As you’ve likely seen, Donald Trump is back in Manhattan for his supposed fraud trial, facing off against Judge Arthur Engoron and New York Attorney General Letitia James. John wrote yesterday about the sometimes chaotic interplay between Trump and the judge, and that pattern has continued. Judge Engoron claims to simply be trying to stick to standard courtroom protocols, but he has thus far seemed to be making Trump’s case for him. The former president accuses the judge of being biased against him, and Engoron has been living up to that billing. But it’s not just bias. This judge appears to be seriously unhinged and he’s actually breaking some protocols in a seeming effort to steer the proceeding in favor of the state while trying to undermine Trump’s defense. (Washington Examiner)

The scolding from Engoron began when Trump was responding to questions about his financial statements. The former president detailed how he often did not factor in his “brand” value and instead undervalued his assets, countering claims New York Attorney General Letitia James has made that he grossly exaggerated his wealth over several years.

“Did you ask for an essay on brand value?” Engoron asked James’s attorneys.

Engoron then lectured Trump and his attorneys for “editorializing” after Trump claimed he was too busy during a period in 2021 to pay close attention to financial documents because Democrats, “all Trump haters,” were targeting him then. Trump also drew the judge’s ire when he referred to the trial as “crazy.”

The choice of the word “scolding” in the excerpt above is correct. Engoron has been scolding Trump and his attorneys rather than simply delivering rulings. Before this even began he was issuing gag orders against Trump and his legal team because he clearly didn’t want them telling their side of the story. Now that Trump is taking the stand, Engoron is trying to limit him to only “yes” or “no” answers. But few questions can be that cleanly and simply addressed without applicable context. Whatever happened to the right to participate in your own defense?

It was almost amusing to watch Judge Engoron telling Trump’s lawyer to “control” him. (Good luck with that.) Most lawyers typically prefer that their clients keep their mouths closed, and I’m sure Trump’s attorneys would like that as well, but that’s just not how Donald Trump is built. When you call a defendant to the stand and put questions to them, they’re going to respond, and that may result in you getting more information than you were counting on.

Of course, the entire trial is a farce as far as I can tell, and nothing we’ve heard thus far changes that reality. Letitia James has brought fraud charges against Donald Trump without offering even a suggestion of any person or organization that was defrauded. All of the banks involved were repaid with interest and they made a tidy profit. Nobody complained. They were even given the opportunity to alter some of the claimed property values and they did so on multiple occasions. Again, if you’re going to claim that fraud took place, you need to be able to demonstrate that someone was defrauded.

Trying to silence a witness or a defendant is pretty much the exact opposite of justice. Donald Trump has the right to mount a defense against this heavily politicized attack just as much as anyone else. And mounting a defense involves bringing forward accurate information that counters the narrative of the prosecution. It seems very likely that attempting to silence Trump in this fashion will only play to his advantage as the process plays out. If Engoron rules against Trump (as has seemed likely since before this began), his team should be able to demonstrate later that he was summoned to a kangaroo court where he never stood a chance from the beginning and that a politically biased Attorney General had it out for him, working to make sure that he would be convicted of something (anything!) without bothering to worry about whether an underlying crime had taken place or not.