Former President Donald Trump’s $9,000 fines for repeatedly violating the gag order in his hush money case have been paid, a court spokesperson confirmed Friday.
Judge Juan Merchan held Trump in criminal contempt on Tuesday, determining various statements by Trump were gag order violations. Merchan fined Trump the maximum $1,000 fine per violation.
The $9,000 fines were paid Thursday with two cashiers checks, one for $7,000 and one for $2,000, Al Baker, the communications director for the New York State Office of Court Administration, told USA TODAY on Friday.
Merchan is currently also considering whether Trump violated the gag order an additional four times.
Merchan’s gag order bars Trump from publicly commenting on the participation of potential witnesses in his hush money case. Trump was fined for comments about former porn star Stormy Daniels, and Michael Cohen, his former lawyer who allegedly paid Daniels hush money allegedly on Trump’s behalf.
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Trump has continued to rail against Merchan’s gag order in press conferences.
Merchan warned the former president in the Tuesday gag order decision that he could be jailed for future violations.
Trump’s gag order violations
Despite the judge’s gag order, Trump targeted Cohen and Daniels in a series of statements and re-postings on his Truth Social media platform and his campaign website, including describing the two as “sleazebags.”
Another post described Cohen as a “serial perjurer” who will embarrass the New York legal system by trying to prove Trump committed “an old misdemeanor.”
Trump is charged with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. The charges are felonies, not misdemeanors, because prosecutors allege not just that Trump falsified records, but also that he did so in order to commit or conceal another crime.
Although Trump previously paid $15,000 in fines for violating a gag order in his New York civil fraud case, a 2016 USA TODAY NETWORK investigation found hundreds of people – including dishwashers, painters, and his own lawyers – who said he didn’t pay them for their work.
Who are Michael Cohen and Stormy Daniels?
Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer, could provide key testimony about checks that prosecutors say were falsified in order to cover up unlawful interference in the 2016 presidential election. Trump labeled the purpose of the checks to Cohen as “legal expenses,” but prosecutors say they were really reimbursement payments to Cohen, who handed over $130,000 to Daniels.
Daniels is a porn star who alleges Trump and she had a sexual encounter. Trump denies her claim.
