Trump threatens NYT, CNN over Iran reports
NN Desk :
President Trump on Wednesday threatened to sue The New York Times (NYT) and CNN for publishing articles about a preliminary intelligence report that said the American attack on Iran had set back the country’s nuclear program by only a few months.
An attorney representing President Donald Trump sent legal letters to CNN and The New York Times threatening legal action over reporting about US airstrikes in Iran.
President Trump has ratcheted up his rhetorical battle over recent US airstrikes in Iran by having an attorney send legal letters to CNN and The New York Times demanding retractions of accurate reports.
In a letter to The Times, a personal lawyer for the president said the newspaper’s article had damaged Mr. Trump’s reputation and demanded that the news organization “retract and apologize for” the piece, which the letter described as “false,” “defamatory” and “unpatriotic.”
On Thursday evening a CNN spokesperson confirmed that the network responded to the letter by rejecting the claims in it.
The Times publicized its response, which said in part, “No retraction is needed. No apology will be forthcoming. We told the truth to the best of our ability. We will continue to do so.”
Trump has a long history of litigation in his business career, and an even longer history of threatening to sue and not following through.
In the past year, Trump has stepped up a legal campaign against major media outlets including CBS, leading some First Amendment experts to decry his use of legal threats and lawsuits to tie up and intimidate newsrooms.
This week’s legal letter from Alejandro Brito, one of Trump’s personal attorneys, alleged that June 24 stories by CNN and The Times were false and defamatory.
The stories described an early US intelligence assessment of the strikes that was at odds with Trump’s insistence that Iran’s nuclear enrichment sites were “completely and totally obliterated.”
Administration officials confirmed the existence of the intel but claimed the assessment was of low confidence and asserted that it was leaked to undercut the president.
Several officials have vowed to conduct leak investigations, and Trump has said any the leakers “should be prosecuted.”
Trump also responded by attacking CNN and The Times in highly personal terms. On Wednesday, when he called for one of three CNN reporters who broke the initial story to be fired, CNN said “we stand 100% behind Natasha Bertrand’s journalism and specifically her and her colleagues’ reporting” about the intelligence assessment.
