A federal judge has ended President Trump's $10 billion defamation lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal. U.S. District Judge Darrin P. Gayles dismissed the case with prejudice on Saturday — the Journal, Dow Jones, News Corp, Rupert Murdoch and the reporters who wrote the story about a purported birthday letter bearing Trump's name in Jeffrey Epstein's 2003 birthday album are out of the case, and the same claims cannot be filed again in district court.
In his 20-page ruling, the judge found that the amended complaint failed to adequately allege actual malice — the legal standard a public figure must meet to win a defamation case — describing the allegations as vague, conclusory and at times inconsistent, and the suit itself as "grasping at straws." As with his first attempt, the judge wrote, Trump has failed. Trump has denied writing the letter at the centre of the Journal's story.
Dismissal with prejudice closes the district-court door, but it is not the last word available to the president: he can appeal to the 11th Circuit, and IJR reports that Trump will appeal. The judge also left open whether the defendants may seek their legal fees.
For citizens, the ruling is about the line every American's speech stands behind: the actual-malice standard is what stops powerful people from using billion-dollar lawsuits to silence reporting they dislike — and it is the same shield that protects ordinary people, small outlets and critics when they speak about the powerful. The appeal will test whether that line holds for a sitting president's case too.
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