Former President Donald Trump and his legal team were fined almost $1 million Thursday by a federal judge as punishment for filing a frivolous lawsuit.
The lawsuit against Hillary Clinton and the Democratic National Committee had been dismissed in September, but sanctions were requested for filing the case at all.
The suit accused Mrs. Clinton of defaming him by spreading false information about his purported ties to Russia in the 2016 presidential election.
“This case should never have been brought,” wrote Judge Donald M. Middlebrooks in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida in his order sanctioning Mr. Trump.
“Its inadequacy as a legal claim was evident from the start,” he wrote. “No reasonable lawyer would have filed it. Intended for a political purpose, none of the counts of the amended complaint stated a cognizable legal claim.”
In dismissing the case back in the fall, “with prejudice,” Judge Middlebrooks said Mr. Trump was “seeking to flaunt a two-hundred-page political manifesto outlining his grievances against those that have opposed him, and this Court is not the appropriate forum.”
The judge also blasted then “the audacity of Plaintiff’s legal theories and the manner in which they clearly contravene binding case law.”
The fact the lawsuit was dismissed with prejudice means the former president cannot refile it.
In dismissing the case back in the fall, Judge Middlebrooks said Mr. Trump was “seeking to flaunt a two-hundred-page political manifesto outlining his grievances against those that have opposed him, and this Court is not the appropriate forum.”
The judge also blasted then “the audacity of Plaintiff’s legal theories and the manner in which they clearly contravene binding case law.”
His dismissal of the lawsuit “with prejudice” meant the former president cannot refile it.
Under Thursday’s order, Mr. Trump and lead lawyer Alina Habba are jointly liable for a series of sanctions adding up to $937,989.39.
The judge already had sanctioned Ms. Habba and fellow Trump lawyers Michael T. Madaio, Peter Ticktin and Jamie Alan Sasson $50,000 each in November, plus about $16,000 in lawyers’ fees incurred by Charles Dolan, a Democratic public-relations executive named in the case.
Thursday’s ruling was based on sanctions requests from other defendants in the case, including Mrs. Clinton and the DNC.
• Victor Morton can be reached at vmorton@washingtontimes.com.
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