Judge says jurors in Trump rape lawsuit trial to be anonymous, fearing "harassment or worse"

A judge is allowing the jury for Donald Trump's rape lawsuit trial to remain anonymous, citing "a very strong risk" to jurors' safety if their identities are disclosed. Because as we all by now know, wherever Trump goes, a very strong risk follows.

As Trump was calling on his MAGA thugs to threaten the Manhattan DA yesterday, U.S. District Judge Lewis A. Kaplan stated his concerns about "harassment or worse" by the former president and his followers if the trial did not go Trump's way. And so although keeping jurors' names secret is highly unusual for a case that doesn't involve murder, so is having a former president (and popular presidential candidate) in the U.S. who personally bullies Americans into fearing for their lives.

From AP News:

The Associated Press and the Daily News of New York objected to the plan to conceal the identities of jurors in the trial over columnist E. Jean Carroll's claim — denied by Trump — that the Republican raped her in the 1990s. …

But U.S. District Judge Lewis A. Kaplan said he was concerned that jurors would be subjected to unwanted attention from the media and "harassment or worse" from supporters of a president who has railed against the judicial process, or from people unhappy with any verdict that might ensue.

"On the basis of the unprecedented circumstances in which this trial will take place, including the extensive pretrial publicity and a very strong risk that jurors will fear harassment, unwanted invasions of their privacy and retaliation," he wrote, "there is strong reason to believe that the jury needs the protection." …

Besides having their names kept confidential, jurors will be transported to and from court and sequestered from the public while on breaks there.