Bloomberg News’ Zoe Tillman reports: “Lauro keeps calling this ‘censorship,’ and Chutkan stops him: There is no question that a court is entitled to draw restrictions on a def’s behavior and a def’s speech pending trial. You keep taking about censorship like the def has unfettered First Amendment rights. He doesn’t.”
At one point Judge Chutkan appeared to quote England’s King Henry II.
Tillman writes: “Judge says, ‘would no one rid me of this troublesome priest’ comes to mind re: Trump’s repeated attacks on Jack Smith, calling him a ‘thug’ — she asks, doesn’t that suggest someone should get him off the street? Lauro disputes there’s proof of any imminent risk.”
Deadline’s Ted Johnson reports after Judge Chutkan read “Trump’s post on Mark Milley, suggesting that he should be executed,” Lauro “insist[ed] that Trump was not suggesting that Milley should be executed.”
Johnson adds Chutkan’s response: “Chutkan: What he’s not entitled to say that that punishment in days gone by ‘would be punishable by death.’ She does not appear to be buying Lauro’s argument that he was not suggesting that.”
Lauro also pledged to appeal enforcement of a gag order, and claimed Trump has made “no threats, nothing that amounts to intimidation.”
“Judge: laughs out loud. … Politics stops at this courthouse door …” Parloff writes.
Parloff also offered this exchange between Judge Chutkan and John Lauro:
Judge: in what kind of case is it appropriate for criminal defendant to call prosecutor a 'thug' and stay on the streets.
— Roger Parloff (@rparloff) October 16, 2023
L: whether it's language i would use–
J: i'm asking in normal prosecution would def be allowed to call prosecutor a thug?
L: this is not a normal case
/21