'No holds barred!' CNN expert warns Trump just walked himself into a legal trap
President Donald Trump's lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal for publishing this week's massive story about his salacious birthday letter to deceased financier and child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein exposes him to a massive legal risk, former prosecutor Elie Honig told CNN's Jake Tapper on Friday afternoon.
The story, which Trump reportedly scrambled behind the scenes to try to stop from going public at all, details a graphic letter Trump sent that was outlined by a doodle of a naked woman. Trump claims this letter was fabricated and he doesn't make drawings of that sort, even though a number of such Trump drawings have sold at auction.
"So Elie, what would discovery look like?" asked anchor Jake Tapper. "I mean, I imagine if the Wall Street Journal and News Corp and Rupert Murdoch are going to mount any sort of defense, they're going to want to know everything they can find out about President Trump's relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. They're going to seek possession or introduction as evidence, whatever this birthday book is. I mean, might this not end up just dredging up a lot of stuff Trump doesn't want to talk about anyway?"
Honig, a frequent analyst of the president's legal situation, agreed. "I'm not so sure Donald Trump has fully thought this one through, Jake."
"You showed at the beginning of the show his very recent social media post where he said, 'Oh, I look forward to deposing Rupert Murdoch under oath, that should be fascinating,'" said Honig. "Well, guess who else is going to have to testify under oath at a deposition? The plaintiff in this case, the person who's suing: Donald John Trump. And the subject of that testimony, which again, will be under oath, will be his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, no holds barred."
The upshot, he said, is that "by filing this lawsuit, he is walking himself right into that scenario. Discovery goes both ways. Plaintiff has to turn stuff over to the defendant and vice versa. So I have some questions about the legal strategy here."
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