Donald Trump, former US president sued CNN and seeks $475 million in punitive damages on the grounds of defamation, claiming “As a part of its concerted effort to tilt the political balance to the left, CNN has tried to taint the Plaintiff with a series of ever-more scandalous, false, and defamatory labels of ‘racist,’ ‘Russian lackey,’ ‘insurrectionist,’ and ultimately ‘Hitler’,” as reported by Reuters.
The 29-page lawsuit claims that CNN carried out a “campaign of libel and slander” against him, it’s claimed that the network allegedly has a long record of criticising him however, it has been ramped up in recent months in supposed fear of Trump running for president in 2024.
The lawsuit was filed in the US District Court in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Trump claims in the lawsuit that the network’s considerable influence was being used to defeat him politically.
The former president said he would be filing lawsuits against more media companies “in the coming weeks and months” and that he could even take action against a congressional committee probing his supporters’ attack on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021.