Judge Juan Merchan’s reproach of the press for publishing potentially identifiable information about the jurors in former President Donald Trump’s hush money trial seems to have been ignored.
On Thursday morning, Merchan noted that the media is “able and allowed to write about anything that’s on the record,” but still advised journalists to use “common sense” and avoid reporting information that could threaten the anonymity of the jury.
The warning came after a number of media outlets — including ABC News, which tweeted out an article with the caption “Here’s everything you need to know about the first seven jurors of Trump’s historic criminal trial” six separate times — published primers on the members of the jury.
Nevertheless, many persisted in the practice after Merchan expressed his concerns on Thursday morning.
On Politico‘s liveblog covering the trail, for example, Erica Orden is providing everything but jurors’ names and what they had for breakfast this morning.
Politico on Thursday (two minutes ago) published extensive biographical details about a potential Juror — her neighborhood, occupation, marital status, hobbies, prior experience with the criminal justice system.
But it’s only bad if Jesse Watters repeats this information on his… https://t.co/E0scHMloEt pic.twitter.com/yNV674t7y1
— Andrew Kerr (@AndrewKerrNC) April 18, 2024
And her descriptions are being blasted out by her colleague, Ben Feuerherd.
Prospective Trump juror is a lifelong Hell’s Kitchen resident, only reads the tabs and has a flip phone so he doesn’t “watch” any podcasts —> https://t.co/hkXSLOqtDt pic.twitter.com/dWpMgOkwyw
— Ben Feuerherd (@benfeuerherd) April 18, 2024
Inner City Press is doing the same thing Orden is, but on X (formerly Twitter).
Seat 2: Question 42? No.
Justice Merchan: Thank you.
Seat 3 (man) I live in Hell’s Kitchen, I work in investment banking. I have an MBA in finance. I am married. I do Iive with my wife. Enjoying NYC.— Inner City Press (@innercitypress) April 18, 2024
Other outlets, such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, and NBC, have continued to report on some aspects of the prospective jurors, but have refrained from going into the level of detail others have.
