Melania Trump files for sanctions against journalist Michael Wolff

MANHATTAN (CN) — First lady Melania Trump filed a motion for sanctions against journalist and Donald Trump biographer Michael Wolff on Tuesday, weeks after a federal judge cautioned her against the move.

Accusing Wolff and his lawyers of using the federal courts for “a fundraising drive and a political spectacle,” Melania Trump is seeking a myriad of fees in connection with Wolff’s unsuccessful anti-SLAPP lawsuit against her.

“Plaintiff and his counsel asserted a legally frivolous claim, propped it up with factual contentions that lacked any evidentiary support, and used them to run a political and commercial campaign,” the first lady claims in the 26-page motion. “They should pay for Mrs. Trump’s fees and expenses incurred for the process they abused.”

Wolff preemptively sued Melania Trump in an effort to ward off a billion-dollar defamation threat from the first lady, who was demanding retractions and an apology for Wolff’s commentary about her connections to disgraced financier and convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.

But U.S. District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil dismissed the claim, finding Wolff filed the suit too early. She also lambasted Wolff for what she called an “inappropriate level of tactical gamesmanship” by trying to keep the fight in a more favorable jurisdiction.

“Plaintiff asks for a declaration that, if the first lady sues him, he deserves to win. That is not how the federal courts work,” Vyskocil, a Donald Trump appointee, wrote in the May ruling.

Despite Melania Trump’s victory — and the scathing nature of Vyskocil’s order against Wolff — the judge cautioned the first lady about the “very high burden” for success with a sanctions motion and suggested she should perhaps quit while she is ahead.

“I wonder if it’s in the best interest of the parties to continue litigating in this court,” Vyskocil said from the bench at a July 1 conference.

Nonetheless, Melania Trump pushed ahead with her sanctions motion on the back of Vyskocil’s own findings.

“Plaintiff filed a patently meritless lawsuit and used it to harass Mrs. Trump in public,” the first lady claims. “The requested sanctions do not depend on a ruling that plaintiff’s statements were defamatory. They rest on the unsupported and mischaracterized federal submissions, the use of those papers for improper purposes, counsel’s multiplication of the federal proceedings, and the court’s findings that the action itself was abusively presented as textbook bad-faith forum-shopping.”

Melania Trump further argues that Wolff made false assertions about her personal life in several docketed filings. For instance, Wolff’s counsel proffered a declaration that stated Melania Trump’s relationship with the president “has no doubt been diminished if not fractured by his notorious affairs with other women — especially at the time of the birth of their son.”

The first lady said this speculation was not only untrue but completely irrelevant and “offered only to malign and embarrass” her.

She also critiqued Wolff for writing extensively about the lawsuit on his Substack account, as well as continuing to pool money on GoFundMe for the litigation, even after the lawsuit was dismissed. At the time of writing, Wolff has raised more than $836,000 on the crowdfunding platform.

“With your help, I intend to fight the Trumps and to make every effort to force husband and wife, under oath, to testify about their relationship with Epstein, or to hold them to account for why they won’t,” Wolff writes on his GoFundMe page. “And, as well, with the subpoena power of a lawsuit, to call other witnesses who can help explain the nature of Donald and Melania Trump’s long involvement with Epstein.”

Among the statements he sought to defend in the lawsuit was a claim that Donald Trump liked to have sex with his friends’ wives, and that he first slept with Melania Trump on Epstein’s private jet. Wolff also looked to back up his claim that their marriage was a “sham marriage, trophy marriage.”

He’s stated that Melania Trump “plays no small part” in “the Epstein story,” though he also noted in the now-dismissed suit that he never said Melania Trump was involved in Epstein’s crimes.

Wolff interviewed Epstein extensively before his 2019 suicide in a New York City prison. The Trumps’ reported relationship with the infamous sex offender continues to be a thorn in their side.

Melania Trump even released an unprompted recorded statement distancing herself from Epstein’s sex trafficking in April.

“I have never been friends with Epstein,” she said. “Donald and I were invited to the same parties as Epstein from time to time, since overlapping in social circles is common in New York City and Palm Beach.”

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