Tag: Lawsuit

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Donald Trump Jr.

Vindman Suing Donald Trump Jr. For Witness Intimidation

Former Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman just made the legal problems facing Donald Trump Jr. even worse, filing a lawsuit against the failed, one-term former president’s son that could result in costing Don Jr. millions of dollars in damages.

ABC News reports:

Vindman has filed a lawsuit against Donald Trump Jr., Rudy Giuliani, former White House Deputy Chief of Staff Dan Scavino and former Trump White House official Julia Hahn, alleging they engaged in a conspiracy of witness intimidation against him over his testimony in then-President Donald Trump’s 2019 impeachment.

Vindman, who was one of the few officials to directly listen into the July 2019 phone call between former President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, outlines in the lawsuit what he describes as “an intentional, concerted campaign of unlawful intimidation and retaliation” over his role in Trump’s impeachment.

Lt. Col. Vindman is asking a federal judge to rule Trump Jr., Giuliani, Scavino, and Hahn were all part of a “conspiracy campaign” and award financial damages.

Vindman’s lawsuit is based on a law that was passed to help control the Ku Klux Klan, which is ironic considering that Donald Trump’s late father, Fred, was allegedly aligned with the KKK:

The lawsuit against the four alleges that they violated sections 1 and 2 of the Ku Klux Klan Act, which is intended to bar threats or intimidation against government officials carrying out their constitutional duties.

Additionally, Vindman’s suit alleges that the harassment campaign against him is tied to the ongoing investigation being conducted by the House Select Committee looking into the January 6 Capitol insurrection.

“Witnesses subpoenaed by Congress in connection with its investigation into the events of January 6, 2021, continue to heed former President Trump’s instructions to defy those subpoenas, undermining Congress’s constitutional oversight role and the fundamental principle of checks and balances between three co-equal branches of government.”

 

Categories
Fox News Fox News Lies Media in America

Judge Rules That Massive $1.6 Billion Lawsuit Against Fox News Will Move Forward

A Delaware judge has ruled that Fox News “intended to avoid the truth” when broadcasting misinformation about the 2020 election and Dominion Voting Systems, which is suing the right-wing network for defamation and seeking $1.6 billion in damages.

CNN reports that Superior Court Judge Eric Davis’ ruling was a major blow to Fox, which was asking the court to dismiss the Dominion suit:

The ruling will now allow Dominion to attempt to unearth extensive communications within Fox News as they gather evidence for the case, and the company may be able to interview the network’s top names under oath.

At this stage, the court must assume Dominion’s claims about Fox News are true.

Judge Davis noted in his ruling that Dominion had notified Fox of inaccuracies they had broadcast and supplied them with information that clearly refuted accusations of vote-switching in the 2020 presidential race:

“Nevertheless, Fox and its news personnel continued to report Dominion purported connection to the election fraud claims without also reporting on Dominion’s emails … Given that Fox apparently refused to report contrary evidence, including evidence from the Department of Justice, the Complaint’s allegations support the reasonable inference that Fox intended to keep Dominion’s side of the story out of the narrative.”

According to CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin, the ruling is very bad news for Fox:

“By putting Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, making these outrageous false allegations on the air without allowing Dominion to refute them, that’s libel. And that’s what Fox is going to have to defend. And I don’t know how they’re going to defend it it. I think it’s a very good case for the plaintiffs.”

Former White House counsel John Dean concurred with Toobin, noting:

“This case has not been decided on any substance yet. Just on the pleadings. And it made the basic bar and got over that, which is going to be a nightmare for Fox, as Jeffrey says. They’re going to now dig in deep and it’s not going to be easy.”

If Fox is found liable and forced to pay $1.6 billion in damages, that could lead to other enormous lawsuits. Enough large lawsuits could leave the network financially vulnerable and lead to its collapse. Imagine how much better a world without Fox News would be.

 

Categories
Donald Trump Jr. The Karma Is Gonna Get Ya

Court Loss For Donald Trump Jr. Could Wind Up Costing Him A Fortune

Donald Trump Jr. loves to run his mouth and toss around insults aimed at others. But a slur he used against a West Virginia Senate candidate is now one step closer to costing him a lot of money.

Remember the name Don Blankenship? He’s the former head of Massey Energy, which owns and operates coal mines in the Mountain State. He ran for the Republican nomination to be a U.S. Senator from West Virginia and had previously been convicted of conspiring to violate safety standards at the Upper Big Branch mine, which is a misdemeanor.

When someone mentioned on Twitter that Blankenship would face a tough race against incumbent Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, Junior replied:

“He’s probably never run against a felon.”

Even though Don Jr. later deleted the tweet, the damage had been done, and Blankenship filed a lawsuit for defamation. Why? Because he’s not a felon. He was convicted of a misdemeanor. Granted, that’s slicing it thin, but the suit was filed.

 

Since then, attorneys for Don Jr. have been trying to have the defamation suit dismissed, but a judge ruled recently that the suit will move forward, according to Jan Wolfe of Reuters:

https://twitter.com/JanNWolfe/status/1433205563383599107?s=20
https://twitter.com/JanNWolfe/status/1433206259650646017?s=20

The defamation suit is still active and will proceed, according to the judge. That’s bad news for Junior because he could be facing a considerable financial judgment if he’s found guilty of having defamed Blankenship.

Of course, Junior and other members of his family are also facing criminal charges for their allegedly illegal actions regarding the Trump Organization, including possibly being indicted for tax fraud and other financial crimes.

It was a bad day for Donald Trump Jr. And it appears he’s facing many more bad days in the months ahead.

 

Categories
Congress GOP Whining Russia WTF?!

Devin Nunes Sues MSNBC Because Rachel Maddow Exposed His Ties To Russia

Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) — who is fresh off losing a lawsuit he filed against CNN — is now suing the parent company of MSNBC, NBCUniversal Media, for defamation because MSNBC host Rachel Maddow dared to reveal his many connections to Russia and Russian operatives who tried to influence the 2016 presidential election.

According to Bloomberg:

“California Republican Congressman Devin Nunes sued NBCUniversal Media alleging that MSNBC’s liberal talk show host Rachel Maddow defamed him with on-air suggestions he’d conspired with a Russian agent to rig the 2016 presidential election for Donald Trump.

“Nunes, who is the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, says Maddow has repeatedly targeted him with defamatory statements that accuse him of obstruction of justice and treason. Nunes said Maddow has also called for him to lose his committee post and be stripped of his security clearances.”

What exactly did Maddow say that Nunes is claiming was defamatory? Well, she let the world know about his many ties to Russia and Russian nationals who played a part in running a smear campaign against Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election to benefit Donald Trump, who was favored by the Kremlin.

Here’s what Maddow reported on March 8, 2021:

“Last summer, the Senate Intelligence Committee in the house learned that same guy, Derkach, had mailed a stack of unknown materials to Devin Nunes, who is the top Republican on the Intelligence Committee to this day. Andrei Derkach singled out by name by the Director of National Intelligence as someone under Vladimir Putin‘s direct purview who helped run this organization targeting our election last year. Congressman Nunes accepted a package from him. What was in it? Congressman Nunes has refused to answer questions about what he has received from Andrei Derkach.”

The problem for Nunes is that every single word of what Maddow said is true and easily fact-checked against declassified congressional and intelligence reports on the 2016 election.

So why is Nunes suing? He claims that Maddow and MSNBC never contacted him for comment and therefore he wasn’t allowed to present his side of the story. However, given the fact that Nunes constantly lies, his accusation is almost certainly false.

Also, a journalist as precise and seasoned as Maddow would never air a story without reaching out for comment from Nunes or an official representative who could speak on behalf of the congressman.

The highly litigious California Republican will lose the suit against NBCUniversal, the same way he’s lost all of the other defamation suits he’s filed against media companies — including Twitter — which dared to allow accounts that were critical of Nunes to remain on their platform.

Devin Nunes is a Russian asset. All the lawsuits in the world won’t change that fact.

 

Categories
Coronavirus Donald Trump

Trump Slapped With $1 Trillion Lawsuit For The Enormous U.S. COVID Death Toll

Everywhere he looks, failed, one-term former President Donald Trump sees legal obstacles, any one of which may wind up leading to him being put on trial and having to serve major prison time.

Now there’s a new legal problem for Trump, and this one could well send him to the poorhouse.

NewJersey.com reports that the Donald is being sued for the sum of $1 trillion for the way he mishandled the COVID-19 pandemic, and the person who filed the lawsuit isn’t even an attorney. Instead, he’s a convicted murderer who’s currently on parole:

“Arnett Thomas never thought he would be battling Donald Trump in court.  

“Thomas, now 71, disabled and living in a government-sponsored housing complex in Orange came to file a lawsuit in federal court in Newark that blames Trump for America’s massive — and growing — COVID-19 death toll.”

Thomas wastes no time explaining why he’s decided to file such a lawsuit, and he doesn’t spare any words:

“The former president literally became the very domestic enemy to the Constitution he swore to defend.

“The point of all of this is how Trump dealt with the pandemic. He drove people to dying.”

The punishment should fit the crime, Thomas believes. And since nearly 570,000 Americans are already dead from the disease, $1 trillion sounds like a fitting amount.

Even though Thomas wrote the lawsuit himself, he’s currently seeking to have an attorney take the case. And he’s also managed to round up 75 co-plaintiffs so far, but that number will probably increase as news of the suit begins to spread.

Thomas also believes that if Trump had done his job and battled the virus the way he should have, things would have been very different — for the nation and for the former president:

“Trump allowed the disease to spread. What he did was politically motivated. If Trump would have handled this pandemic in a proper way he would have been elected [again]. Trump got kicked out because of the way he handled it.”

Instead, Trump told the nation COVID would disappear just as quickly as it had arrived. He pooh-pooed the mounting death toll and muzzled medical experts such as Dr. Anthony Fauci. He failed to do what he promised to do when he took the oath of office: To protect the country from all enemies, foreign and domestic. There should be a price to pay for that.

When you think of it that way, $1 trillion doesn’t seem like nearly enough.