On Monday, former President Donald Trump filed a lawsuit against CNN, demanding $475 million in damages on the grounds that the network defamed him in an attempt to stymie any future political campaigns he may run.
The complaint, filed in U.S. District Court in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, centers on the phrase “The Big Lie,” which refers to Trump’s bogus accusations of widespread fraud that he alleges lost him the 2020 presidential election to Joe Biden.
In response to the case, CNN said that it had no comment.
Trump’s attacks on CNN while in office were popular among his Republican supporters. Like many others, he has tried to sue major technology firms without much success. A California court dismissed his complaint against Twitter earlier this year for removing him from the site after the revolt on January 6, 2021, in the United States Capitol.
The attorney general of the United States, as well as a large number of federal and local election authorities from both parties, as well as prominent former campaign aides, have all declared that Trump has shown no proof of the electoral fraud he claims occurred.
Trump argues in his complaint that since January 2021, CNN has referred to him over 7,700 times as the “Big Lie,” a term having Nazi overtones.
Those who hear it will be “aggravated,” “frightened,” and “triggered,” he claimed.
On Monday, Trump issued a statement in which he hinted that additional news outlets might be sued in a manner similar to the one he described. He also threatened “necessary measures” against the House panel probing his supporters’ assault on the Capitol on January 6. As he considers running for president in 2024, the lawsuit comes at a bad time.
Reportedly, more than three months ago, CNN’s new CEO Chris Licht privately told his news workers to avoid using the word because it is too similar to Democratic attempts to brand the previous president.