UPDATED: A federal judge dismissed Donald Trump’s $10 billion defamation lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal, Rupert Murdoch and others, ruling that the president’s claim “comes nowhere close” to adequately alleging actual malice.
As definitive as his ruling was, U.S. District Judge Darrin P. Gayles will allow the president to file an amended complaint.
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He wrote, “The lawsuit raises many questions of fact and law about the publication’s account of events, journalistic integrity, and the First Amendment’s protection of sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials. However, most of those questions are for another day.”
Last summer, the Journal reported on a letter in Trump’s name that was included in an album given to Jeffrey Epstein for his 50th birthday in 2003. The letter, the Journal reported, “contains several lines of typewritten text framed by the outline of a naked woman, which appears to be hand-drawn with a heavy marker,” adding that a “pair of small arcs denotes the woman’s breasts, and the future president’s signature is a squiggly ‘Donald’ below her waist, mimicking pubic hair.”
Trump sued, alleging that the letter was “fake.” Trump denied to the Journal that he wrote the letter and threatened to sue. He also has said that he spoke to Murdoch beforehand, and the media mogul told him he would “take care of it.”
But in September, the House Oversight Committee released documents that included a letter matching the Journal‘s description.
In his opinion, the judge wrote, “While the produced documents certainly appear identical to
the album and Letter referenced in the Article, the Court cannot, simply by taking judicial notice,
find that they are the same, particularly where President Trump disputes their accuracy. This is a factual dispute that the court cannot resolve at this stage of the litigation.”
Yet in ruling that Trump failed to make a claim of actual malice, the judge noted that the Journal contacted Trump before running the story, as well as DOJ and FBI officials, confirming that the reporters attempted to investigate.
“Trump’s conclusory allegation that [The Journal] had contradictory evidence and failed to investigate is rebutted by the article and is insufficient to establish actual malice,” Gayles wrote.
Trump has filed a blizzard of lawsuits against media outlets, but a number of them, including against CNN and The New York Times, have been dismissed. The Journal sought to collect attorneys fees and costs from Trump, but Gayles declined to issue such an order, citing the possibility that the president’s lawyers would file an amended complaint.
A spokesman for Trump’s legal team said, “President Trump will follow Judge Gayles’s ruling and guidance to refile this powerhouse lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal and all of the other Defendants. The President will continue to hold accountable those who traffic in Fake News to mislead the American People.”
A Dow Jones spokesperson said, “We are pleased with the judge’s decision to dismiss this complaint. We stand behind the reliability, rigor and accuracy of The Wall Street Journal’s reporting.”
Shortly after the judge’s decision, the White House Correspondents’ Association announced its winners to be honored at next week’s annual dinner. Among the honorees: The Journal and the reporting team for the Trump-Epstein piece, headlined, “Jeffrey Epstein’s Friends Sent Him Bawdy Letters for a 50th
Birthday Album. One Was From Donald Trump.” Trump plans to attend the dinner, for the first time as president.
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