Alina Habba's Donald Trump Defense Raises Eyebrows

Alina Habba, a lawyer representing Donald Trump, has prompted criticism after suggesting that the former president sharing posts by other people on social media didn't violate a gag order in his hush money trial.

The trial, which entered its third week on Monday, centers on allegations that Trump falsified records at his company to hide the nature of payments made to Michael Cohen, his lawyer at the time, to bury allegations of extramarital sexual encounters during the 2016 presidential campaign. Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records in connection with the hush money payments and denied all wrongdoing.

Judge Juan M. Merchan fined Trump $1,000 on Monday for violating a court-imposed gag order that bars him from making public statements about witnesses, jurors and some others connected to the case. Trump was fined $9,000 last week for nine violations of the gag order.

In his sternest warning so far, Judge Merchan told Trump that future violations of the gag order could land him behind bars. "It appears that the $1,000 fines are not serving as a deterrent. Therefore going forward, this court will have to consider a jail sanction," Merchan said, according to the Associated Press. Trump's statements "threaten to interfere with the fair administration of justice and constitute a direct attack on the rule of law. I cannot allow that to continue," the judge said.

In an appearance on Fox News' Hannity, Habba said Merchan had threatened to put Trump in jail "for speaking."

"He didn't even speak frankly, Sean," she told Hannity. "He reposted things that other people said and that in itself, [the judge] called contempt. We are looking at a serious dual system of justice."

Habba has been contacted for further comment via email.

Attorneys and others on social media questioned Habba's defense.

"I guess now we know who gave him the bad legal advice that it would not be a violation," Ron Filipkowski, an attorney and the editor-in-chief of Meidas Touch, wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

Another attorney, A. J. Delgado, wrote: "I don't think she understands how this works. So if someone posts, 'We should harm the witnesses testifying against Trump,' and he RT's that... that's not a violation? It is."

Delgado added: "You don't get to harass by proxy."

Jon Favreau, host of the Pod Save America podcast and a former Barack Obama aide, wrote: "Trump's lawyer going with the ol' RTs ≠ endorsements defense."

Trump's latest gag order violation stemmed from an April 22 interview with Real America's Voice, in which he criticized the speed at which the jury was selected and claimed, without evidence, that it was "95 percent Democrats."

Five of the violations Merchan ruled on last week included Trump repeatedly posting a link to a New York Post article about Cohen on social media, The Washington Post reported.

Other violations came when Trump called Cohen a "disgraced attorney and felon" on social media and suggested he be "prosecuted for LYING." Merchant ruled he also violated the order by posting about Stormy Daniels on social media and by amplifying Fox News commentator Jesse Watters' claim that "undercover liberal activists" were lying to the judge to get on the jury.