From CNN's Jeremy Herb, Lauren del Valle and Kara Scannell in the courthouse
Judge Juan Merchan just raised his voice while talking to Donald Trump attorney Todd Blanche.
"I'm asking the questions. I'm going to be the one who decides whether your client is in contempt," he said.
"I keep asking you over and over again for a specific answer, and I’m not getting an answer," Merchan said to Blanche.
Judge Juan Merchan again pushes Donald Trump attorney Todd Blanche to zero in on what specific attack from Michael Cohen or Stormy Daniels prompted the former president's posts on social media.
"There must've been a very recent attack to cause him to pull out a document that is six years old and is going to be used at trial," he told the court.
Judge Juan Merchan pressed defense attorney Todd Blanche on specifics about Michael Cohen attacking Donald Trump politically.
"There’s no specific post that you’re referring to?" he asks Blanche.
Blanche said he's generally referring to repeated attacks from Cohen and Stormy Daniels, who he said “have ramped up their political attacks and their attacks on him as a candidate as well" in the weeks leading up to the trial.
In the back and forth between Judge Juan Merchan and Trump attorney Todd Blanche, Merchan said, "You're suggesting that merely the use of a word pardon is sufficient for your client to violate a gag order."
Blanche retorts, "Absolutely not. President Trump is allowed to respond to political attacks."
Donald Trump appears to be looking at Judge Juan Merchan as the judge is engaged in a back-and-forth with defense attorney Todd Blanche.
Defense lawyer Todd Blanche tells the judge that two things about a Trump post referencing Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen make it political, pointing to a reference to being pardoned and how Daniels and Cohen are making money posting about the former president and their strong dislike of him.
Judge Juan Merchan steers Blanche back on track asking him to refer directly to the posts at issue rather than inferring the general meaning of public comments from Cohen and Daniels.
"So the pardon is what makes it political?" Merchan asks Blanche.
"Of course," Blanche responds.
"When your client is violating a gag order, I expect more than one word," Merchan said in response to Blanche's argument that a reference to pardons is political in nature.
Donald Trump attorney Todd Blanche said posts the former president made involving Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen "were in direct response" to statements those two made and not about the trial.
Blanche added that Cohen directly responded to one of Trump's posts "politically." It was not about the case or his testimony, Blanche said.
Donald Trump is still looking straight ahead while his lawyer is speaking, not visibly reacting at all to any of the proceedings yet.
Trump attorney Todd Blanche is now speaking for Donald Trump.
"President Trump does in fact know what the gag order allows him to do and not allow him to do," Blanche said, adding, "there was absolutely no willful violation of the gag order."
