Jesse Watters on Monday lamented the “cruel and unusual punishment” inflicted on Donald Trump in the form of a mandatory court appearance four days a week.
In the latest instance of Watters dutifully having the indicted former president’s back, the Fox News host spun a woeful, hyperbolic tale of all that was unfair with Trump having to abide by the legal process.
“The guy needs exercise. He’s usually golfing. And so you’re going to put a man who is almost 80 sitting in a room like this on his butt for all that time? It’s not healthy. You know how big of a health nut I am,” Watters said on The Five.
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“He needs sunlight,” Watters continued. “He needs activity. He needs to be walking around. He needs action. It is really cruel and unusual punishment to make a man do that, and any time he moves, they threaten to throw him in prison.”
After the first day of testimony in his New York criminal case, Trump potentially violated a gag order barring him from badmouthing any witnesses or potential witnesses, among others, by ranting about his former lawyer, Michael Cohen. A contempt hearing concerning those and other comments Trump has made is scheduled for Tuesday.
Last Friday, Trump was told to sit down by Judge Juan Merchan after having stood up, apparently thinking the proceedings had concluded for the day.
Despite these fairly standard courtroom developments, Watters summed up the whole trial as “cruel and unusual,” and even suggested Trump is being treated worse than 9/11 architect and Guantanamo Bay prisoner Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
“He has to sit there all week for six weeks. If he says anything, they’ll throw him in jail. If he leaves, they throw him in jail. That’s crazy!” Watters huffed. “They had more allowances for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. I think they bought a million-dollar soccer field for the people in GitMo. I don’t know if [Mohammed] was able to visit his son for his high school graduation, but it’s similar.”
Watters, like Trump, also complained about the temperature in the courtroom.
“They’re freezing him to death! They’re putting them in a meat locker!” he exclaimed. “He says it’s like 45 degrees in there.”
Watters still wasn’t done. Trump’s attendance in the same courtroom for weeks on end, he argued, amounted to a threat on his life.
“They’re putting his life in danger. They are telling the entire world—all the wackos—this is where the former president is going to be at this date, at this time, surrounded by high-rise buildings,” he said.
“And then,” Watters added, seemingly covering all his bases, “they are seizing his bank accounts with these unconstitutional fines and unreasonable bond asks. It’s disgusting.”
Trump is appealing more than $500 million in fines and penalties for defamation and bank fraud.
