Donald Trump May Have Already Broken His Gag Order

Donald Trump has described the gag order imposed on him by a federal judge as "a witch hunt" and his campaign denounced it as "an absolute abomination"—potentially breaking the order on the same day it was imposed.

Trump criticized the order on social media site, Truth Social.

"WILL APPEAL THE GAG ORDER RULING. WITCH HUNT!" he wrote in one post.

"A TERRIBLE THING HAPPENED TO DEMOCRACY TODAY - GAG ORDER!" he wrote in another.

A statement from his campaign also denounced the gag order.

"Today's decision is an absolute abomination and another partisan knife stuck in the heart of our Democracy by Crooked Joe Biden, who was granted the right to muzzle his political opponent, the leading candidate for the Presidency in 2024, and the most popular political leader in America, President Donald J. Trump," said a Trump spokesperson in a statement, using language strongly associated with the former president.

Trump also wrote in a fundraising email from his campaign: "THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION CAN TRY AND GAG ME, BUT THEY CAN *NEVER* GAG THE AMERICAN PEOPLE!"

Trump later took the stage at an Iowa campaign rally to again criticize the order and tell his cheering supporters that it was "so unconstitutional" and was supposed to stop him criticizing "bad people."

"Today, a judge put on a gag order. I'll be the only politician in history that runs with a gag order where I'm not allowed to criticize people. Can you imagine this? Do you believe this?" Trump told the crowd. "I'm not allowed to criticize people. So we'll see. We'll appeal it. And we'll see. But it's so unconstitutional."

Addressing the Caucus for Trump rally in Adel, Iowa, Trump also criticized "weaponized elections and all the stuff they do."

Trump has over 50 percent of Republican support in Iowa, compared with 17 percent for Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, his nearest rival for the Republican nomination, according to the latest ABC poll.

During his speech, he said he is now under more indictments than mobster Al Capone.

"I got indicted more than Alphonse Capone," Trump said, noting that for Capone: "If he didn't like you, you looked at him a little bit askance, he blew your brains out."

"He was only indicted one time, I've been indicted four times," Trump complained.

He was reacting to Judge Tanya Chutkan, who said at a federal courthouse in Washington D.C. on Monday that she would impose a partial gag order on Trump for his inflammatory comments about her, the prosecutor Jack Smith, and others involved in the case.

"I can't imagine any other criminal case where a defendant is allowed to call a prosecutor deranged or a thug," Chutkan said, referring to Trump's Truth Social post from the night before, in which both she and Smith were denounced as partisan "hacks."

Trump's presidential candidacy "does not give him carte blanche" to "encourage violence on public servants simply doing their job" the judge said.

Her order prohibits any Trump statements targeting the special counsel or his staff.

It also bans "any statement publicly targeting any of my staff or any other court personnel', noting that Trump was already under a gag order in New York for criticizing a court clerk. That case involves his alleged payment of hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels.

Chutkan said the order applies to family members as well, after Trump mentioned Jack Smith's wife in a post. She said the order was "necessary and narrowly-tailored," noting that Trump is still free to say he is being unfairly prosecuted. Chutkan also said he is free to complain about Washington D.C, a Democrat stronghold that Trump denounced as "rat-infested" in a recent post.

She said Trump's criticism of Washington D.C would undermine his arguments that he can't get a fair trial there. American courts generally do not entertain claims of jury bias if a defendant is openly criticizing the jury pool in an attempt to have a case moved or delayed.

Chutkan said Trump's attacks on D.C., which he called a "filthy and crime-ridden embarrassment to our nation" could be handled during jury screening, when attorneys ask questions of potential jurors to see if they have negative or positive feelings towards a defendant.

She also raised a Truth Social post that Trump had published at 11.30 p.m. on Sunday night, just hours before she was due to consider the gagging order.

In the post, Trump wrote: "Tomorrow is a big day for Democracy. A Leaking, Crooked and Deranged Prosecutor, Jack Smith, who has a terrible record of failure, is asking a highly partisan Obama appointed Judge, Tanya Chutkan, who should recuse herself based on the horrible things she has said, to silence me, through the use of a powerful GAG ORDER, making it impossible for me to criticize those who are doing the silencing, namely Crooked Joe Biden, and his corrupt and weaponized DOJ & FBI."

"I'm not confident that without some kind of a restriction we won't be in here all the time," Chutkan said, referencing the legal fallout that would likely occur if Trump continued to publish inflammatory posts.