A former President Barack Obama judge has reportedly been assigned to President Donald Trump's $10 billion defamation lawsuit against Rupert Murdoch and The Wall Street Journal.
U.S. District Judge Darrin Gayles in the Southern District of Florida was nominated by Obama in February 2014, and became the first openly gay Black federal judge.
Gayles was also assigned a Trump $500 million lawsuit against embattled former attorney Michael Cohen in 2023, but Trump was forced to temporarily pause that case due to court-date conflicts in the Democrat prosecutor-led cases he faced before the 2024 presidential election.
Gayles has filed dissent against voter ID laws, claiming they hurt minorities, potentially showing a bias against Trump, who signed anti-DEI executive orders his first day in office.
Trump filed his $10 billion lawsuit against the Journal and Murdoch on Friday, a day after the newspaper published a report on a 50th birthday note to Jeffrey Epstein, who Trump has admitted to having interacted with but severed ties when allegations of sex trafficking came to light.
The move came shortly after the Justice Department asked a federal court Friday to unseal grand jury transcripts in Epstein's sex trafficking case.
Trump promised to sue the Journal almost immediately, denying writing the letter claimed by the Journal, calling the story "false, malicious, and defamatory."
The suit accuses the paper and its reporters of having "knowingly and recklessly" published "numerous false, defamatory, and disparaging statements," which, it alleges, caused "overwhelming financial and reputational harm" to the president.
"This lawsuit is filed not only on behalf of your favorite President, ME, but also in order to continue standing up for ALL Americans who will no longer tolerate the abusive wrongdoings of the Fake News Media," Trump wrote in a Truth Social post, announcing the defamation lawsuit.
Trump said he spoke to both to the paper's owner, Rupert Murdoch, and its top editor, Emma Tucker, before the story was published and told them the letter was "fake."
"These are not my words, not the way I talk. Also, I don't draw pictures," the president insisted.
The outlet described the contents of the letter but did not publish a photo showing it entirely or provide details on how it came to learn about it.
In the lawsuit, the defendants, it attests, "failed to attach the letter, failed to attach the alleged drawing, failed to show proof that President Trump authored or signed any such letter, and failed to explain how this purported letter was obtained."
"The reason for those failures is because no authentic letter or drawing exists," it goes on to charge, alleging the "Defendants concocted this story to malign President Trump's character and integrity and deceptively portray him in a false light."
Earlier Friday, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche filed motions in a separate federal court urging them to unseal the Epstein transcripts as well as those in the case against Ghislaine Maxwell, who was convicted of luring teenage girls to be sexually abused by Epstein. Epstein died by suicide in 2019, shortly after his arrest while awaiting trial.
The DOJ said in the court filings that it will work with prosecutors in New York to make appropriate redactions of victim-related information and other personally identifying information before transcripts are released.
"Transparency in this process will not be at the expense of our obligation under the law to protect victims," Blanche wrote.
Information from The Associated Press was used to compile this report.
Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
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