The left-wing district judge in charge of overseeing the Biden administration’s criminal prosecution against former President Donald Trump over his First Amendment right to claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen confirmed to her court on Friday that the Republican’s third presidential campaign is subject to interference by her and federal prosecutors.
Tanya Chutkan, the U.S. District Judge in Washington D.C., not only admitted during proceedings that she finds the pure existence of Trump’s 2024 run a threat to the government’s Jan. 6 case against him but also that she has no issues legally curbing his speech on the campaign trail.
“What the defendant is currently doing — the fact that he’s running a political campaign has to yield to the orderly administration of justice. If that means he can’t say exactly what he wants to say about witnesses in this case, that’s how it has to be,” the Obama appointee said in comments transcribed by reporters.
Trump has repeatedly labeled the cases against him, including the most recent conspiracy and obstruction charges from Special Counsel Jack Smith, as an attempt to interfere in the 2024 election.
“When you look at what’s happening, this is a persecution of a political opponent,” Trump said as he departed Washington D.C. last week after pleading not guilty.
“This is the persecution of the person that is leading by very, very substantial numbers in the Republican primary and leading Biden by a lot. So if you can’t beat him, you persecute him
