General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: One way Judge Merchan could handle sentencing: [View all]onenote
(46,151 posts)The transcript from Friday May 3 can be found here: https://static01.nyt.com/newsgraphics/documenttools/911fffbad09d3299/2fcaff60-full.pdf
The index indicates the pages where the gag order and the issue of Trump testifying is discussed: Pages 2035 - 2047 and 2243 - 2246.
That discussion focuses first on the scope of the gag order -- this is where the judge reminds Trump that the gag order doesn't prevent him from testifying. It then returns to the issue at the end of the day where the judge considers whether, if Trump testifies, the prosecution can bring up the court's ruling finding nine instances of Trump having committed gag order violations. This was before the court's ruling on Monday, May 6, finding one more violation and clarifying the scope of the gag order. The issue is whether evidence of the court's orders should be allowed as a means of attacking Trumps credibility as a witness or whether it would be unduly prejudicial to allow the jury to be told about those orders. Judge Merchan sided with the defense and declared that the prosecution, on cross if Trump testified, could not ask him about the contempt rulings.
At no point is there any suggestion that there are additional instances of contempt not addressed by the prior order finding nine violations and as previosly discussed, on May 6, the day the court ruled on the one remaining alleged violation, there was no discussion of any other alleged violations
And for what its worth, I did a word search of the transcripts for every day of the trial from May 3 until the end and there is no such allegation in any of those transcripts.