Trump loses legal battle over Epstein-linked Wall Street Journal case

Judge permanently drops Trump’s $10bn WSJ lawsuit, ruling the president failed to prove actual malice in the newspaper’s reporting

A federal judge has permanently dismissed United States President Donald Trump’s multibillion-dollar defamation lawsuit against media mogul Rupert Murdoch and The Wall Street Journal.

On Saturday, US District Judge Darrin Gayles concluded that the president had failed to establish the standard of “actual malice” required for defamation suits.

Under US law, a successful complaint must show that the defendant released a defamatory statement knowing it was false or with “reckless disregard” for its accuracy.

Gayles, however, said that Trump was “grasping at straws” with his $10bn case against The Wall Street Journal.

“The Amended Complaint falls short of pleading actual malice,” Gayles wrote.

“Indeed, the allegations regarding malice are conclusory, vague, sometimes inconsistent with the Article and often irrelevant to whether Defendants knew or should have known that the statements in the Article were purportedly false.”

The judge went so far as to suggest that Trump’s legal team had attempted “to manufacture flaws with the investigation” published in The Wall Street Journal.

The case stemmed from coverage that linked Trump to the late disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

On 17 July 2025, The Wall Street Journal published an exclusive describing a sexually suggestive birthday note gifted to Epstein for his 50th birthday in 2003, as part of a book of congratulatory letters.

The letters were reportedly collected by disgraced British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year prison sentence for her involvement in Epstein’s sex-trafficking scheme.

The note attributed to Trump includes typed text framed by a hand-drawn outline of what appears to be a curvaceous woman. At the bottom, where her pelvic region might be, is Trump’s signature.

Trump vehemently denied responsibility for the text, the signature and the artwork. A copy of the birthday letter was later released through the House Oversight Committee.

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The Wall Street Journal’s article came at a time when Trump’s second administration was facing intense scrutiny over whether it had withheld documents about Epstein’s alleged sex crimes, despite promises of transparency.

Critics had also raised questions about the nature of Trump and Epstein’s relationship. The two men appear to have socialised together, and Epstein was known to have surrounded himself with powerful figures from politics, academia and the business world.

In 2025, Trump said he ended his relationship with Epstein after the financier “stole” female employees from his Mar-a-Lago resort.

Epstein was convicted of soliciting a minor for sex in Florida in 2008, for which he served 13 months in jail. In 2019, he faced federal charges related to sex trafficking, but he was found dead in his New York City jail cell before he could be brought to trial. His death was later ruled a suicide.

Legal advocates say Epstein’s victims are estimated to number in the hundreds.

After the release of The Wall Street Journal report, Trump branded the newspaper’s coverage “false, malicious, and defamatory”.

His lawsuit, filed in the federal court in Miami on 18 July 2025, accused the paper and its reporters of having “knowingly and recklessly” published “numerous false, defamatory, and disparaging statements”.

The result, it alleged, was “overwhelming financial and reputational harm” to the president. Two journalists associated with The Wall Street Journal article were named among the defendants.

In April, Judge Gayles dismissed the defamation lawsuit, ruling that Trump had failed to prove the reporting was borne of “actual malice”.

But that initial ruling gave Trump the opportunity to refile his complaint, which he did in May.

The updated lawsuit claimed The Wall Street Journal had been reckless in not showing how reporters had received and verified the letter.

Saturday’s Miami ruling deals a final blow to Trump’s attempt to sue over the issue. Gayles’s decision dismisses the case “with prejudice”, which effectively blocks any future litigation on the matter.

Trump has other ongoing defamation cases against other media outlets, including the BBC and The New York Times.