Judges, do your jobs: It is time for gag orders on former President Trump.
The news media, Republican politicians and big business have all chickened out when confronted with Trump’s intimidation and threats of violence. So he keeps threatening people — bullying everyone from prosecutors and witnesses to top military officials.
After a New York judge ruled that his business may have benefited from lies about the value of his properties, Trump wrote to his supporters, assailing the judge’s ruling as driven by “anger & hatred,” not by the law. His son Eric wrote: “Never before have I seen such hatred toward one person by a judge.”
Then Trump described the New York attorney general to his followers as “the racist A.G. Letitia James.”
In August, Trump threatened a federal judge and demanded she recuse herself from overseeing a case charging him with mishandling classified documents. He posted the message, “If you go after me, I’m coming after you!”
That led a Texas woman to leave a threatening message on the judge’s voicemail. She vowed to “kill anyone” viewed as holding Trump accountable for lawbreaking.
“You are in our sights, we want to kill you,” Abigail Jo Shry of Alvin, Texas, said in the voice message. “Trump doesn’t get elected in 2024, we are coming to kill you, so tread lightly, bitch.”
Trump’s threats go beyond the courts. Last week, he insinuated that Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley should be put to death for his actions in office.
He falsely accused the general, who could be called to testify against him, of treason. He wrote that in the past, Milley’s actions (he communicated with Chinese officials in the normal course of his job) would have resulted in “punishment…DEATH!”
Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) followed up on Trump’s threats to Milley by writing that, “in a better society, quislings like…Milley would be [hanged.]”
Most famously, Trump’s inflammatory language preceded his supporters’ violent attack on the Capitol and threats to harm Vice President Mike Pence in order to stop Congress from certifying President Biden’s election.
Acting like a schoolyard bully, Trump sees threats that can lead to violence as giving him leverage over American institutions accustomed to showing deference to a former president.
The courts stand as a last line of defense. But so far, no judge has responded to his provocations with a gag order.
Judges are constrained by the free speech protections in the First Amendment. That is especially true as it applies to a candidate for the GOP’s nomination for president.
But it is also true that politicians are not entitled to operate under a different set of rules from any other American defendant.
When judges stick their heads in the sand to avoid putting a gag order on Trump, it allows him to play by a separate set of rules.
That signals that the Constitution’s promise of equal justice under the law does not apply to Trump. He has made it into a joke.
There is only one branch of government with the power to end this undermining of the law. There is only one branch of government empowered to respond to violent threats against judges, the military, law enforcement and politicians. That is the judicial branch. It is empowered to punish speech if it impedes the fair administration of American justice.
Judges must faithfully protect the legal process. By protecting the justice system from vigilantes, they protect the stability of the American system. Democracy relies upon an independent judiciary, free of intimidation.
Trump’s disrespect for the judiciary is well-documented. During the 2016 campaign, he slammed the judge presiding over the Trump University fraud trial as “Mexican,” and therefore incapable of judging the case fairly. The judge in question, Gonzalo Curiel, is as American as anyone, born in Northern Indiana to Mexican parents.
Trump’s insult to that judge and his attempt to demonize the New York attorney general both betray his willingness to use racist appeals to intimidate people of color and stop the fair application of the law.
It is the responsibility of state and federal judges presiding over Trump’s criminal and civil trials to put a stop to his loud dog whistles that could prompt supporters to engage in violence. If he does not abide by the gag order, he must be taken into custody.
Federal prosecutors have requested a gag order on Trump from Federal Judge Tanya Chutkan. They explained that the gag order is needed because “the defendant has previously issued public statements on social media regarding witnesses, judges, attorneys, and others associated with legal matters pending against him…”
The requested gag order would prohibit Trump from making statements regarding “any party, witness, attorney, court personnel, or potential jurors that are disparaging and inflammatory, or intimidating.”
The conservative editorial page of The Wall Street Journal called out Trump’s “lunacy” in an editorial last week: “We realize no one is supposed to take Trump’s words seriously, but what if some crank does and decides to shoot Gen. Milley in his retirement?” asked the Journal.
Which judge will answer history’s call and take the brave and necessary step to slap Trump with a gag order before it is too late?
Juan Williams is an author and a political analyst for Fox News Channel.