Trump ordered to pay hefty sum for New York Times’ legal fees

In one of many Trump related news items to hit on Friday, he’s been ordered to pay $392,638.69 in legal fees to the New York Times and three reporters — Susanne Craig, David Barstow and Russ Buettner — as a consequence of his failed lawsuit against the publication for a 2018 Pulitzer-winning story on his family’s finances.

In May 2023, New York Judge Robert Reed tossed out the lawsuit on the basis that the reporters were protected under the First Amendment and this latest development would otherwise put it rest, were it not for Trump’s team railing against it.

In his order at the start of the weekend, Reed wrote that the sum put upon Trump is “reasonable” given the case’s complexity, according to Politico, but Trump’s lawyers pushed against it, calling the amount “exorbitant.”

Mary Trump, the niece of the former president who was part of this lawsuit — accused by her uncle of conspiring with the reporters of the NYT to publish his tax records — was also in the mix for possible reimbursement of her legal fees, but her request was denied in June 2023.