Manhattan prosecutors asked the judge overseeing Donald Trump's hush money criminal case to "clarify or confirm" a gag order issued this week to determine whether it prohibits the former president from attacking the judge's adult daughter.
Assistant District Attorney Joshua Steinglass sent the letter to New York Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan after Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, accused the judge's daughter of posting a picture of him in jail and being connected to President Joe Biden and other Democrats, the Associated Press reported Friday.
A court official has said the posting was wrongly attributed to Loren Merchan.
"As a result, this Court should make abundantly clear that the March 26 Order protects family members of the Court, the District Attorney, and all other individuals mentioned in the Order. Furthermore, the Court should warn defendant that his recent conduct is contumacious and direct him to immediately desist," the letter said.
Merchan's order from Tuesday does not mention himself or his family. Neither does it include Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
Trump's lawyers, who have defended Trump's comments in the past as protected by the First Amendment, said the gag order does not specify family members so Trump's posting didn't violate the order.
"The Court cannot 'direct' President Trump to do something that the gag order does not require," lawyers Todd Blanche and Susan Necheles wrote to Merchan. "To 'clarify or confirm' the meaning of the gag order in the way the People suggest would be to expand it."
Trump's trial is scheduled to begin April 15.
Prosecutors said he falsified payment records to hide a $130,000 hush money payment to former porn star Stormy Daniels shortly before the 2016 election to buy for her silence about an affair she said with him a decade earlier.
