The lawsuit focused on a March 10 interview that Stephanopoulos conducted on the network’s Sunday morning show, “This Week,” with Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.). In that interview, Stephanopoulos confronted Mace—who has said she’s a rape survivor—about her endorsement of Trump, falsely noting that “judges and two separate juries have found him liable for rape, and for defaming the victim of that rape.”
Stephanopoulos was referring to the lawsuit brought by E. Jean Carroll, who alleged that Trump raped her in 1996 in the dressing room of a New York City department store; as my colleague Russ Choma reported, while the jury found that Carroll’s attorneys did not prove the rape allegation, they did agree that Trump forcibly sexually abused and defamed her, and ruled that Trump had to pay Carroll $5 million.
While Trump has claimed he now believes a free press is “vital,” there are fears that he and his acolytes could use baseless lawsuits to go after journalists whose coverage is unfavorable to him—particularly after Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) this week blocked a federal shield bill that, if passed, would protect journalists from being forced to reveal their confidential sources.
Determining whether Trump was found responsible for "rape" is complicated. As described here, the act the civil jury in May, 2024 found Trump had committed was not "rape" under New York State law at the time but is now because of a law Governor Kathy Hochul signed in January of 2024. And even at the time, the act fit the definition under federal law. Judge Kaplan explained that the absence of a finding of rape by the jury “does not mean that she failed to prove that Mr. Trump ‘raped’ her as many people commonly understand the word ‘rape.’” He added "as the evidence at trial recounted below makes clear, the jury found that Mr. Trump in fact did exactly that.”
Further, if the individual is a public official or public figure (as is, and was, Trump), the plaintiff must prove either that the defendant knew the defamatory statement was false or "acted with reckess disregard for the truth." Having not made up the statement out of whole cloth, Stephanopoulos likely believed it was truth. ABC- or more likely, parent company Disney- caved.
So there was ample reason for the "fears" cited by Mother Jones" MCShane. Andthere is even more now that
Donald Trump promised Monday to launch a lawsuit against the Des Moines Register over a preelection poll that found Vice President Kamala Harris had “leapfrogged” the Republican candidate, in a state he went on to handily win.
During a press conference at Mar-a-Lago, one journalist asked Trump about his ongoing defamation cases, asking, “Could you see moving that to other people with individual platforms, social media influencers, people that—”
“Or newspapers, yeah.” Trump interrupted.
“Yeah, oh I do. I think you have to do it, because they’re
very dishonest,” Trump continued. “We need a great media, we need a fair media.
We need, uh, it’s very important. And we need borders, we need walls, but we
need borders and we need fair elections.”
Trump went on rambling on about how they were still counting votes in California, which is not true. The weave eventually wove itself back, and the president-elect continued his pledge to sue newspapers over alleged defamation.
“I have a few others that I’m doing, uh I’m gonna, as an example, we’re bringing—I’m doing this not because I want to, I’m doing this because I have an obligation to—I’m gonna be bringing one against the people in Iowa, their newspaper, which had a very, very good pollster, who got me right all the time. And then just before the election, she said I was gonna lose by three or four points, and it became the biggest story all over the world … because I was gonna win Iowa by 20 points. The farmers love me, and I love the farmers,” he said.
Trump was speaking about pollster Ann Selzer, whose Iowa poll anticipated that Harris would lead Trump by three points in the state. In reality, he won Iowa by 13 points, making for a 16-point error. Selzer & Co. had previously been considered the gold standard of polling in the country.
Legally, the President-elect has little or no case. Of course, with Trump, the term "legally" is the inoperative word. The U.S. Supreme Court, in Trump v. United States, discovered a new and novel constitutional right for one individual among hundreds of millions of American citizens. Henceforth, an ex-President would have complete criminal liability for "official acts" or anything heor she might do using the pw=owers of the office. Henceforth, a President can do anything, declare it an "official act," and get a free get out of jail card- or "cannot be prosecuted" card. Sweet.
Three days after the election, Conor Friedersdorf of The Atlantic (behind paywall) wrote "I hope that Trump willl normalize himself, too" by "what he says and does," a President "who reassures the nation that he will adhere to the law, the Constitution, and basic human decency."
Donald Trump is not President yet, and that ship already has sailed. Nor will it end with the Des Moines Register and ABC News.
President Trump will not have to suppress and oppress his enemies. He will issue more threats- some empty, some not- before he can bring the media to heel. Intimidation will be a prime elemnt of his governing strategy and his ambitions are not modest. So as for this tweeter's assessment of Trump as a "fascist clown": yes and no, respectively.
Donald Trump says he's going to sue Ann Selzer and the Des Moines Register because he didn't like her poll that had him losing.
— Art Candee 🍿🥤 (@ArtCandee) December 16, 2024
Fascist clown. pic.twitter.com/xxOL9Jh3Np
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