President Donald Trump won a crucial legal victory Monday in his lawsuit against Pulitzer Prize Board members, opening the door for the discovery phase of their litigation battle.
Last Monday, the board members filed a move for a Protective Order Governing Discovery in order to protect their internal conversations over the decision to award The New York Times and The Washington Post Pulitzer Prizes for their reporting on Russiagate during Trump’s first term in office.
Judge Robert L. Pegg of the 19th Judicial Circuit Court in Okeechobee County, Florida, denied their request.
The rule demands an affirmative demonstration of irritation, humiliation, oppression, or excessive hardship or expense from the party or person involved. Defendants have failed to meet this requirement, as there is no factual evidence in the record to show that any defendant, let alone each defendant, would face annoyance, embarrassment, oppression, or undue burden or expense if a protective order is not entered,” Pegg wrote in his filing.
“President Trump is committed to holding those who engage in deception and fake news accountable,” Trump attorney Quincy Bird told AWN Digital. “The defendants, hiding behind the once-prestigious Pulitzer Prizes, attempted to resurrect a left-wing hoax by giving, as well as continuing to stand by and republishing, its disgraced award to the organizations that drove the infamous ‘Russia Russia Russia’ hoax.”
“This was a slanderous hoax intended to harm President Trump’s reputation and presidential campaign. Following today’s court victory, the lawsuit will move forward with a comprehensive discovery process. President Trump is dedicated to bringing the matter to a fair conclusion, according to Bird.
AWN Digital contacted the Pulitzer Prizes for comment.
In 2022, Trump filed a defamation lawsuit against the Pulitzer Prize Board for the Times and Post’s 2018 National Reporting awards for coverage of the “now-debunked theory” of alleged cooperation between the Trump campaign and Russia.
According to the lawsuit, a “demonstrably false connection was and remains the stated basis” for the reportage that garnered the coveted prize.
The Times and Post staffs shared the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting for “deeply sourced, relentlessly reported coverage in the public interest that dramatically furthered the nation’s understanding of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and its connections to the Trump campaign, the President-elect’s transition team, and his eventual administration,” according to the Pulitzer website.
“A large swath of Americans had a tremendous misunderstanding of the truth at the time the Times’ and the Post’s propagation of the Russia Collusion Hoax dominated the media,” the complaint stipulates. “Remarkably, they were rewarded for lying to the American public.”
The lawsuit cited a number of reasons why it believes the Pulitzer Prize-winning pieces are undeserving of the award, including Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s failure to establish proof of collusion and a DOJ Inspector General Report detailing misbehavior by government investigators.
Trump’s team had earlier requested “a full and fair correction, apology, or retraction” in addition to the revocation of the 2018 accolades, but the Pulitzer Prize Board ruled the awards would stay.
“The Pulitzer Prize Board has a well-established, formal process for thoroughly reviewing complaints about winning entries.” In the last three years, the Pulitzer Prize Board has received inquiries, including from former President Donald Trump, about submissions from The New York Times and The Washington Post on Russian interference in the US election and its connections to the Trump campaign–submissions that jointly won the 2018 National Reporting Prize,” the Pulitzer Prize Board previously stated.
This new legal success follows ABC News’ $15 million settlement and Meta’s $25 million deal with Trump in recent weeks. CBS News’ parent company, Paramount, is allegedly considering its own deal to terminate the network’s high-profile legal dispute with Trump. Trump has also sued The Des Moines Register and Ann Selzer, a seasoned pollster.
Boris Epshteyn, Trump’s Senior Counsel, is coordinating several legal fronts, both criminal and civil, including the fight against the Pulitzer board members.
