A US judge has dismissed President Donald Trump's $10 billion lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal and its parent company Dow Jones, ruling the suit violated the First Amendment.
Judge Darrin Gayles threw out the case "with prejudice," meaning it cannot be refiled. This was the second dismissal of the suit. Trump had originally sought $20 billion in damages before reducing the claim and refiling.
Trump sued after the Journal published a story about a letter bearing his name that appeared in a 2003 birthday book for financier Jeffrey Epstein. The letter allegedly contained suggestive language and a hand-drawn outline of a woman's body. Trump denied writing or signing the letter and claimed the Journal slandered him.
Gayles found Trump's legal team failed to prove the defendants made defamatory statements with "actual malice," the legal standard required for public figures to win defamation cases. That standard requires proof the defendant knew a statement was false or acted with reckless disregard for its truth.
Trump's lawyers had argued the Journal should have disregarded its investigation and not published the story because Trump denied writing the letter. Gayles rejected that argument, writing that if such a standard applied, "any time a public figure or his team denies an accusation, journalists would be immediately blocked from publishing negative or contradictory press."
The judge described the Journal's investigation as "thoughtful and detailed" and called Trump's lawsuit "grasping at straws."