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A federal judge dismissed US President Donald Trump’s US$10 billion defamation lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal and Rupert Murdoch on Monday over a story on his ties to Jeffrey Epstein.
US District Judge Darrin P. Gayles in Florida wrote in the order that Trump had failed to make the argument that the article was published with the intent to be malicious but gave the president a chance to file an amended complaint.
Trump filed the lawsuit in July, following up on a promise to sue the newspaper almost immediately after it put a new spotlight on his well-documented relationship with Epstein by publishing an article that described a sexually suggestive letter that the newspaper said bore Trump’s signature and was included in a 2003 album compiled for Epstein’s 50th birthday.
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The letter was subsequently released publicly by Congress, which subpoenaed the records from Epstein’s estate. Trump denied writing it, calling the story “false, malicious and defamatory”.
Lawyers for The Wall Street Journal and Murdoch, whose News Corporation media company owns the newspaper, had asked Gayles to rule that the article’s statements were true and therefore could not be defamatory.
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However, the judge wrote that “whether President Trump was the author of the Letter or Epstein’s friend are questions of fact that cannot be determined at this stage of the litigation”.
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