Donald Trump is almost guaranteed to violate the terms of his new gag order, and the judge might throw him in jail for it, former acting solicitor general Neal Katyal said Tuesday.
The former president was hit with the gag order earlier in the day, after he attacked the judge's law clerk in a social media post. The underlying matter is the civil fraud trial he faces in New York.
Katyal appeared on MSNBC's Alex Wagner Tonight on Tuesday, and was asked about how far a judge might be willing to go if Trump violates their order.
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"Well, it could mean, in an ordinary thing, if there's a gag order imposed, and it's violated, it means putting someone in jail," Katyal said, adding that Trump had to try "really hard" to get such a gag order
"It's kind of like failing kindergarten. To get a gag order imposed, you have to try. Trump managed to work at it and do it. And succeed. But it took a lot of work on his part. Now, I think the judge is basically saying, you attack a member of my staff, there will be serious sanctions, including even up to jail."
He continued:
"If we're gonna ask, is Trump gonna violate a gag order? Almost certainly, yes. It's more likely that he'll violate the gag order than almost anything... I mean, we're talking a significant probability he's going to violate the gag order."
