A federal judge dismissed Donald Trump’s $475 million defamation lawsuit against CNN, litigation centered on references made by on-air figures to “the Big Lie,” or the former president’s unfounded claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him. U.S. District Judge Raag Singhal wrote that CNN’s references to the term “the Big Lie” were matters of opinion, not fact. The judge wrote, “Trump complains that CNN described his election challenges as ‘the Big Lie.’ Trump argues that ‘the Big Lie’ is a phrase attributed to Joseph Goebbels and that CNN’s use of the phrase wrongly links Trump with the Hitler regime in the public eye. This is a stacking of inferences that cannot support a finding of falsehood.”The lawsuit cited five examples of the use of the term “The Big Lie” or election lies that Trump’s attorneys say the network has refused to retract. CNN’s use of the phrase “the Big Lie” in connection with Trump’s election challenges does not give rise to a plausible inference that Trump advocates the persecution and genocide of Jews or any other group of people.

Source: CNN July 29, 2023 12:10 UTC