One year ago, The Star reported on Melania Trump’s threat to sue the author and journalist Michael Wolff for $1 billion if he did not retract and apologize for statements linking her to the late financier and pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
Mr. Wolff, who with his family moved from Manhattan to Amagansett during the Covid-19 pandemic, countered that threat by bringing a lawsuit in State Supreme Court accusing the first lady of trying to stifle his inquiry into Epstein, suppressing his reporting on a matter of public concern.
Mrs. Trump had referred to an article based on “Trump’s Epstein Scandal Can’t Stop Won’t Stop,” an episode of The Daily Beast’s “Inside Trump’s Head” podcast, which Mr. Wolff co-hosts. The Daily Beast retracted the article following a complaint from Mrs. Trump, writing that it “did not meet our standards and has therefore been removed from our platforms.”
In his lawsuit, Mr. Wolff relied on New York State’s anti-SLAPP law (Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation). SLAPP lawsuits — litigation tactics intended to silence critics and force time-consuming and expensive legal procedures — have long been employed by President Trump. New York’s anti-SLAPP legislation protects against meritless lawsuits aimed at suppressing free speech on matters of public interest.
Mr. Wolff is the author of books including “Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House,” published in 2018, and “Too Famous: The Rich, the Powerful, the Wishful, the Notorious, the Damned” from 2022, which includes a long essay titled “The Last Days of Jeffrey Epstein.” In the 1990s, he was a media columnist for New York magazine and more recently wrote for The Hollywood Reporter. He has long known the president, and previously told The Star that he had met Epstein a few times while working for New York magazine. His own name appears repeatedly in the so-called Epstein files.
Mr. Wolff sued Mrs. Trump in New York State Supreme Court after receiving a Florida pre-suit libel notice demanding a retraction and apology. Mrs. Trump successfully moved the case to a federal court, asserting “diversity jurisdiction,” which allows that court to hear a civil lawsuit when the dispute is between parties from different states. The move was necessary, she maintained, because she is a resident of Florida and not New York.
Mr. Wolff argued that Mrs. Trump was indeed a New York resident, citing her residence at Trump Tower in Manhattan, ongoing ties via property ownership, and continuous time spent in the state.
In May, rather than decide the case, the federal district court dismissed it, reasoning that Mr. Wolff should wait to see “if and when” Mrs. Trump actually sued him for defamation.
Mr. Wolff filed a notice of appeal in June. On Friday, his lawyers asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit to reverse the federal court and send the case back to New York. “This action arises from an effort to silence” Mr. Wolff’s reporting, the legal brief states. “The gravamen of the Complaint is to protect Mr. Wolff’s free-speech rights under the New York Constitution, the First Amendment, and New York anti-SLAPP law to preserve his ability to continue reporting on the Trumps and the Epstein matter without the chilling effect of Mrs. Trump’s threats.”
The federal court’s determination “in effect, gags the speech of a journalist on matters of utmost public concern,” the brief argues. Mrs. Trump is not a public official, it continues, “yet this action unavoidably implicates the public’s entitlement to information about its government. The speech being suppressed concerns the extent of the sitting President and First Lady’s relationship with child sex offender and human trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.”
Along with the assertion that Mrs. Trump has yet to provide clear and convincing evidence that she has changed her residency to Florida, the brief charges that “the district court abused its discretion by assuming supplemental jurisdiction over Mr. Wolff’s affirmative anti-SLAPP claim — only to dismiss this action.” The dismissal leaves him facing the “chilling effect” of the threatened defamation suit without an adjudication of his rights, it concludes.
Should the Court of Appeals side with Mr. Wolff, who seeks costs, attorney’s fees, and damages under New York Civil Rights Law, it could order the case returned to State Supreme Court, which would allow his anti-SLAPP claim to be heard without having to wait for a defamation lawsuit from Mrs. Trump, or at minimum require further fact-finding about her legal residency.
