Trump sued ABC and anchored George Stephanopoulos, who inaccurately said on air that Trump was found civilly liable for raping writer E. Jean Carroll. The 15 million will go toward the Trump presidential library. Let’s now bring in senior staff writer for TheHill.com, Alex Bolton. Alex, good morning to you. Hope you had a great weekend. Let me play a bit of sound off the top here for starters because some of the media are really sounding the alarm over this settlement. Take a quick listen. Trump and his team is going to be emboldened by this settlement. Have shown they want to use the courts in order to achieve certain outcomes they want.

In this case, they believe justice is being done by holding ABC accountable. Others would say this is a form of lawfare. This feels like it has a real chilling effect. What George Stephanopoulos said in that interview, I mean, it seems to hold up with what the judge said after the fact. Alex, will this have a chilling effect on the media or is this denial that Stephanopoulos messed? Just because you talk fast don’t mean that you know what you’re talking about. To the lady that had the bus cut up in his language on his program.

Well, clearly Stephanopoulos messed up because he mischaracterized the verdict by saying that found liable for rape when in fact he was found liable for sexual assault. Big difference. And it was something that the judge in the case, Lewis Kaplan, clarified that he pointed out explicitly that the New York penal code’s definition of rape was far narrower than what Trump was found liable for. So certainly it was a mistake by Stephanopoulos. Now, does it rise to a whole of a $15 million penalty? That’s pretty steep. But I think what it does show is that media organizations aren’t as confident as they were a decade ago, even though the First Amendment is still there.

Public’s perception of the media and journalists has gone down. Also, they don’t really have the financial resources that they did a decade ago. It’s a less financially stable industry than it was a decade ago. It’s literally less interested in waging a protracted legal battle with a very wealthy opponent. I think the other thing weighing on ABC’s mind is that Dominion voting systems settlement against Fox News, $787 million. Fox decided to fight that out with Dominion over claims related to the 2020 election. Through the discovery process, a lot of embarrassing information, text messages came out.

I think it’s clear that ABC, while it may have had a pretty strong case in court to beat the lawsuit, Trump’s lawsuit. They didn’t want to go through the protracted battle that could have. That’s the thing that people don’t understand. They don’t even understand that when it comes to regular lawsuits. The reason why people don’t want to participate in lawsuits, the reason why they don’t want to that they want to settle it is not because they’re guilty a lot of times. That’s not related to this particular story, but I’m going to tie it in for you guys.

It’s because they don’t want to go through the discovery phase. They don’t want to go through the Fawny Willis’s. You know how when Fawny Willis, once it was discovered that she had her little boy toy, what turned out to be her actually trying to prosecute Trump wasted all of the resources in Fulton County, wasted taxpayer dollars. And then what happened was the boy toy that she was messing to wind up going through a divorce. People started questioning and saying, hey, man, why is this being blocked from being public information when everybody else’s divorce has filed is public information? Well, once that was unsealed, then we started to get into the thick of things because what turned out to be her hiring somebody that was unqualified to help get the back and prosecute Trump.

Then we start reading through text messages. We start seeing a geo locations. We start seeing how often he went over her house. We start seeing everything, right? So a part of the discovery phase and a part of evidence now is also what did you do last summer and what emails was exchanged and who else are you targeting and what other information is being disclosed that we think could tie you to this case and or wind up getting you persecuted or sued from somebody else. And so this is not just about 15, 16 million dollars that they settle for.

This is on multiple different fronts, protecting themselves from future or anything that could could put them in a better and worse situation than what they already was in. Once they realized that they couldn’t get this case thrown out, they settled. They settled. They said, listen, we will put an apology out there and minting guilt. We were wrong. George Stopinopolis is an idiot because he basically put us all in a bad position. We’re going to give Trump 15 million dollars choices presidential library because it ain’t like you need the money. It’s the principal. It’s the principal.

You know what I’m saying? And then they had to pay his lawyers one million dollars in fees and they got to pay their lawyers. And they got to pay their lawyers. And it was a possibility that they could lose. And you go on a war with a billionaire and George Stopinopolis, the roosters is coming home. And again, you got to remember, not only can you lose, you also getting yourself, you’re costing yourself money to even defend yourself. And so they had to do a cost benefit analysis. Here’s what I’m wondering as a part of that cost benefit analysis.

What happens to George Stopinopolis? That’s a heck of a name, ain’t it? Do they dock him? Do they tell him he got to take a pay cut over the next however long? How do they get their money back? Because George was running his mouth about something and being emotional like a female about something that he shouldn’t have been speaking on in the first place. Because if you don’t have the facts and if you call yourself a news organization and you’re a journalist and you don’t state the facts and separate the difference between what your opinion is versus who it is that you’re defaming, then that could be a problem.

And this is why a lot of times also people keep asking. They was originally asking the question, well, how come Jay-Z don’t sue Jaguar Wright? Because according to what everybody else is saying on the internet, she ain’t got no money. Sue her for what? And then what? It would cost me more to sue her and collect than it would for whatever it is that she got to pay. Y’all keep thinking that just because people throw a lawsuit out there, that don’t hurt people that don’t have no money. You can sue somebody all you want to.

Bill collectors sue y’all all day long. I know. I done had some bill collectors sue me in my day. 2008 hit. I was like, they came back and got their money once I got my money back up, but that’s irrelevant. The point of the matter is this doesn’t hurt anybody that don’t got no money. I’m gonna sue you for what? For the pennies that you got? You don’t even got a regular job. Don’t make no difference. Opened up a can of worms. And there’s also CBS, CBS too, right? You can sue for future earnings.

Now, have y’all seen some of these people that y’all say don’t have future earnings? Future earnings doing what? I’m gonna sue for future earnings. You’re a billionaire. See, it makes sense to sue ABC because then you can start to hold people accountable. You can hold these news outlets accountable for how they paint your image and into fame of your character because they got a huge platform. I’m gonna give a piss about these people as pennies. If I sue you, it’s just for the principle. I’m spending money because I got FU money and I just want to make an example out of you.

If I come after you, my initial consulting fees is going to be crazy. But I’m gonna do it just to make an example out of you. And now I got to see it through. I got to make sure that I really get you. Because it ain’t like whatever it is that you got can change my life or do anything whatsoever. Most stories is gone within two or three days anyway. But I may make an example out of you just because. Trump is still suing CBS News for $10 billion for alleged dishonest reporting. And it’s handling a Vice President Harris’ 60-minute interview when we saw different clips being played.

CBS says the interview was edited for timing. How do you see this settlement here with ABC affecting not just that case, but the media’s overall coverage of President-elect Trump moving forward? Well, my view is the… Did he say $10 billion? CBS isn’t as strong because in journalism, you have to make decisions about what’s newsworthy, what’s not newsworthy, what’s worth the viewer’s time and attention. So that’s, I think, basic editorial decision-making. Also, it doesn’t necessarily impugn Trump in the same way that Stephanopoulos did by saying that he was found liable for rape.

I mean, that’s about as ugly a charge as there can be. So I think that Trump may have found more sympathy with the jury in terms of providing a misleading interview about Kamala Harris based on editing decisions. I mean, that seems more of a coin flip. I’d be surprised if CBS settles, but given Trump’s deep pockets, given that corporate ownership wants to stay on the Trump administration’s good side, who knows? Yeah, and I was going to ask you, too, do you think there would have been a settlement with ABC here if Trump had just lost? Is this needing four more years of good favor and is this kissing the ring? That’s a great question.

I don’t think there would have been a settlement had Kamala Harris won the White House, and I think you can’t forget. Everybody’s scared enough. ABC News is owned by Walt Disney Company. It’s a major company that, of course, is going to have business before the new Trump administration. The Trump administration will cut. So also, is this settlement of the lawsuit an investment towards a better relationship with Trump? That’s what y’all got to understand. A lot of these companies are owned by subsidiaries or they’re subsidiaries of larger companies, and so when they settle this lawsuit, are they also looking to get back in Trump’s good graces? Because maybe it’s going to pay out for them longer.

Maybe George Stephanopoulos, maybe Trump’s saying, hey, man, George, keep George around just for the embarrassment. Who knows? Who knows? I’m going to control or have influence over all elements of FCC law and regulation. Shats, not checkers. And the other thing here is that, look, ABC needs to be able to cover the president-elect, and if they have such a bad relationship, it makes that job more difficult. So thanks for watching, everybody. So, yeah, a lot of these news organizations are basically running around with their hair cut off, talking to their legal team, making sure that they get their joy reads in order probably to ensure that hopefully they don’t get sued and they don’t end up like ABC and catch themselves with a $10 billion lawsuit, maybe like CBS.

Then they’re really going to be going out of business. [tr:trw].

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