Former President Donald Trump has sued CBS News, claiming the “deceptive” editing of a recent 60 Minutes interview with Vice President Kamala Harris misled the public and unfairly disadvantaged him.
In a statement released Thursday, CBS News called the former president’s claims “completely baseless” and said the network planned to vigorously defend itself against the lawsuit.
The lawsuit, which comes just days before the two candidates face off in the 2024 presidential election, focuses on two clips from an interview 60 Minutes conducted with Harris in October. One of the clips was edited to include a longer part of her answer to a question about the conflict in the Middle East. Trump’s lawsuit claims this editing decision was intended to deliberately benefit his opponent and mislead the public, something CBS News has disputed.
“To cover up Kamala’s ‘word salad’ weakness, CBS used its national platform on 60 Minutes to cross the line from exercising judgment in reporting to deceptive, deceptive manipulation of news,” the lawsuit alleges. According to the lawsuit, the former president is seeking a jury trial and damages of at least $10 billion.
Former President Trump’s repeated claims to 60 Minutes are false network statement say. “The interview was not manipulated.”
Trump’s legal complaint was filed Thursday in federal court in the Amarillo Division in the Northern District of Texas, a remote location where the sole judge is a 2019 Trump appointee. Republican-led states and special interest groups have referred at least fourteen politically sensitive cases to that court since January 2021, according to progressive watchdog group Accountable.US.
The lawsuit does not allege that Trump was defamed by the network, said Geoffrey R. Stone, a First Amendment scholar and law professor at the University of Chicago, who reviewed the complaint. Instead, the lawsuit seeks to make a new use of a Texas statute intended to prevent advertisers from misleading the public about a product being sold: the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Consumer Protection Act.
Stone called it a “misapplication” of the law.
“That statute is about sales: a seller can be held liable if he claims that a product has certain positive effects when he knows that this is not the case,” Stone said. “But CBS is not in the business of advertising here.”
Harvard law professor Noah Feldman, an expert on constitutional law, said he was stunned by Trump’s claims and called the case an “outrageous violation of the principles of the First Amendment.”
“This is a complaint so ill-founded that it could almost be dismissed as frivolous,” Feldman said.
The former president has been expressing his dissatisfaction with the campaign interview for weeks.
“Millions of Americans, including residents of Texas and this District, were confused and misled by the two doctored interview versions,” the complaint alleges.
In an earlier statement from 60 Minutes, the network explained that the two clips were edited differently because one segment, which appeared on “Face the Nation,” allowed more time to process a longer portion of Harris’ response.
“Same question. Same answer. But different part of the answer,” October 20 statement from 60 Minutess said. “When we edit an interview, whether it’s with a politician, an athlete or a movie star, we strive to be clear, accurate and timely. The part of her response to 60 Minutes was more concise, allowing time for other topics in a broader context.
Trump was invited for his own interview on 60 Minutes, but rejected.
The former president has previously filed several lawsuits against media organizations, including a defamation lawsuit in March against ABC News following a question asked by host George Stephanopoulos during an interview.
He has lost previous defamation lawsuits against CNN, The Washington Post and The New York Times.
