“The View” host Whoopi Goldberg blasted former President Donald Trump for continuing to exercise his freedom of speech.
During Tuesday’s episode of the ABC mid-day talk show, Goldberg argued that Trump’s complaints about New York City Judge Arthur Engoron amounted to “threats” and would pose a risk to him and potentially the prosecutors.
“Why can he continue to threaten judges, threaten AGs, and threaten just people?” she asked. “Now, I understand that some folks say it’s freedom of speech, but if I did that, they would not consider it freedom of speech.”
“So why does he get to continue to threaten — and it’s threats like he did with January 6th,” she conitnued. “He basically said, ‘Come after her.’ He didn’t say exactly those words, but I don’t know how else you take those words — but why is he continuously allowed to do that when none of us would be able to?”
Co-hosts Joy Behar and Sunny Hostin then chimed in and accused Trump of “hiding behind the First Amendment.” Behar said that he had done the same thing when he verbally attacked former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley and his own former Vice President Mike Pence.
In addition to the gag order, Engoron also issued another directive preventing Trump from moving his assets without prior notification to a court-appointed monitor.
The order requires the former president and his co-defendants to reveal all entities they possess and to provide prior notice of “any anticipated transfer of assets or liabilities to any other entities.”
Trump blasted the court’s decision on the social media platform Truth Social, calling Engoron a “Trump-hating judge.”
“The ridiculous A.G. case against me in New York, brought by the Racist and Incompetent Peekaboo James, is being studied and mocked all over the World. Companies are Fleeing! It, and the highly political, Trump Hating Judge, are DESTROYING the Image and Reputation of the New York State Legal System & Courts,” he wrote.
Engoron drew criticism when he mugged for television cameras and shrugged in front of the courtroom audience during the first of Trump’s real estate appeal trial. Some claimed that the judge’s gesture indicated that he already saw the result as inevitable.
