Just hours after a federal judge handed down a gag order which prohibits him from publicly targeting witnesses, prosecutors, and court staff, former President Donald Trump went on a tirade against the judge, likely violating the order almost immediately.
He made the comments during a campaign speech in Clive, Iowa, calling the order “totally unconstitutional” while claiming that Judge Tanya Chutkan’s “whole life is not liking me.”
Trump later said: “I am willing to go to jail if that’s what it takes for our country to win and become a democracy again.”
Chutkan officially issued the partial gag order Monday morning, which prevents him from haranguing those connected to the federal case surrounding his alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
Any violation of the order may result in sanctions—including fines, additional terms for his pre-trial release, or even incarceration.
During a fiery hearing in D.C., Chutkan unloaded on Trump for his repeated declarations that any attempt to stifle his public attacks was a violation of his First Amendment rights.
“This is not about whether I like the language Mr. Trump uses,” Chutkan said. “This is about language that presents a danger to the administration of justice.”
“His presidential candidacy does not give him carte blanche to vilify public servants who are simply doing their jobs,” she added.
Over the last few months, Trump has attacked Chutkan repeatedly by name, calling her “biased” and “Trump hating”—even threatening the day after his arraignment: “If you go after me, I’m coming after you.”
He’s also called special counsel Jack Smith, who is prosecuting the case, “deranged” and a “thug,” among other unsavory descriptors.
“When you start to use a word like ‘thug’ to describe a prosecutor doing their job, that wouldn’t be allowed by any other criminal defendant,” Chutkan said. “Just because the defendant is running a political campaign does not allow him to do whatever he wants.”
It was just one of many heated back-and-forths between Chutkan and Trump’s legal team, who at one point argued that the former president’s speech could not be constrained due to his ongoing presidential bid: “Every single issue that relates to this case also has political issues,” Trump attorney John Lauro said.
He also told Chutkan: “What you have put in place, respectfully, is working,”—a comment that elicited a round of audible laughter from the judge.
“I have to take issue with you, Mr. Lauro,” she responded.
“He does not have the right to say and do exactly what he pleases. Do you agree with that?” Chutkan asked later in the hearing.
“100 percent,” Lauro responded.
“Politics stops at this courtroom door,” Chutkan added.
Under the limited order, however, Trump will remain free to disparage the Washington D.C. jury pool, President Joe Biden and the Department of Justice, despite prosecutors lobbying for both subjects to be included in the gag order.
“If the message Mr. Trump wants to express is ‘my prosecution is politically motivated,’” he can do so without using “highly charged language,” Chutkan said.
Though the former president’s legal team did not visibly react when Monday’s gag order was handed down, CNN reports that they were “fairly jovial” upon leaving court—with one attorney loudly declaring that they would have to call Trump to tell him the news.
A Trump spokesperson later called the decision “an absolute abomination,” claiming it was “another partisan knife struck 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.”
