President Donald Trump's defamation lawsuit against the New York Times could backfire -- and land him under oath to testify about Russia's involvement in his 2016 campaign.
The Trump re-election campaign sued the Times claiming that Max Frankel, the newspaper's former executive editor, defamed the president in a March 27, 2019, op-ed alleging that Russia had an "overarching deal" with the president, but attorney David Lurie warned in a Daily Beast column the suit was highly unlikely to succeed.
"On its merits, Trump’s complaint is extremely weak," Lurie wrote. "A defamation action requires proof that the challenged statement was false. But, because, the campaign (like Trump himself) is a 'public figure,' the First Amendment also bars the suit unless the Trump campaign can establish that the newspaper acted with 'actual malice' -- meaning that the Times had actual knowledge, or reckless disregard, of the challenged statement’s falsity."
The re-election campaign argues the newspaper knew that Trump and his campaign were not corruptly involved with the Kremlin, but Lurie argues that a mountain of evidence -- some reported by the Times and other outlets, and more in indictments filed by Robert Mueller -- showed numerous links between the 2016 campaign and Russia.
"Since truth is a defense, if the Trump campaign’s case against Trump was to go forward to the discovery stage, the Times would inevitably seek to obtain evidence regarding whether Trump and his campaign did in fact enter into a quid pro quo arrangement with Putin," Lurie wrote. "Furthermore, Trump himself would also certainly be a key witness, and would be called upon to provide testimony and documents."
Getting Trump under oath might be such a sweet proposition that the Times might skip any attempt to dismiss the case and proceed directly to the discovery phase, Lurie wrote.
"If the Times employs that strategy, it will be difficult for Trump to maintain that the Constitution prohibits him from being required to testify," Lurie wrote. "After all, the campaign, a corporation Trump controls, chose to bring the case, necessarily recognizing that its principal would have to be made available to provide evidence."