TFG sued ABC and George Stephanopoulos for defamation over George Stephanopoulos's interview of Nancy Mace

[LetMyPeopleVote]

Link to tweet

Here is a link to the lawsuit
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.flsd.664183/gov.uscourts.flsd.664183.1.0.pdf

[Rhiannon12866]

1. Hasn't he got enough legal issues all on his own?? Who's going to pay these legal bills??

[blm]

4. He's been filing suits like this his entire life.

It’s why experienced businesspeople in New York City wouldn’t work with him by the end of the 80s.

[Rhiannon12866]

8. That appears to be his "hobby," and an expensive one for someone can't pay his legal bills

[question everything]

11. My first thoughts exactly

[pfitz59]

2. Hope the judge tosses it.

George asked a reasonable question and she wigged out. He kept his cool.

[Ocelot II]

3. I'm running out of palms with which to do facepalms.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

6. TFG got zapped for $1 million for one of these lawsuits

Lets see how much TFG gets zapped for this lawsuit

[Meadowoak]

5. ABCs and George Dtephanopolos's fault for

Interviewing such a piece of shit. What did they expect?

[NutmegYankee]

7. Didn't the judge in the second case rule that in regular use, what he did was in fact rape

An obscure state legal wording doesn't change the fact that the general usage of the term and the official federal government definition considers penetration by a finger to be rape.

[SunSeeker]

15. Correct.

https://www.reuters.com/legal/trump-cannot-challenge-writers-rape-claim-defamation-trial-judge-rules-2024-01-08/

[sheshe2]

9. FFS!

[LetMyPeopleVote]

10. TFG is using the same attorney he tried to use to sue Michael Cohen

Link to tweet

That lawsuit was later dismissed when Cohen tried to take TFG’S deposition

Link to tweet

[RockRaven]

12. George and ABC are going to have to get in line to try to recoup their

legal fees once this shit gets tossed, at best, if they even ever qualify for such.

[NanaCat]

13. I'm waiting for the first judge

To declare him a vexatious litigant. On that day, there will be much rejoicing:

[LetMyPeopleVote]

21. TFG does qualify as a vexatious litigant

[SunSeeker]

14. What a stupid SLAPP suit. Stephanopoulos will finally get his sit-down interview with Trump.

Albeit by way of court ordered deposition.

Or Shitler will dismiss the suit as soon as it looks like he is about to be deposed, like he did with his defamation suit against Cohen.

He and his attorneys need to be sanctioned for these frivolous SLAPP suits.

[no_hypocrisy]

16. TSF's goal may be

1. To actually go to court and clear his name. (Unlikely)
2. To get a settlement from GS and ABC. (Possibly, he needs the money.)
3. To get more favorable media coverage during his campaign. (Probably.)

[Hermit-The-Prog]

19. The very stable genius plan seems to be to get someone to pay him to stop bullying.

[mopinko]

17. the lawyer who filed this shd b disbarred.

these fucking frivolous suits shd b punished, not just dismissed.

[malaise]

18. Please proceed Smelvis. the SF Slobfather

That is all

[LetMyPeopleVote]

20. TFG is suing because TFG disagrees with a federal judge calling him a rapist and this comment being repeated

Link to tweet

The theory of Trump’s complaint here is that, since the jury in Carroll II, the case tried last year, unanimously found that Trump forcibly and without consent penetrated Carroll’s vagina with his fingers and not his penis, and since this constituted sexual assault and not rape as defined by the New York Penal Code, Stephanopoulos libeled him by saying he had been held liable for “rape,” even though the judge in the Carroll case has held multiple times since the verdict that in common parlance (and the law of most other jurisdictions) forcible digital penetration is rape.

In other words, Trump is suing Stephanopoulos and ABC because Stephanopoulos repeated what a federal district judge has said repeatedly in written opinions.

By bringing this lawsuit, Trump will only bring more public attention to what he did to Carroll. And he and his lawyers may very well be—in fact, ought to be—sanctioned.

Another brilliant stable-genius move.

Trump is not only a rapist, he’s a nut job, and a very, very dumb one at that.

Link to tweet

[LetMyPeopleVote]

22. Why Trump's case against George Stephanopoulos is politically risky

Many Republican voters have no idea that Donald Trump was recently held liable for sexual abuse. The Republican's new civil suit might help change that.

Link to tweet

https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/trumps-case-george-stephanopoulos-politically-risky-rcna144064

After leaving the White House, the former president kept suing media outlets — and kept losing — though the defeats apparently haven’t deterred him. The New York Times reported:

Former President Donald J. Trump filed a defamation lawsuit against ABC News on Monday, arguing that the anchor George Stephanopoulos had harmed his reputation by saying multiple times on-air that Mr. Trump had been found liable for raping the writer E. Jean Carroll.

Stephanopoulos is also named as a co-defendant in the case.

The controversy, to the extent that one exists, began nine days ago, when Republican Rep. Nancy Mace appeared on ABC’s “This Week” and faced a difficult line of inquiry: Stephanopoulos asked the South Carolina congresswoman, who has spoken publicly about being raped as a teenager, about how she reconciles her support for rape victims with her support for Trump......

Legal experts can speak with more authority than I can about the case’s prospects — though given recent history, the former president and his followers should probably keep their expectations low — but I wonder if Team Trump appreciates the political risk it’s taking.

For one thing, there's not much of an upside for a presidential candidate to effectively argue, "I was held liable for sexual assault, not rape, even if a judge said there's little meaningful difference between the two given the details of the case."

For another, the “Streisand Effect“ keeps coming to mind.

Remember, recent polling suggests many Republican voters have no idea that Trump was recently held liable for sexual abuse. The more the former president goes after Stephanopoulos and ABC, the more likely it is that voters will hear about the case — in an election year — which is the opposite of what the presumptive GOP nominee should want.