The Justice Department dropped a lawsuit Monday that critics said it had no business filing to begin with, attempting to penalize the author of a tell-all book about ex-first lady Melania Trump.
The Trump DOJ sought to seize profits from the 2020 book “Melania and Me,” claiming it violated a nondisclosure agreement by Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, a 15-year friend of the first lady who served as a volunteer senior adviser.
Biden administration DOJ officials “evaluated the case and concluded that dismissal … was in the best interests of the United States,” according to a statement. A judge dismissed the lawsuit on Monday.
Wolkoff hailed the decision in a tweet as “vindication” against the “former President, and Melania on down, who attempted to wield their power to silence me by intimidating me from speaking the truth.”
Legal experts viewed the suit as an attempt to wield the might of the federal government to punish a former friend over personal issues.
“The U.S. government can’t sue someone just for making Melania Trump look bad,” read the headline of a scathing op-ed by Washington attorney Mark Zaid, who blasted the lawsuit as “unconstitutional.”
“This is just the latest move by the Trump family to try to turn the Justice Department into its own private law firm to silence those who speak critically of the Trumps,” Zaid wrote in The Washington Post.
Wolkoff insisted she abided by her nondisclosure agreement and said the confidentiality restrictions ended with her stint as a volunteer in 2018.
She landed a few choice jabs in the battle, including release of a recorded phone call of the first lady’s icy bashing of media questions about immigrant children — and about Christmas decorations.
“They said, ‘Oh, what about the children that were separated?’ Give me a fucking break,” Trump told Wolkoff on the 2018 call. (See the video below.) She also moaned about decorating the White House for the holidays: “You know, who gives a fuck about Christmas stuff and decoration, but I need to do it, right?” (Check out the video up top.)
The dismissal of the DOJ’s case against me is vindication against forces from the former President, and Melania on down, who attempted to wield their power to silence me by intimidating me from speaking the truth. This is a sign that justice is being restored in our great nation. https://t.co/iQRmRe92I1
— Stephanie Winston Wolkoff (@SWWCreative) February 9, 2021
Also on HuffPost
This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.
Source: Read Full Article
