SAN DIEGO — Donald Trump's lawyer cited a laundry list of legal precedents Wednesday as he fought in court to keep potentially embarrassing deposition videos of the presumptive GOP nominee from going public, but one of those points seemed to resonate a bit more than others: an invocation of the litigation over Hillary Clinton's private email server.

Arguing to shield the recordings of Trump enduring more than ten hours of questioning in class-action fraud lawsuits over his Trump University program, attorney Daniel Petrocelli urged U.S. District Court Judge Gonzalo Curiel to follow the example of a fellow judge in Washington who ruled against public access to videos of Clinton aides testifying about the former secretary's use of a private email server.


"We have an almost identical situation that just came up in the Hillary Clinton email case," Petrocelli said, noting that the judge in Washington decided to sequester the videos at the request of former Clinton Chief of Staff Cheryl Mills.

"But she's not a candidate for president," Curiel chimed in.

Petrocelli acknowledged that, but noted that the Freedom of Information Act lawsuit at issue is exploring Clinton's actions as secretary of state, while the Trump University lawsuits relate solely to events that occurred while Trump was promoting the now-defunct real estate seminar program as he worked in the private sector.

"The conduct was about a public official and the discharge of her duties while in office," Petrocelli argued. "The case involved alleged misconduct by a sitting secretary of state. This case involves no such allegation of misconduct by a sitting public official. This case involves purely private conduct by a company and people who bought a ticket to these events and signed up for these courses."

Curiel did not rule immediately on Trump's request to protect the videos or a related media request to lift all restrictions on the videos' release, so it was difficult to tell whether he bought into Petrocelli's what's-good-for-the-goose-is-good-for-the-gander argument about Clinton.

However, the judge did raise the ruling from the Clinton email case later in the hearing, calling on a lawyer for news organizations to address how that situation was or wasn't parallel to Trump's.

Attorney Dan Laidman noted that the ruling on the Clinton aides' videos was a brief docket entry known as a "minute order," not a formal legal opinion.

"This was a very abbreviated proceeding at another stage of the case," Laidman told the judge, noting that Mills and the other aides aren't even parties to those suits but were pulled in as witnesses. The media lawyer also noted that, due to precedents, legal standards for release of information differ in federal courts in California from those in Washington.

One key challenge Trump's attorneys faced Wednesday: the judge they had the tricky job of trying to convince is the same one whose Latino heritage Trump has repeatedly invoked in recent months as he accused the jurist and former federal prosecutor of bias and a conflict of interest.

During the 45-minute hearing, Curiel did not make direct reference to Trump's attacks on him and his ethnic background.

However, the judge did note that Trump has spoken out publicly about the case. Curiel asked whether those comments and the "universe" of media attention to the case mean the video would be only of incremental impact and wouldn't do much harm.

Citing "public comments by candidates for president, by your client [and] the stories that have been presented in the media," Curiel said he did not think anyone could dispute that the amount of information already public is "massive."

"Given that universe of information already exists, how would this particular video tape affect the current state?" the judge asked.

"We have this convention in Cleveland next week. There's all kinds of potential for mischief," Petrocelli replied. "They will be used in political ads, to be sure," he said, adding that he was confident that worry was one reason the judge in Washington blocked release of the videos in the Clinton email suit.

"They would be subject to massive and perhaps unprecedented public dissemination," Petrocelli argued at an earlier point in the hearing. "These depositions are going to find themselves all over the news, cable news stations, streaming on digital video, YouTube—far beyond my comprehension. I think nobody disagrees there is going to be widespread use and dissemination of these videos."

"People...who may be sitting on our jury are going to be exposed to it. It's going to make the job of picking an impartial jury that much more difficult," the lawyer added.

The court hearing was just the latest example of an extraordinary array of legal entanglements involving the leading presidential candidates this year.

It emerged Wednesday that Trump is seeking $10 million in damages against former senior campaign adviser Sam Nunberg for allegedly leaking confidential information in violation of a non-disclosure agreement. Lawyers for Nunberg asked a state judge in New York on Wednesday to shut down the arbitration proceeding where Trump is demanding the money. Nunberg alleged Trump wants to silence him as part of an effort to "cover up media coverage of an apparent affair" between two other top Trump campaign aides.

And Clinton has faced her own legal woes, including a criminal investigation into whether she or her aides broke federal law by discussing classified information on her private email server. The FBI and Justice Department announced last week that no one will be prosecuted in the case, but Republican lawmakers have asked that Clinton be investigated for perjury.

In addition, Clinton is fighting an effort to force her into a deposition in the same civil lawsuit where Mills and several of Clinton's other aides were already questioned by court order.

The videos in dispute in San Diego Wednesday depict over ten hours of recordings of testimony Trump gave behind closed doors at Trump Tower in New York in December and at a Trump hotel in Las Vegas in January. The second session was ordered by a federal magistrate who said the real estate mogul had not been sufficiently responsive to questions.

While videos of the depositions are not public, transcripts of the sessions are. They show the real estate mogul bristling as he is peppered with queries from one of the class-action lawyers pressing the suits.

"Same answer to your harassment questions," Trump snapped as attorney Jason Forge read a long list of Trump University instructors and Trump said he did not know them.

The depositions also include Trump being grilled about his past praise for Hillary Clinton, President Bill Clinton, Jeb Bush and other political figures. Airing the exchanges could be politically awkward for the presumed GOP nominee, but he has been subjected to similar questioning in media interviews.

Those inquiries about other politicians were a point of contention Wednesday.

Curiel said at one point that the Trump University case and the fraud allegations against Trump "certainly" seem to be legitimate matters of public interest, but the judge asked Laidman if that was equally true when Trump was questioned about matters not directly related to the real estate seminar program.

"Questions about his opinions relating to certain politicians—Jeb Bush and Rick Perry or Pataki or Hillary Clinton, do you believe the public also has a right to know about those matters…as it relates to this case?" the judge asked.

"That information is already out there," Laidman replied.

Petrocelli noted that he resisted that line of questioning but a federal magistrate ruled that Trump was obliged to answer. "Questions that, in my view, were utterly improper and utterly irrelevant were asked and they were answered," the Trump lawyer said.

At the hearing, Forge defended the questioning. He said it was intended to undercut claims by Trump that nearly all participants in the Trump University program filled out forms or made brief videos praising the seminars.

Forge noted that Trump defended his past praise for the politicians, saying he was a businessman trying to maintain a good relationship with them.

"Just like Mr. Trump, [the attendees] had an expectation of needing help from the people they were evaluating," the class action attorney said.

Forge backed the media motion for access, saying Trump had not met his burden to show "particularized harm" would result from release of the videos.

"These broad, conclusory, speculative harms don’t cut it in this context. They don’t amount to good cause," Forge said.

Petrocelli insisted that the videos by their nature would cause problems the transcripts had not and he argued that the court shouldn't really be deciding what information is needed because Trump is a presidential candidate.

"This lawsuit, your honor, is not a vehicle to litigate the presidential campaign," the attorney said. "The court's duty is not to facilitate the public election. The court's duty is to facilitate a fair trial."

Trump's testimony was taken in connection with a pair of federal class-action lawsuits. One is a nationwide case charging Trump personally with overseeing a racketeering scheme by promoting Trump University based on false representations about its activities, instructors and the exclusiveness of its curriculum. The other suit claims that Trump University violated state anti-fraud laws in California, Florida and New York.

Curiel has set a trial in that second case for Nov. 28, about three weeks after the presidential election. The racketeering case is expected to go to trial sometime later, although Trump's lawyers are making a bid to get that case thrown out entirely, arguing that the alleged conduct doesn't amount to racketeering under the law and that Trump wasn't sufficiently involved in the decisions to be held personally liable.

Both suits seek damages on behalf of former Trump University students, many of whom paid about $1,500 for a three-day seminar and some of whom paid nearly $35,000 for a mentorship program. In the racketeering action, the ex-students could receive triple damages and the class-action lawyers pursuing the case could recover their attorneys' fees.

The hearing Wednesday drew more than two dozen journalists and other observers who filled the small gallery in the second-floor courtroom with a few courtroom sketch artists and other onlookers spilling into the jury box. Trump was attending a fundraiser Wednesday in Rancho Santa Fe, about 25 miles north of the downtown San Diego courthouse where the legal arguments took place.

Petrocelli and Forge declined to comment after the hearing. A handful of TV cameramen staked out the courthouse. They gave chase to the plaintiffs' lawyers as they left, missing the famed trial lawyer Petrocelli and his colleague as they slipped out moments later.