Donald Trump was accused by a Manhattan judge of intimidating a potential juror by “muttering” and gesturing when the woman was called in to explain alleged “anti-Trump” social media posts.
“Your client was audibly muttering something,” said Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan to Trump’s lawyer Todd Blanche during jury selection Tuesday. “I don’t know what he was muttering.”
The former president’s agitated moment, Merchan said, occurred just “12 feet away” from the prospective panelist – who was standing at a courtroom lectern to answer questions about two Facebook posts Blanche claimed were “extraordinarily hostile.”
He then offered a stiff warning: “I won’t tolerate that. I won’t have any jurors intimidated in this courtroom. I will be crystal clear.”
The flareup came as Blanche had been questioning a group of 18 possible jurors during “voir dire” – when defense lawyers and prosecutors whittle down the pool in an attempt to get an unbiased group of 12 panelists to decide the former president’s fate.
Blanche was seeking to have the woman – Juror No. B133 – tossed out over a video posted on social media that showed people celebrating on 96th Street after the 45th president lost his seat in the White House for a second term in 2020.
“This is a woman who said she never attended a Trump rally,” Trump’s other lawyer Susan Necheles said, noting that this was “clearly anti-Trump event.”