Courts

Offhand Lie About Central Park 5 Lands Trump Back In Legal Trouble

He is really good at being demonstrably wrong in public!

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ABC News Hosts Presidential Debate Between Donald Trump And VP Kamala Harris At The National Constitution Center In Philadelphia

(Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

There’s a big buzz right now about Trump serving McDonald’s french fries to fake McCustomers. Cute PR move, but it is a little too close to election day to get caught up in camera shutters. But do you know what’s evergreen? Lawsuits! Reuters has coverage:

The five Black and Hispanic teenagers who were wrongfully convicted for the 1989 rape of a white jogger in New York’s Central Park sued Donald Trump for defamation on Monday over statements he made at last month’s U.S. presidential debate.

Trump, the Republican nominee for the White House, falsely said at the Sept. 10 debate with Democrat Vice President Kamala Harris that the Central Park Five had killed a person and pleaded guilty.

The lawsuit filed in federal court in Philadelphia by Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana, Kevin Richardson, Antron Brown and Korey Wise, called Trump’s statements “demonstrably false.” Salaam is now a member of the New York City Council.

In case you aren’t familiar, the Central Park 5 were accused of assaulting and raping a jogger in 1989. Trump proceeded to buy ads in newspapers saying that they should get the death penalty. They were exonerated in 2002 after DNA evidence and someone else’s confession showed they weren’t to blame. Despite this, Trump opted not to apologize for needlessly dragging their reputations through the mud. No clue why he decided to double down on falsehoods 5 years later, but hitting him in his pockets is as good a response as any.

Central Park Five sue Trump for defamation over debate remarks [Reuters]

Chris Williams became a social media manager and assistant editor for Above the Law in June 2021. Prior to joining the staff, he moonlighted as a minor Memelord™ in the Facebook group Law School Memes for Edgy T14s.  He endured Missouri long enough to graduate from Washington University in St. Louis School of Law. He is a former boatbuilder who cannot swim, a published author on critical race theory, philosophy, and humor, and has a love for cycling that occasionally annoys his peers. You can reach him by email at [email protected] and by tweet at @WritesForRent.

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