Judge presiding over Trump's Wall Street Journal lawsuit has seen this movie before

[LetMyPeopleVote]

This is the same judge who dismissed trump's lawsuit against Michael Cohen

Judge presiding over Trump’s Wall Street Journal lawsuit has seen this movie before

The Obama appointee made history as the first openly gay Black man appointed to the federal bench.

www.politico.com/news/2025/07...

— Lauren Ashley Davis (@laurenmeidasa.bsky.social) 2025-07-21T17:49:19.423Z

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/07/21/wall-street-lawsuit-judge-donald-trump-00465363

President Donald Trump’s bid to take down the Wall Street Journal over its coverage of his connection to Jeffrey Epstein has landed in the courtroom of Darrin Gayles, who is likely experiencing deja vu.

That’s because Gayles, a 2014 appointee of Barack Obama, had another brush with a litigious Trump in 2023, when the then-former president sought to punish his onetime lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen.

Trump sued Cohen in April 2023 seeking a $500 million payout for claims that Cohen violated his attorney-client relationship with Trump and enriched himself off their relationship. Six months later, Trump abandoned the lawsuit, just before Cohen’s lawyers were set to question him under oath.

Trump’s new lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal and owner Rupert Murdoch seeks an even more audacious sum: $20 billion. Trump says the newspaper defamed him by reporting last week that Trump may have sent Epstein a suggestive birthday card more than two decades ago. Trump filed the lawsuit on Friday, and Gayles was assigned to preside over the case on Monday.

But as with the Cohen case, there’s an open question of whether Trump’s new lawsuit is more of a political stunt than a serious attempt to litigate the issue. If Trump pursues the case, he would open himself up to answering questions under oath about his connection to the disgraced financier who killed himself in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges.

This will be fun to watch

[Scubamatt]

1. Someone reassure me . . .

that this isn't just a grand plot between the orange tub of goo and Murdoch to "discredit" the Epstein issue by having the WSJ issue a retraction, saying the pic was a fake, etc. Seems right out of the con's playbook.