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★ Private Action

ABC News pays $15M to Trump library to settle defamation suit

Where the Settlements Went

Filed December 2024$16,000,000

★ The Brief

What happened

ABC News agreed in December 2024 to pay $15 million to a fund for Donald Trump's planned presidential library, plus $1 million in legal fees, to settle his defamation suit over George Stephanopoulos' on-air claim that Trump had been found liable for rape.

Who enabled it

ABC News

Who benefits

Donald J. Trump Presidential Library Foundation

Deal or steal?

It went to the same presidential-library fund Meta paid $22 million and Paramount $16 million to settle their own suits with Trump; ABC additionally paid $1 million to Trump's personal attorney.

★ Cast your vote

ABC News agreed to settle a defamation lawsuit filed by Donald Trump in federal court in Miami, arising from anchor George Stephanopoulos' repeated on-air assertions during a March 10, 2024 'This Week' broadcast that Trump had been found civilly liable for rape in E. Jean Carroll's lawsuits — a characterization that courts had clarified was technically inaccurate under New York law. Under the settlement, signed by Trump, Stephanopoulos, and ABC News Group president Debra OConnell on December 13, 2024, ABC agreed to pay $15 million to a non-profit organization being established in connection with Trump's yet-to-be-built presidential library, characterized in the agreement as a 'charitable contribution,' and $1 million in legal fees to the law firm of Trump's attorney Alejandro Brito. ABC also posted an editor's note on its website expressing regret over Stephanopoulos' statements.

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