By Jack Queen
NEW YORK, April 29 (Reuters) – President Donald Trump has suffered a string of courtroom setbacks in his battles with the American media, but the rulings have done little to blunt a broader campaign of pressure and retaliation that extends beyond the press.
Courts have consistently sided with news organizations, rejecting Trump’s defamation lawsuits and blocking efforts by his administration to limit press access or defund public media, citing the robust free-speech protections guaranteed by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
But slow-moving litigation and multi-layered appeals have worked in favor of an administration that acts quickly, tests legal boundaries and shifts tactics after defeats.
Trump’s clash with ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel reflects a pressure campaign that extends beyond the courts. Even as judges affirm media protections, Trump demands firings and urges regulatory scrutiny, pressing companies outside formal legal channels.
TRUMP SEEN TO SLOW-WALK LITIGATION
“Trump can repeatedly lose individual court battles but still advance his broader agenda of weakening and destabilizing the press,” said Christina Koningisor, a professor at UC Law San Francisco, citing what she described as Trump’s strategy of slow-walking litigation.
A spokesman for Trump’s personal lawyers said the president would continue to pursue accountability for what he calls false reporting and defamatory claims. Separately, a White House spokesperson described Trump as the most open and accessible U.S. president ever, saying his administration has broadened press access in unprecedented ways.
Trump has filed at least nine lawsuits against major media companies since 2020, seeking tens of billions of dollars in damages for what he alleges are false or misleading reports.
Separately, his administration has acted to restrict press access to government agencies and threatened to use regulatory powers against critical outlets, drawing legal challenges by media outlets.
Trump’s latest setback came on April 13, when a judge threw out his $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal and its parent company Dow Jones over a story describing a birthday letter to disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein bearing Trump’s signature.
U.S. District Judge Darrin Gayles said the complaint fell “nowhere close” to plausibly alleging the Journal knowingly published false information or recklessly disregarded the truth — the “actual malice” standard that makes defamation claims by public figures difficult to win.
Gayles nevertheless has allowed Trump to file a revised complaint, meaning Dow Jones could still face a costly and time-consuming court battle defending what it says was accurate reporting. Trump’s lawyers say they will file a revised suit.
Should the case survive another bid for dismissal, the subsequent discovery, trial and appeals could take years.
Trump’s 2022 lawsuit against CNN over its coverage of his false claims of election-rigging was tossed out in 2023. An appeals court upheld the ruling, but Trump could still seek Supreme Court review.
“The way our legal system works, it can cost a lot of time and money, and the president is able to take advantage of that,” said Tre Lovell, a defamation law specialist.
SETTLEMENTS UNDERSCORE COST OF PROLONGED LEGAL FIGHTS
Two media companies have settled defamation suits brought by Trump that were deemed meritless by legal experts but could have been costly to fight in court.
ABC agreed to donate $15 million to Trump’s presidential library after he sued over inaccurate on-air comments about a civil case in which a jury found him liable for sexual abuse. CBS reached a similar settlement after Trump sued over edits to an interview with his 2024 election rival Kamala Harris.
Neither company admitted wrongdoing, though ABC agreed to apologize and said it regretted anchor George Stephanopoulos’ on-air description of the civil judgment.
Critics of the CBS deal said its parent, Paramount, may have settled to smooth the way to regulatory approval of its $8.4 billion merger with Skydance Media, which the Federal Communications Commission granted shortly afterward.
More broadly, challenges to Trump administration actions can be slow and costly, and even courtroom victories for the press have at times proved fleeting, stalled by appeals or arriving too late to have an impact.
COURT VICTORIES BUT WITH LIMITED CONSEQUENCES
In the last month, judges have blocked a Trump executive order cutting off federal funds for public broadcasting, reversed his attempts to dismantle the government-run Voice of America and twice invalidated Pentagon press access rules as unconstitutional.
In each case, courts said the Trump administration violated First Amendment prohibitions by discriminating against media outlets based on viewpoint.
But an administration willing to test legal limits and swiftly appeal losses has managed repeatedly to outmaneuver a judicial process that is slow and deliberative.
National Public Radio sued in May 2025 to block Trump’s executive order eliminating federal broadcasting funds. When U.S. District Judge Randolph Moss ruled for NPR last month, the agency that once financed it no longer existed, its funding exhausted by Trump’s actions and parallel moves by his Republican allies in Congress.
Voice of America won court relief on March 18, nearly a year after its journalists sued to block its dismantling.
Courts remain essential to protecting press freedom but cannot serve as the sole check on abuses, said First Amendment attorney Doug Mirell.
“Trump’s campaign against the media is one that is so multifaceted that the judicial efforts to control him are insufficient,” Mirell said.
(Reporting by Jack Queen in New York; Editing by Noeleen Walder and Howard Goller)
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