Judge treated Trump like a 'truant child' with a presumption of mistrust: Ex-prosecutor

District Judge Tanya Chutkan is treating former President Donald Trump like a "truant child" — and her orders and warnings reflect her own distrust that the former president will comply with what she is asking, argued former federal prosecutor Harry Litman on MSNBC Friday.

After a tough hearing this morning, Chutkan released a protective order that limits what Trump and prosecutors are allowed to disclose, including personally identifying information, witness testimony, sealed orders, and recordings and transcripts from witness interviews.

"I want to underline a part of this," said anchor Alicia Menendez, pointing specifically at Trump's post last week appearing to threaten prosecutors. "If they would be reasonably interpreted to intimidate witnesses. Does Trump's post about, 'If you come after me, I'll come after you' — does that fly?"

"I think it falls totally flat," said Litman. "One more point. She treated Trump like a truant child. The most sort of galling thing of all. Obviously, he started at a level of mistrust. So he started with a record, as it were. Now, there will be exactly this debate. The reason there is something for him is not just what he got, but there will be a next level where they argue about terms and then she imposes something more strict."

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Ultimately, Litman continued, if Trump defies her orders, and keeps defying them, "the big hammer she has, of course, but she doesn't want to deploy it early or at all if they could help it, is putting him in jail."

"But they know that at the end of the day, it is her courtroom and her witnesses to worry about and it is her process to take account of," said Litman. "And she will, I think, she showed today, be unafraid — if he pushed her to the wall of responding with the most severe sanction."

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[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbWasBybb6k&feature=youtu.be expand=1 site_id=20266338] Harry Litman says Judge Chutkan is treating Trump like a "truant child"www.youtube.com