Court signals it could narrow gag order in Trump election case

A federal appeals court in Washington appeared to signal at a hearing Monday it would keep in place at least some version of the gag order placed on former President Donald Trump in the criminal case accusing him of plotting to overturn the 2020 election.

But a three-judge panel of the court left open the possibility of adjusting the terms of the order or even narrowing the scope of the people covered by it, including by potentially freeing Trump to attack Jack Smith, the special counsel overseeing the federal cases against him.

The trial judge, Tanya Chutkan, imposed the gag order in October in U.S. District Court in Washington, forbidding Trump from publicly maligning any prosecutors, potential witnesses or court employees involved in the case.

But Chutkan explicitly permitted Trump to criticize the Justice Department, President Joe Biden and herself. She also allowed him to claim the prosecution itself was a partisan retaliation against him.