On Tuesday, the Manhattan judge overseeing former President Donald Trump’s New York hush money trial issued a written order holding Trump in contempt, threatening jail time if the former president violates his gag order again.
In the order from New York Judge Juan Merchan, he wrote that action needed to be taken to reprimand Trump for violating the gag order in his trial.
“While $1,000 may suffice in most instances to protect the dignity of the judicial system, to compel respect for its mandates, and to punish the offender for disobeying a court order, it, unfortunately, will not achieve the desired result in those instances where the contemnor can easily afford such a fine,” Merchan wrote. “In those circumstances, it would be preferable if the Court could impose a fine more commensurate with the wealth of the contemnor. In some cases, that might be a $2,500 fine, in other cases it might be a fine of $150,000.”
However, Merchan continued by saying that New York law does not give him “discretion” to impose higher fines against Trump for violating his gag order, so his only option would be to “consider whether, in some instances, jail may be a necessary punishment.”
Merchan continued, saying in the order that the “defendant is hereby warned that the Court will not tolerate continued willful violations of its lawful orders and that if necessary and appropriate under the circumstances, it will impose an incarceratory punishment.”
This means Trump could soon find himself making more history as the first president, sitting or former, to spend time behind bars.
The order listed nine posts that Trump has made on social media and his campaign website that violate his gag order, mandating that he has until 2:15 p.m. EST to take them down or else face his punishment.