case. Truth be told, the subhead pretty much tells the tale, so here it is:
There's no chance of actually winning on the merits. So Trump and his lawyers are hoping to score some PR points, kick up as much dirt as possible, enrage the judge, trash some of the witnesses, and turn the process into a media circus.
In the body of the article, the authors talk about how Trump's lawyers are deliberately asking questions they are not supposed to ask, are dragging things out by being extra verbose and by repeating themselves, and are just generally doing a bunch of things that officers of the court are not supposed to do. Defense counsel has already been fined $7,500, and there's every chance that bigger penalties could be headed down the pike, including much larger fines, time in jail for contempt of court and, according to some experts, potential disbarment. It continues to boggle the mind how good Trump is at finding people willing to risk utter ruin on his behalf. (Z)