Donald Trump does not walk away from a fight.
The media is seeing just how seriously Trump lives by that.
But Trump just went nuclear in court by unleashing this bold move.
The Story That Started It All
Back in July 2025, The Wall Street Journal published a story about a birthday album assembled for Jeffrey Epstein in 2003 by his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, who is currently serving a 20-year federal prison sentence for child sex trafficking.
The Journal alleged that one item in that album was a letter bearing Trump’s name, accompanied by a sexually suggestive drawing of a woman and the message: “Happy Birthday, may every day be another wonderful secret.”
Trump denied it from the start. His legal team called the letter fabricated. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt went further, posting on X that “WSJ refused to show us the letter and conceded they don’t even have it in their possession when we asked them to verify the alleged document they’re basing their ENTIRE fake story on.”
The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee later subpoenaed and obtained a redacted version of the birthday book from Epstein’s estate, which included the document at the center of the lawsuit. Leavitt said at the time that “it’s very clear President Trump did not draw this picture, and he did not sign it.”
Round One: The First Lawsuit Gets Tossed
Trump filed suit against Dow Jones and Company, the Journal’s publisher, seeking more than $10 billion in damages. The complaint accused the paper of “glaring failures in journalistic ethics and standards of accurate reporting.”
U.S. District Judge Darrin P. Gayles, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, dismissed the case in April, ruling that Trump had “not plausibly alleged that the Defendants published the Article with actual malice.” That is the legal standard public figures must clear to win a defamation case — they have to show the publisher either knew the information was false or recklessly disregarded whether it was true or not.
Gayles wrote that Trump’s original complaint came “nowhere close” to that bar. The judge also noted that the Journal had contacted Trump for comment before publication and included his denial in the article, which actually weakened the malice argument. But Gayles dismissed the case without prejudice, giving Trump’s legal team until late May to refile with stronger allegations.
Trump’s legal team did not hesitate. A spokesperson said at the time: “President Trump will follow Judge Gayles’s ruling and guidance to refile this powerhouse lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal and all of the other Defendants.”
Round Two: The Murdoch Bombshell
The refiled complaint is seven pages longer than the original, and the new material goes straight at Rupert Murdoch personally.
According to the amended filing, Trump called Murdoch on July 15, 2025, after Journal reporters first contacted the White House about the story. Trump told Murdoch the central allegation was “categorically false, and that he had not signed or sent a letter to Epstein for Epstein’s fiftieth birthday.” According to the complaint, Murdoch replied: “I will handle it.”
Trump’s attorneys say the president “reasonably interpreted” that statement to mean the article would not be published. It was published anyway — the very next day.
And that is the new hook. If Murdoch personally assured Trump the story would be killed, and the Journal published it anyway, Trump’s team argues that goes directly to the question of whether the defendants “recklessly disregarded” the truth. The amended complaint states: “At the time of publication, Defendants recklessly disregarded whether the Defamatory Statements were true and/or they purposefully avoided the discovery of the truth.”
The complaint also says that Journal reporter Joseph Palazzolo emailed Leavitt on July 15, 2025, advising her of the intent to publish. Leavitt called Palazzolo back to tell him the story’s central claim was false. That afternoon, Trump’s attorneys sent a cease-and-desist letter to Dow Jones warning them not to run it. According to the complaint, the defendants did not respond.
Trump’s legal team argues that Murdoch’s “actual malice” is legally “attributable” to the entire organization because of his ownership and control over Dow Jones and News Corp.
Who Is Being Sued and What They Are Saying
The defendants named in the refiled complaint include Rupert Murdoch, Dow Jones and Company, News Corp, News Corp CEO Robert Thomson, and the two Journal reporters who wrote the story, Khadeeja Safdar and Joseph Palazzolo.
Dow Jones has not changed its position. The company previously stated: “We have full confidence in the rigor and accuracy of our reporting, and will vigorously defend against any lawsuit.”
The Journal’s reporters have maintained they reviewed the letter in question and that it was part of a collection of birthday wishes reviewed by the U.S. Department of Justice during its investigation of Epstein.
Of the two people who could directly confirm or deny whether Trump sent the letter, Trump has “vehemently denied” doing so, according to the complaint. The other, Ghislaine Maxwell, “has testified to a federal official that she had no knowledge of it,” according to the filing.
The Bigger Picture
Trump has filed similar defamation and related lawsuits against The New York Times, the BBC, and Iowa’s Des Moines Register. Some of those cases ended in settlements after Trump won reelection. Murdoch’s camp has taken a different approach — they have said publicly they will not settle and plan to fight this one in court.
That stance is notable given that Murdoch, now 95, has maintained what observers describe as a complicated but ongoing relationship with Trump, including multiple meetings at the White House in recent months.
The amended lawsuit, filed in federal court in Miami, puts the judge back in the position of deciding whether the new allegations — particularly the claim that Murdoch personally promised to kill the story — are enough to satisfy the actual malice standard that sank the first complaint.
Trump’s legal team put it plainly in a statement: “The President will continue to hold those who mislead the American People with Fake News and smears accountable for their actions.”
Sources: Mediaite; Reuters via U.S. News and World Report; Newsweek; The Hill; CNBC; CBS News; Freedom Forum; Axios