Donald Trump, facing allegations of falsifying accounting documents, has already been fined ten times for breaching the ban on making verbal attacks on witnesses and jurors

At Donald Trump’s criminal trial in New York, Judge Juan Merchan reiterated his threat to jail the former US president for breaching the ban on making derogatory comments about witnesses and jurors. At the end of the day’s proceedings, prosecutors said they expected to hear from the remaining witnesses in the case in around two weeks. Donald Trump voiced his displeasure, once again accusing ‘election interference’ and claiming that the judge was deliberately prolonging the trial to distance him from the presidential campaign.

Earlier in the day, Judge Juan Merchan fined Donald Trump $1,000 for breaching his order by making public comments about the jury and the selection process. He also warned that future violations could result in jail time. The penalty followed criticism by Donald Trump of the speed and alleged composition of the jury, expressed in an interview.

Donald Trump is facing four separate criminal trials and is seeking to delay the proceedings as long as possible. This trial in New York, which is smaller than the one brought by the federal justice system in Washington for his attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, could be the only one heard before the elections on 5 November.

In this case, Donald Trump is accused of 34 falsifications of accounting documents aimed at concealing a payment of 130,000 dollars made to buy the silence of former X actress Stormy Daniels, who claims to have had an affair with him in 2006. The previous week, Judge Merchan imposed nine fines totalling $9,000 on Donald Trump for publicly criticising witnesses and jurors, and had already threatened to send him to prison if he offended again.

If re-elected, Donald Trump could, once in office in January 2025, dismiss the two federal lawsuits brought against him in Washington and Florida on charges relating to his handling of classified documents after he left the White House.