Trump blasts N.Y. judge, his gag order

NEW YORK — Donald Trump lashed out Wednesday at the New York judge who put him under a gag order ahead of his April 15 hush-money criminal trial, suggesting that the veteran jurist was kowtowing to his daughter’s interests as a Democratic political consultant. The former president objected in particular to what he claimed was her posting of a social media photo showing him behind bars.

Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, complained on social media that the gag order issued Tuesday was “illegal, un-american, un-constitutional.”

He said Judge Juan Merchan was “wrongfully attempting to deprive me of my First Amendment Right to speak out against the Weaponization of Law Enforcement” by Democratic rivals and urged him to step aside from the case.

The gag order, which prosecutors had requested, bars Trump from either making or directing other people to make public statements on his behalf about jurors and potential witnesses in the hush-money trial, such as his lawyer turned nemesis Michael Cohen and porn star Stormy Daniels. It also prohibits any statements meant to interfere with or harass the court’s staff, prosecution team or their families.

It does not bar comments about Merchan or his family, nor does it prohibit criticism of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, the elected Democrat whose office is prosecuting Trump.

Merchan’s daughter, whose firm has worked on campaigns for President Joe Biden and other Democrats, “makes money by working to ‘Get Trump,’” and recently posted a fake photo on social media depicting her “obvious goal” of seeing him behind bars, Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. He argued those circumstances make it “completely impossible for me to get a fair trial.”