Trump threatens more lawsuits against media as ABC to pay $15 million to settle case

Donald Trump said yesterday at a Mar-a-Lago news conference that he would take a couple of questions. 

By the time he finished speaking, he had gone on for an hour. 

Trump made news on a dozen topics, a reminder of the freewheeling approach in which even among journalists who can’t stand him, the incoming president is a newsmaking machine who provides headlines around the clock, setting the terms of debate – in a sharp contrast with the reclusive Joe Biden. 

Trump also deflected a few questions that he absolutely should not have answered, such as strategy on Ukraine and whether he’d retaliate against Iran.

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I was a bit surprised, though, that he launched an attack on the press, though, since this contradicted his recent remarks about reaching out to even hostile news outlets, as long as they treat him fairly. 

This took place two days after ABC and George Stephanopoulos apologized to Trump to settle a defamation, agreeing to donate $15 million to a presidential library or foundation, plus another million bucks to cover his legal fees. This averted what could have been an embarrassing and grueling deposition by its star anchor.

The network’s problem is that Stephanopoulos had repeatedly said Trump had been found liable for “rape,” repeating the word about 10 times, in the E. Jean Carroll civil suit, when the jury held him liable for “sexual abuse.” 

While the judge said this would commonly be understood as rape, they are legally different in New York. You don’t agree to 15 million bucks unless you think you don’t have much of a case.

While left-leaning pundits are accusing ABC of “caving” to Trump, the network made a different judgment call.

Trump ripped the media as “very corrupt” and ticked off more lawsuits he has filed or plans to file.

The president-elect said he planned to sue the Des Moines Register for having a poll before the election that turned out to be wrong. He praised pollster Ann Selzer as always having gotten him right until the Iowa caucuses, when she said he’d lose by 4 points and he won the state by 13. 

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Trump said he was taking legal action against “60 Minutes” for substituting a different, tighter answer to a different question than had been asked—a practice that most journalists, including me, said was a huge blunder by the CBS show. 

“We have to straighten out the press,” he said. “The press is very corrupt. Almost as corrupt as our elections.”

He added: “I’m doing this not because I want to. I’m doing this because I feel I have an obligation to,” Trump said. “In my opinion, it was fraud and it was election interference.”

Trump also said he would pursue a suit against Bob Woodward for making public the audiotapes from a book project. Woodward has said he never agreed not to do so. 

And Trump plans to pursue his action against the Pulitzer Prize board for giving the Washington Post and New York Times awards for what he calls the Russia Russia Russia hoax. While it was certainly overplayed, the board says Trump could not point to any inaccuracies in the articles submitted. 

And then there was Trump commenting on, well, just about everything else. 

He said he would consider a pardon for indicted New York Mayor Eric Adams because he’d been treated “very unfairly.”

He said he couldn’t understand how people could sympathize with the suspect in the fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson: “It was cold-blooded. Just a cold-blooded, horrible killing, and how people can like this guy is — that’s a sickness, actually.”

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He heaped praise on Lara Trump but said the decision on whether to name her to a vacant Florida Senate seat was up to DeSantis. However, the Wall Street Journal reports that he has lobbied the governor to choose her.

He defended DOD nominee Pete Hegseth, saying all he wants to do is improve the military. He also provided visual backing by bringing Hegseth to the Army-Navy Game, along with JD Vance, Elon Musk (of course), Ron DeSantis, Tulsi Gabbard and Speaker Mike Johnson.

Trump said he would keep the polio vaccine but would have discussions with RFK Jr. about other vaccines, including his totally debunked theory that vaccines cause autism. Trump did argue there has been a rise in autism among boys. “I think he’s going to be much less radical than you would think,” he told reporters.

Trump demanded that Biden officials explain what is happening with the mystery drones, since they obviously know. 

That is a whole lot of news. Perhaps we’ve forgotten how Donald J. Trump loves to sound off on everything under the sun. We’re about to get a four-year refresher course.