Trump’s Free Speech Faces Court-ordered Limits A 90-minute court hearing on Aug. 11, 2023, that would have been routine in almost any other case was, in fact, historic. It was the first time lawyers prosecuting and defending former President Donald Trump on charges he attempted to overturn the 2020 election appeared before the federal judge in the case.
At issue in the hearing before Judge Tanya Chutkan were public statements about what in legal terms is called “discovery” – defined by the American Bar Association as “the formal process of exchanging information between the parties about the witnesses and evidence they will present at trial.” Prosecutors from the Department of Justice wanted Chutkan Trump’s Free Speech Faces Court-ordered Limits to bar Trump and his lawyers from releasing or commenting publicly on those materials with something called a “protective order,” because public comments could end up intimidating witnesses or tainting the pool of potential jurors. Trump’s lawyers said any limit on the right to speak about the documents violated Trump’s free speech rights.
Chutkan told Trump’s lawyers she would impose limits on what he could say. “I caution you and your client to take special care in your public statements in this case,” she said. “I will take whatever measures are necessary to protect the integrity of these proceedings.” The Conversation’s senior politics and society editor, Naomi Schalit, interviewed attorneys Thomas A. Durkin and Joseph Ferguson, law professors at Loyola University, Chicago, about the hearing.
Do people lose their First Amendment rights when they are criminally indicted?
Durkin: You don’t really lose your rights, but the discovery process requires certain restrictions on what you can do with what are essentially Belize WhatsApp Number List government documents and information. So I’m not sure that’s a restriction of the First Amendment. You have put the constraint on yourself.
This is not a limitation on Trump’s standing free speech rights. They are not absolute and must operate within the confines of the competing interest of justice in this case. The initial reports are that the judge has made clear that justice trumps other considerations.
What did the judge say?
Ferguson: The judge has signaled that Trump’s rights as a criminal defendant are subject to the rules of the court. This will frame all subsequent decisions.
I recently said that it seemed to me Trump was looking for a mouthpiece and not a lawyer. And I think there is a fear, as Joe says, of the cphonenumber client dictating to the lawyers what to do. A lot of people have commented publicly how unprofessional the quotes of many of his lawyers seem to be and that they seem to be sometimes making. They don’t seem to be very experienced in dealing with the press.