Trump gets $15m in ABC News defamation case

Getty Images Donald Trump stands beside the ABC News logo before the final presidential debate in September (Getty Images)

BBC News, December 15 — ABC News has agreed to pay $15m (£12m) to US President-elect Donald Trump to settle a defamation lawsuit after its star anchor falsely said he had been found "liable for rape".

George Stephanopoulos made the statements repeatedly during an interview on 10 March this year while challenging a congresswoman about her support for Trump.

A jury in a civil case last year determined Trump was liable for "sexual abuse", which has a specific definition under New York law.

As part of Saturday's settlement, first reported by Fox News Digital, ABC will also publish a statement expressing its "regret" for the statements by Stephanopoulos.

According to the settlement, ABC News will pay $15m as a charitable contribution to a "Presidential foundation and museum to be established by or for Plaintiff, as Presidents of the United States of America have established in the past".

The network also agreed to pay $1m towards Trump's legal fees.

Under the settlement, the network will post an editor's note to the bottom of its 10 March 2024 online news article about the story.

It will say: "ABC News and George Stephanopoulos regret statements regarding President Donald J Trump made during an interview by George Stephanopoulos with Rep. Nancy Mace on ABC's This Week on March 10, 2024."

An ABC News spokesperson said in a statement the company was "pleased that the parties have reached an agreement to dismiss the lawsuit on the terms in the court filing".

In 2023, a New York civil court found Trump sexually abused E Jean Carroll in a dressing room at a department store in 1996. He was also found guilty of defaming the magazine columnist.

Judge Lewis Kaplan said the jury's conclusion was that Ms Carroll had failed to prove that Trump raped her "within the narrow, technical meaning of a particular section of the New York Penal Law".

Judge Kaplan noted that the definition of rape was "far narrower" than how rape is defined in common modern parlance, in some dictionaries and in criminal statutes elsewhere.

In a separate case, also presided over by the same judge, a jury ordered Trump to pay $83.3m to Ms Carroll for additional defamatory statements.

During the 10 March broadcast, Stephanopoulos asked South Carolina Republican congresswoman Nancy Mace how she could endorse Trump.

The anchor falsely said "judges and two separate juries have found him liable for rape".

Stephanopoulos repeated the claim 10 times throughout the broadcast.

Ahead of the ruling, a federal magistrate judge had ordered Trump and Stephanopoulos to give sworn evidence at depositions next week.

Trump has also sued CBS, the BBC's US broadcast partner, for "deceptive conduct" over an interview with Kamala Harris.

In 2023, a judge threw out his defamation lawsuit against CNN, in which he alleged the network had likened him to Adolf Hitler.

He has also had lawsuits filed against the New York Times and the Washington Post dismissed.