Insets: New York Times and Penguin Random House buildings (YouTube/Fox News/Penguin Random House). Background: President-elect Donald Trump speaks at an election night watch party, Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2024, in West Palm Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon).
President-elect Donald Trump has reportedly sent a $10 billion warning shot across the legal bows of Penguin Random House and the New York Times — threatening to sue the print giants for eleven figures — over allegedly “false and defamatory statements” that were published about him in articles before the election, the companies say.
“There was a time, long ago, when the New York Times was considered the ‘newspaper of record,’” a letter reads from Trump’s attorney, Edward Andrew Paltzik, to Penguin Random House and the Times, which was reviewed and first reported by Columbia Journalism Review on Thursday.
“Those halcyon days have passed,” the letter says, blasting the Times as a “full-throated mouthpiece of the Democratic Party” that employs “industrial-scale libel against political opponents,” per CJR.
The newspaper reportedly had “every intention of defaming and disparaging the world-renowned Trump brand that consumers have long associated with excellence, luxury, and success in entertainment, hospitality, and real estate, among many other industries, as well as falsely and maliciously defaming and disparaging him as a candidate for the highest office in the United States,” the letter asserted.
When CJR reported the legal threat on Thursday, it said the letter was received a week before the 2024 election. The ten-page warning named writers Peter Baker, Michael S. Schmidt, Susanne Craig and Russ Buettner as being behind “false and defamatory statements” published by the Times and Penguin Press, which is a publishing company within the Penguin Random House Group.
Some of the “defamatory” comments cited in Trump’s letter, per CJR, were about the future and former president’s alleged financial dealings, with there being references to Buettner and Craig’s recently released book, “Lucky Loser: How Donald Trump Squandered His Father’s Fortune and Created the Illusion of Success,” which was spurred on by a 2018 expose by the Pulitzer Prize-winning reporters and former Times journalist David Barstow, who disputed Trump’s claims of being a self-made billionaire.
“Drawing on over twenty years’ worth of Trump’s confidential tax information, including the tax returns he tried to conceal, alongside business records and interviews with Trump insiders, New York Times investigative reporters Russ Buettner and Susanne Craig track Trump’s financial rise and fall, and rise and fall again,” a description reads from Penguin Press.
Some other writings cited by Trump’s lawyer come from an October 20 article written by Baker for the Times — titled, “For Trump, a Lifetime of Scandals Heads Toward a Moment of Judgment” — in which he declared that “no major party presidential candidate, much less president, in American history” had been “accused of wrongdoing” as many times as Trump has. Publishers Weekly referred to “Lucky Loser” as a “scrupulous takedown of Trump’s competence and character” in its September review.
“Given the long list of well-known and historic business achievements by President Trump and his family, President Trump’s remarkable business, literary, media, and real estate achievements, and the fact that President Trump — and his life story — are the epitome of the American Dream and what it means to be an American patriot, as well as his lifelong support for America’s men and women in uniform, these defamatory statements are all the more despicable in their falsity,” Trump’s letter said.
The document claimed that “harm” has been done to the value of Trump Media, per CJR, and reportedly demands $10 billion in damages. Trump is seeking this same amount in a lawsuit against CBS News over an October “60 Minutes” interview it aired with Vice President Kamala Harris, with his attorneys claiming the aired footage was “doctored” to “confuse, deceive, and mislead the public” to “tip the scales” in favor of Democrats before the election. Trump’s camp has blasted the move as “election and voter interference.” The complaint for that case was filed on Oct. 31 in the Northern District of Texas Amarillo Division, where U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk — a Trump appointee — is the lone federal judge.
On Nov. 5, Trump’s legal media crusade continued as he sent a four-page letter on behalf of campaign manager Chris LaCivita to the Daily Beast, per CJR, demanding that the outlet issue a correction and retraction for articles published about his co-chief, including one on Nov. 2 that is now titled, “Trump Raged at Daily Beast Revelation That Campaign Boss’ LLC Got $19.2 Million.”
The Daily Beast initially claimed that LaCivita “raked in” $22 million to help Trump win the 2024 election. An editor’s note has been added to the Nov. 2 story to clarify that it was actually $19.2 million in wake of Trump’s letter.
“Editor’s Note: The original version of this article mistakenly reported that LaCivita’s firm had received a total of $22 million from Trump’s campaign and affiliated PACs,” the Daily Beast says. “Based on a further review of FEC records, the correct total is $19.2 million. The Beast regrets the error. The article has also been updated to make clear that payments were to LaCivita’s LLC not to LaCivita personally.”
Trump’s crusade may have kicked off before the election, but it’s gained even more steam with his win and recent comments he’s made, with free speech advocacy watchdog group PEN America touching upon this in a press release on Friday.
“President-elect Donald Trump’s legal threats mark an ominous start to his transition to the White House, signaling his intent to escalate attacks on journalism and publishing,” said Tim Richardson, program director for Journalism and Disinformation at PEN America, in response to CJR’s reporting. “While The New York Times and Penguin Random House may have the resources to defend themselves against these clearly frivolous claims, smaller news outlets and publishers do not and may be forced to censor themselves rather than risk critical coverage of Trump. That is the point.”
According to Richardson, legal threats and lawsuits like the ones being hurled at CBS and the Times “aren’t about stopping false reporting or even winning cases” brought against them. “They’re about intimidating journalists, writers, and publishers into self-censorship,” Richardson charged. “The worrisome results will be less accountability for our elected leaders and a less informed public.”
Speaking in the press release, PEN America condemned the threats from Trump as being part of a “broader pattern by the President-elect targeting media organizations.” It cited the Times and Random House letter in the release, as well as the CBS lawsuit, the Daily Beast editor’s note and a recent Federal Election Commission complaint against the Washington Post.
“PEN America stands at the intersection of literature and human rights to protect free expression in the United States and worldwide,” the group says in a description. “We champion the freedom to write, recognizing the power of the word to transform the world. Our mission is to unite writers and their allies to celebrate creative expression and defend the liberties that make it possible.”
An insider tells CJR that Penguin Random House responded to Trump’s legal warning with a statement, saying it stood by everything it published. It’s unclear whether Trump’s lawyer has replied.
The Daily Beast, meanwhile, was unable to get off the hook with its editor’s note as Trump’s team sent a follow-up letter on Nov. 12 saying the move “does not remedy the overall messaging of the story — which depicts Mr. LaCivita as deceptively pocketing campaign money for his own personal gain and that he was and is on the verge of being ‘fired’ because of it,” Politico reports.
“This entire narrative is completely false and a result of malicious and irresponsible reporting by the Daily Beast,” the letter said. “Specifically, the now ‘corrected’ reporting has adjusted the $22 million figure to $19.2 million instead. While not all Daily Beast articles on this subject have yet incorporated the ‘corrected’ figure, some have been ‘updated’ with an editor’s note which stating that ‘This article was updated to clarify that the $22m went to LaCivita’s LLC and not to him personally.’ The remainder of the reporting has remained substantially the same, and despite the addition of the editor’s notes and corrections, it continues to falsely imply that Mr. LaCivita personally pocketed $19.2 million allegedly paid by the Trump campaign for campaign advertising.”
CBS has said that Trump’s lawsuit against the outlet is “completely without merit,” adding that it will “vigorously defend” itself against it. The Committee to Protect Journalists, another watchdog group, has blasted Trump’s legal attacks as being a “clear and direct danger to media freedom.”
“The hostile media climate fostered during Donald Trump’s first presidency — expected to continue in his forthcoming second term — poses great risks to media inside and outside the country,” the group said in a Nov. 6 statement.
“The threats against, and lies about, the media that have characterized much of the Republican Party’s presidential campaign represent a clear and direct danger to media freedom,” added CPJ CEO Jodie Ginsberg. “CPJ will continue to defend a free and independent press in the United States as we do around the world and to take all measures to keep reporters safe.”
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