How Pulitzer is 'flipping Trump’s own arguments on their head' in ongoing legal battle

28 January

In late 2022, Donald Trump filed a defamation lawsuit against the Pulitzer Prize Board, which, he claimed, defamed him by refusing to retract prizes it gave the New York Times and the Washington Post for their Russiagate reporting.

Trump, in the lawsuit, alleged that the Times and the Post defamed him in their articles and that the Pulitzer Prize Board, by awarding them, defamed him as well. Many Trump critics attacked the lawsuit as frivolous, pointing out that the Pulitzer Prize Board itself didn't write the articles he claimed were defamatory.

Now, according to CNN and Mediaite, the Pulitzer Prize Board is fighting the lawsuit by "using Trump's own legal arguments against him."

CNN's Hadas Gold reports, "In their motion filed on Monday, (January 27), the Pulitzer Board pointed out that Trump previously sought stays in other civil lawsuits where he was the defendant, saying the suits should be halted while he is in office because of questions of whether the U.S. Constitution bars state courts from exercising jurisdiction over…. a sitting president."

Gold notes that "for years," Trump "demanded the Pulitzer Board rescind the 2018 prize, arguing that he had been exonerated by special counsel Robert Mueller's 2019 report."

"Following Trump’s demands," Gold explains, "the Pulitzer Board commissioned two independent reviews of the awards, issuing a statement in 2022 that read in part: 'No passages or headlines, contentions or assertions in any of the winning submissions were discredited by facts that emerged subsequent to the conferral of the prizes.' It was that statement that prompted Trump to file his defamation suit against the (Pulitzer Prize) Board, choosing to file it in Florida because one member of the Board is a Florida resident."

Mediaite's David Gilmour points out that the Pulitzer Prize Board is "flipping President Donald Trump's own legal arguments on their head in an attempt to pause his defamation lawsuit against them."

"The Pulitzer Board's argument essentially repurposes Trump's own defense tactics to shield themselves from litigation while his case is active," Gilmour observes. "While federal criminal charges against Trump are on hold due to Justice Department policy against prosecuting sitting presidents, several civil suits are moving forward. These include the $500 million fraud judgment secured by New York Attorney General Letitia James and judgments won by E. Jean Carroll for sexual abuse and defamation."

Gilmour adds, "Whether the legal move will halt Trump’s Pulitzer lawsuit remains to be seen."

Read CNN's full article at this link and Mediaite's reporting here.

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