Oct. 18, 2023 - Epoch Times
09:32
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| Good evening, and right before we dive into the main story, I'll quickly mention that if you are just sick and tired of all the censorship on this platform, as well as all the other beautiful platforms out there, and if you're looking for a source of actual honest news, well, consider checking out the Epoch Times, because we've recently extended our awesome sale on subscriptions, just 25 cents a week for the whole year, which, if you do the math, works itself out to just be a single dollar a month. | |
| And so if you're indeed looking for a source of honest news, which oftentimes goes completely under the radar of the legacy news outlets, well, consider trying a subscription for yourself. | |
| I'll throw a link to the sale page. | |
| It'll be right there at the very top of the description box below. | |
| I hope you check it out. | |
| Now, diving into the main topic, this man right here is Donald Trump, the 45th president of the U.S., as well as the current frontrunner of the Republican primary. | |
| He is, of course, also the man currently facing 91 charges across four different criminal lawsuits. | |
| However, unlike many other people who face federal charges and find themselves at the whims of the Department of Justice, President Trump has two things that most people don't. | |
| For one, he has a lot of money, as well as millions of supporters who are willing to donate money to his legal fund. | |
| And secondly, he has a large public platform that he can use to rail against the prosecution. | |
| These two things, the platform and the money, are essentially his counterbalance to the Biden administration's Department of Justice. | |
| And that might be exactly why the courts are attempting to strip away those two very things. | |
| Now, in a previous episode, we already went through point by point how a judge here in the state of New York ordered the dissolution of President Trump's real estate empire by stripping him of the necessary licenses that he needs to operate those particular businesses. | |
| Now, President Trump is currently in the process of appealing that decision, and if you want to dive deeper into it, well, I'll throw a link to the episode where we explain this case in much greater depth right there in the top right corner. | |
| However, right now, the courts are working to strip away the second element that Trump possesses, his large platform. | |
| Because you see, just yesterday, President Trump was over in the state of Iowa giving a campaign rally speech wherein this is part of what he said. | |
| Quote, They have weaponized the Justice Department. | |
| This is like a banana republic. | |
| But it's going to be okay. | |
| The good news is I'm the only one that's ever been indicted where the poll numbers went through the roof because the people understand it. | |
| He then went on in his speech to explain exactly why he decided to challenge the 2020 election results. | |
| For anyone who's been at a Trump rally or seen his speeches over the past year, this was pretty standard fare. | |
| However, something unusual happened yesterday. | |
| Shortly after giving the speech over in the state of Iowa, President Trump was hit with a gag order. | |
| Specifically, This was a gag order requested by Special Counsel Jack Smith. | |
| He is the federal prosecutor pushing forward the January 6th election case over in Washington, D.C. And in this request, in this gag order request, Jack Smith asked the court to, quote, limit what President Trump can say about the prosecutors, potential witnesses, and about the case itself, arguing that with his wide reach online, he could influence jurors in his favor. | |
| However, there was something else inside of this request here which gave us, meaning the public at large, a bit of a peek behind the curtain. | |
| That's because, besides just the witnesses, the prosecutors, and the case itself, Jack Smith was also arguing that, quote, President Trump should be prohibited from making disparaging remarks about Joe Biden. | |
| I repeat, the prosecutor in this case was not only trying to stop President Trump from speaking publicly about the case, but he was also trying to prevent President Trump from being able to say anything negative about Joe Biden, even though Joe Biden has nothing to do with the case. | |
| He's not a witness, nor is he a juror. | |
| And yet, for some reason, leading up to the 2024 election, Jack Smith made the attempt to place a gag order on President Trump, stopping him from being able to lobby any criticism at Joe Biden. | |
| Makes you wonder what this is really all about. | |
| Regardless though, the judge in the case, who for your reference is Judge Tanya Chutkin, she only accepted part of Jack Smith's request. | |
| Specifically, on Monday, which was of course just yesterday, she issued this gag order right here prohibiting President Trump from quote: "Making any public statements, or directing others to make any public statements, that target for one, the special counsel prosecuting this case or his staff, secondly, the defense counsel or their staff, thirdly, any of this court's staff or other the defense counsel or their staff, thirdly, any of this court's staff or other supporting personnel, or fourthly, any reasonably foreseeable witness or the Meaning that if anyone is involved in this case, such as the prosecutor, Mr. | |
| Jack Smith, or anyone they decide to call on as a witness, President Trump is no longer allowed to criticize them publicly. | |
| However, the judge did reject the request to stop President Trump from being able to criticize the federal government or the Biden administration more broadly. | |
| Here is specifically what she wrote in her order in this particular respect. | |
| This order shall not be construed to prohibit President Trump from making statements criticizing the government generally, including the current administration or the Department of Justice, statements asserting that the defendant is innocent of the charges against him, or that his prosecution is politically motivated. | |
| Meaning that while the judge did grant the gag order, she only granted it in part. | |
| She rejected Jack Smith's attempt to stop President Trump from being able to criticize the Biden administration leading up to the 2024 election. | |
| Now, on the one hand, you can see the rationale for a gag order like this. | |
| It's done to stop President Trump from influencing the jury pool. | |
| Meaning that Jack Smith and his team are supposedly worried about the statement that Trump releases on a social media platform, Truth Social, regarding this particular case because It could impact the jurors who are deciding the case. | |
| For instance, in a recent post over on Truth Social, President Trump referred to Prosecutor Jack Smith as being quote-unquote deranged. | |
| And so Jack Smith made the argument that President Trump needs to have a gag order placed on him ASAP before the jury pool gets contaminated by reading too many posts from Truth Social. | |
| But the irony of that argument is that this trial is taking place over in the city of Washington, D.C., with a Washington, D.C. jury pool. | |
| And just for reference, in the last presidential election, Washington, D.C. voted 92% for Joe Biden and only about 5% for Trump. | |
| Furthermore, there was a recent poll that was conducted by Emerson College Polling, and they found that among Washington, D.C. potential jurors, 60 to 68% of them said that they would find Trump guilty if they were on the jury, meaning that without seeing any evidence, The overwhelming majority of the jury pool already thinks that Trump is guilty. | |
| In that same pool, by the way, it found that only 69% of the potential jurors would provide a presumption of innocence before hearing the evidence. | |
| And so, the irony here is that while Jack Smith and his team are making the argument That this gag order is a necessity in order to prevent the jury pool from getting tainted. | |
| Well, the reality is that the people over in Washington, D.C. are not logging into Truth Social. | |
| They're not following President Trump on his personal social media platform or listening to his campaign speeches over in Iowa. | |
| But Jack Smith is likely correct that the jury pool is indeed tainted, although not in the way that he implies. | |
| Regardless, though, the judge in the case, she agreed with Jack Smith, and President Trump does in fact have a gag order placed on him regarding this particular case as of yesterday. | |
| And last night, once the news of this gag order was made public, which happened shortly after his speech over in Iowa, President Trump issued a statement over on Truth Social writing this in part, quote, Terrible thing happened today. | |
| Gag order. | |
| We'll appeal that gag order ruling. | |
| Witch hunt. | |
| And so, the appeal process will now likely begin. | |
| Regardless, if you suddenly notice that President Trump is no longer mentioning either Jack Smith or anything else regarding this case over in Washington DC, well, this is likely why. | |
| If you'd like to read any of the documents for yourself, including the full text of the gag order, I'll throw a PDF version of it down into the description box below this video for you to check out at your own leisure. | |
| And also, I'd love to know your thoughts. | |
| Do you think that this gag order is just the normal thing to do, given the fact that President Trump is so vocal regarding this case, and therefore the prosecution is indeed worried about the jury pool getting contaminated? | |
| Or, do you think that this gag order is politically motivated? | |
| And what do you make of the attempt that Jack Smith made to extend this gag order to not only include the witnesses in the prosecution, but to include all disparaging comments against Joe Biden? | |
| Do you think that this was really about this particular lawsuit, or was this an attempt to interfere with the upcoming election? | |
| I'd love to know your thoughts. | |
| Please leave them in the comments section below. | |
| I'll be reading them later tonight as well as into the week. | |
| And then lastly, as I mentioned at the top of the episode as well, if you are just sick and tired of all the censorship on this beautiful platform we call YouTube, with or without the federal government's involvement, well, you're in luck. | |
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| And then, until next time, I'm your host, Roman from The Epoch Times. |
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