President Trump’s lawsuit against journalist Bob Woodward and his publishing house Simon & Schuster was dismissed by a federal judge on Friday, the same day that Trump filed a new and unrelated suit against the Wall Street Journal.
US District Judge Paul Gardephe of the Southern District of New York gave Trump’s legal team a month to file another amended complaint. But for now, he dismissed the current iteration and said “it appears unlikely” that Trump “can adequately plead a plausible copyright interest in ‘The Trump Tapes.’”
That was the name of an audiobook released by Woodward in 2022, which contained the 20 interviews the veteran journalist conducted with Trump from 2016 through 2020.
Trump filed the lawsuit in early 2023, claiming that Woodward had released audio from their interviews without Trump’s consent.
He initially sought nearly $50 million in damages. Trump’s lawsuit claimed the audio was “protected material, subject to various limitations on use and distribution.”
Woodward and his publisher said the lawsuit was without merit and pledged to aggressively defend against it.
In an 81-page ruling on Friday, Gardephe said that the president had failed to “plausibly” establish that Trump is a joint author of the audiobook or has a copyright interest in the interviews and was thus granting Woodward’s motion to dismiss.
Simon & Schuster said in a statement: “We’re very pleased the Court agreed with us and dismissed the case.”
David Goldman and Hannah Rabinowitz contributed reporting.
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