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Deadline: Legal Blog

From Deadline: White House with Nicolle Wallace

Read: Full text of Judge Merchan's gag order ruling against Trump

The judge presiding over the first criminal trial of a former U.S. president found the defendant in contempt, fined him and warned him of possible imprisonment.

By Jordan Rubin

Judge Juan Merchan finally ruled on Donald Trump's alleged gag order violations in his New York criminal trial. As the second week of testimony started Tuesday, the judge found the defendant in criminal contempt for willfully violating the order nine times. Merchan imposed the maximum legal fine of $1,000 for each violation and warned the presumptive GOP presidential nominee that jail may be next.

Read the ruling here:

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Jordan Rubin

Jordan Rubin is the Deadline: Legal Blog writer. He was a prosecutor for the New York County District Attorney’s Office in Manhattan and is the author of “Bizarro," a book about the secret war on synthetic drugs. Before he joined MSNBC, he was a legal reporter for Bloomberg Law.