Episode description

Donald Trump withdrew his lawsuit against Michael Cohen so he wouldn’t have to sit for a deposition on the holiday, but Columbus Day didn’t stop us from bringing you a new episode of Serious Trouble. This week, we look at Trump’s first gag order: The former president’s gratuitous social media attacks against Judge Arthur Engoron’s law clerk enraged the judge and led him to order Trump (and also the other parties in the New York AG’s civil fraud lawsuit) not to publicly criticize his staff. We also talk about scheduling. Trump has asked Judge Aileen Cannon to delay his criminal trial in the documents case, which is currently set for May. We talk about defamation litigation — Rudy Giuliani is suing Joe Biden for calling him a Russian pawn, a California college student is suing Elon Musk for accusing him of being a fake white nationalist, and a Georgia voter is suing Dinesh D’Souza for calling him a ballot mule. And we look briefly at the Georgia RICO case, where one minor defendant is pleading guilty and cooperating — though it remains to be seen how that will effect the cases DA Fani Willis can present against more prominent defendants.

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