- A federal judge dismissed Donald Trump's $10 billion defamation lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal, Rupert Murdoch, and associated journalists and publishers.
- The lawsuit concerned the newspaper's reporting on an alleged birthday letter from Trump to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, which Trump denies writing.
- Florida District Judge Darrin P. Gayles ruled that Trump failed to demonstrate "actual malice," the legal standard for proving defamation.
- The judge stated that Trump "came nowhere close to this standard" and disagreed with his argument that the defendants acted with serious doubts about their reporting's truthfulness.
- The ruling allows Trump the opportunity to file an amended complaint, while the defendants had argued the lawsuit was an "affront to the First Amendment."
IN FULL