Government

The Mooch Threatens To Sue College Student In Customarily Brilliant PR Move

America's favorite Harvard Law grad is back!

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Harvard Law grad Anthony Scaramucci, the “William Henry Harrison of White House communications directors,” is back in the news because 15 minutes of infamy is apparently not enough these days. This time he’s threatening to sue a college student because apparently his tenure in the Trump administration hasn’t dampened his zeal for shooting himself in the dick with his words.

Scaramucci, a Tufts grad who serves on the advisory board of the school’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy — despite lasting less than two weeks in government service — was scheduled to speak at the school about how important it is to be rich or something when he decided to go after the school newspaper for publishing an op-ed from a grad student. The school has indefinitely postponed The Mooch’s remarks in light of the controversy.

At issue are a pair of op-eds, written by grad student Camilo Caballero, suggesting that Scaramucci exercised less than sound moral judgment when he put up a Twitter poll about the Holocaust that served as catnip for Nazis. Caballero feels this should disqualify Scaramucci as an advisor to the school. It provides a vague and indirect rebuke of Scaramucci’s ethics, but doesn’t go much beyond that. Both op-eds are linked in this morning’s edition.

At that point, Scaramucci could have let it go given that he’s a marginally public figure and we’re talking about a f**king student newspaper. Instead, he decided to fire off some threats and make sure that everyone knows about this op-ed instead of the 20 people who read the Tufts newspaper. Per the New York Post:

“So either back it up or you will hear from my lawyer,” Scaramucci wrote Nov. 16. “You may have a difference of opinion from me politically which I respect but you can’t make spurious claims about my reputation and integrity.”

His attorney then threatened legal action unless Caballero and the newspaper retracted the “false and defamatory allegations of fact” and issued an apology, according to the [Boston] Globe.

Employing the sort of canny wisdom that served him well in his 10 days as communications director, Scaramucci has managed to take an insignificant sideshow and plop it into every national news service’s daily run. “There’s no such thing as bad press” as they say. Except there is such a thing as bad press and inviting it almost never works out.

Claiming defamation, lawyer for Anthony Scaramucci demands retractions from Daily op-eds [Tufts Daily]
Tufts cancels Scaramucci talk after he threatens to sue student, school paper [New York Post]

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HeadshotJoe Patrice is an editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news.

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