WASHINGTON (AP) 鈥� The judge overseeing Donald Trump's in Florida on Tuesday to bar the former president from making public statements that could endanger law enforcement agents participating in the prosecution.
Prosecutors had told U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon that the restriction was necessary to protect law enforcement from potential threats and harassment after the presumptive Republican presidential nominee baselessly claimed that the Biden administration wanted to kill him during in Palm Beach, Florida, nearly two years ago.
Cannon chided prosecutors in her order denying their request, saying they didn鈥檛 give defense lawyers adequate time to discuss the matter before it was filed Friday evening. The judge warned prosecutors that failing to comply with court requirements in the future may lead to sanctions. She denied the request without prejudice, meaning prosecutors could file it again.
A spokesperson for special counsel Jack Smith's team declined to comment Tuesday.
The decision came as at trial in another criminal case against Trump in New York stemming from a hush money payment to a porn actor during the 2016 presidential campaign.
It鈥檚 the latest example of bitterness between Cannon, who was nominated to the bench by Trump, and prosecutors who have accused the former president of at his Mar-a-Lago estate classified documents that he took with him after he left the White House in 2021 and then obstructing the FBI鈥檚 efforts to get them back. Trump has pleaded not guilty and denied wrongdoing.
Cannon has repeatedly chided prosecutors both in hearings and in court papers over a number of matters, including telling Smith鈥檚 team during one hearing that they were Prosecutors have also signaled their frustration with Cannon鈥檚 rulings, saying in one recent court filing that a request from the judge was based on a 鈥渇undamentally flawed legal premise.鈥�
Prosecutors' request followed a distorted claim by Trump earlier this week that the FBI agents who were 鈥渁uthorized to shoot me鈥� and were 鈥渓ocked & loaded ready to take me out & put my family in danger.鈥�
The presumptive Republican presidential nominee was referring to the that the FBI, during the search in Palm Beach, Florida, followed a standard use-of-force policy that prohibits the use of deadly force except when the officer conducting the search has a reasonable belief that the 鈥渟ubject of such force poses an imminent danger of death or serious physical injury to the officer or to another person.鈥�
Prosecutors said in court papers late Friday that Trump鈥檚 false suggestion that federal agents 鈥渨ere complicit in a plot to assassinate him鈥� expose law enforcement officers 鈥渢o the risk of threats, violence, and harassment.鈥� They had urged the judge to bar Trump from making any comments that 鈥減ose a significant, imminent, and foreseeable danger to law enforcement agents鈥� participating in the case.
Defense attorneys in a court filing late Monday called prosecutors' proposed restriction on Trump's speech 鈥渦nconstitutional鈥� and noted that the identities of law enforcement officers in the case are subject to a protective order preventing their public release. Defense attorneys said they asked Smith's team on Friday if the two sides could meet on Monday before prosecutors submit their request to give the defense time to discuss it with Trump.
But prosecutor David Harbach said the situation needed to be addressed urgently, saying in an email to the defense that Trump created a situation that 鈥渘ecessitated a prompt request for relief that could not wait the weekend to file.鈥� They told the judge in their filing late Friday while Trump's lawyers didn't believe there is any 鈥渋mminent danger,鈥� Trump had continued that day to make false statements "smearing and endangering the agents who executed the search."
A spokesperson for Trump's campaign, Steven Cheung, said in a statement Tuesday that "the entire documents case was a political sham from the very beginning and it should be thrown out entirely.鈥�
It鈥檚 among four Trump is confronting as he seeks to reclaim the White House, but outside of the ongoing New York , it鈥檚 unclear that any of the other three will reach trial before the November election.
Trump has already had restrictions placed on his speech in two of the other cases over incendiary comments officials say threaten the integrity of the prosecutions.
In the New York case, and for repeatedly violating a gag order that bars him from making public statements about witnesses, jurors and some others connected to the matter.
He鈥檚 also subject to a in Washington. That order limits what he can say about witnesses, lawyers in the case and court staff, though an appeals court freed him to speak about special counsel Smith, who brought the case.
Alanna Durkin Richer, The Associated Press
