In a dramatic escalation of a political feud, First Lady Melania Trump is threatening to sue Hunter Biden for more than $1 billion unless he retracts a claim that convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein introduced her to her husband, President Donald Trump. The legal warning, delivered in a letter from her attorney, calls Biden’s comments “false, disparaging, defamatory and inflammatory” and alleges they have caused her “overwhelming financial and reputational harm.”
The threat follows remarks made by Hunter Biden in a sprawling interview earlier this month with journalist Andrew Callaghan on the “Channel 5” YouTube show. During the interview, Biden claimed, “Epstein introduced Melania to Trump. The connections are, like, so wide and deep.” He attributed the claim to author Michael Wolff, a source the Trump administration has previously accused of making up stories.
The First Lady’s attorney, Alejandro Brito, sent a letter to Biden’s legal team on August 6, demanding an immediate retraction and a public apology. The letter gives a deadline for compliance, after which, Brito writes, Mrs. Trump will have “no choice” but to file a lawsuit for a staggering sum of over $1 billion in damages. According to reports, Biden has failed to meet this deadline and has doubled down on his remarks in a follow-up interview.
When asked if he would apologize to the First Lady, Biden responded, “F— that – that’s not going to happen.” He added that the threats of lawsuits were “designed distraction” and that what he said was what he had “heard and seen reported and written” by others.
The Trumps and their legal team have long maintained that the President and First Lady met in 1998 at a New York Fashion Week party hosted by a modeling agent, Paolo Zampolli. The First Lady’s team has a history of pursuing legal action against those who spread what they consider false claims. The Daily Beast and a political strategist, James Carville, have both reportedly issued retractions or edited content after receiving legal letters from the First Lady’s team over similar claims.
The potential lawsuit, a legal strategy often employed by the President himself, now sets the stage for a high-stakes legal battle. While public figures must meet a high legal bar to succeed in a defamation suit, the public nature of the feud ensures that it will continue to be a dominant storyline in a tumultuous political environment. For now, the public waits to see if the First Lady’s legal team will follow through on its threat and take the matter to court.