WASHINGTON (AP) — The judge overseeing Donald Trump’s classified Florida documents case denied prosecutors’ request Tuesday to bar the former president from making public comments that could endanger law enforcement agencies involved in the prosecution.
U.S. District Judge Eileen Cannon said in her order that prosecutors on Special Prosecutor Jack Smith’s team did not give the defense sufficient time to discuss the request before it was filed Friday evening. She denied the request without prejudice, meaning prosecutors can file again.
The request comes in response to Trump’s distorted claim last week that FBI agents who searched his Mar-a-Lago property in August 2022 were “authorized to shoot me,” were “prepared to take me out and put my family in danger” and were locked out. It follows. .”
The presumptive Republican presidential nominee cited the release of court documents showing that the FBI followed its standard use-of-force policy during searches in Palm Beach, Florida, which prohibits officers from using deadly force except when conducting searches. If there is a reasonable belief that “the subject of such force creates an imminent risk of death or serious bodily injury to the officer or to any other person.”
Prosecutors said in court documents late Friday that Trump’s statements falsely implying that federal agents were involved in a plot to assassinate him expose law enforcement officials. Prosecutors said some of them would be called as witnesses at his trial. , violence, harassment.”
Trump faces dozens of felony charges for allegedly illegally storing confidential documents from his Mar-a-Lago estate and interfering with FBI efforts to retrieve them after he left the White House in 2021. He pleaded not guilty and denied the crime.
It is one of four criminal cases Trump is facing in his bid to reclaim the White House, but it is unclear whether any of the remaining three will go to trial before the November election, other than the ongoing hush-money prosecution in New York.
Trump has already imposed restrictions on his speech in two other cases where he made incendiary remarks that officials said threatened prosecutorial integrity.
In the New York case, Trump was fined and sentenced to prison for repeatedly violating a gag order banning witnesses, jurors and others from speaking publicly about the case.
