Former President Donald Trump has sued prominent network CNN for defamation in a federal court in Florida.
In a lawsuit filed Monday, Trump’s attorneys claim CNN “has sought to use its massive influence — purportedly as a ‘trusted’ news source — to defame the Plaintiff in the minds of its viewers and readers for the purpose of defeating him politically, culminating in CNN claiming credit for ‘[getting] Trump out’ in the 2020 presidential election.” Trump is seeking $475 million in punitive damages.
Earlier this summer, Trump announced he planned to sue the network, saying in a statement he would “also be commencing actions against other media outlets who have defamed me and defrauded the public regarding the overwhelming evidence of fraud throughout the 2020 Election.”
The former president’s attorneys allege in the filing that CNN “has undertaken a smear campaign to malign the Plaintiff with a barrage of negative associations and innuendos, broadcasting commentary that he is like a cult leader, a Russian lackey, a dog whistler to white supremacists, and a racist.”
It cited anchors and hosts on CNN using the term “Big Lie” to refer to Trump’s claims about the 2020 election and voter fraud as evidence of the outlet attempting to associate him with Adolf Hitler.
Public officials and other public figures must prove journalists acted with malice or reckless disregard for the truth in their reporting when attempting to prove defamation, which is a hard burden of proof, considering First Amendment protections granted to the free press under the Constitution. The New York Times, for example, hasn’t lost a defamation case in over 50 years.
CNN has consistently railed against Trump, his allies and other conservatives. Several highly partisan hosts have, in recent months, been removed as the new leadership of the outlet, Chris Licht, has been pushing to make the outlet more nonpartisan in the face of declining ratings and public opinion.
This is not the first time the network has been placed into the legal frying pan. In 2020, the network settled a $275 million lawsuit brought by a high school student in Kentucky who was at the center of a viral video controversy and became a lightning rod for critics of the mainstream media.
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