A federal judge has dismissed Donald Trump’s defamation lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal over its reporting on a birthday letter to Jeffrey Epstein, ending the president’s legal challenge to the story — this time permanently.
US District Judge Darrin P. Gayles, sitting in Miami, ruled on Saturday that Trump had failed to plausibly allege that the newspaper acted with “actual malice” when it published the story. Because it was Trump’s second attempt at the claim, Gayles dismissed the case with prejudice, meaning it cannot be filed again.
The lawsuit centred on a Wall Street Journal article published on 17 July 2025, headlined “Jeffrey Epstein’s Friends Sent Him Bawdy Letters for a 50th Birthday Album. One Was From Donald Trump.” The paper reported that a book compiled for Epstein’s 50th birthday in 2003 included a letter bearing Trump’s name, with typewritten text framed by the outline of a naked woman and signed “Donald”. The letter ended: “Happy Birthday — and may every day be another wonderful secret.”
Trump sued the Journal’s publisher, Dow Jones, its parent company News Corp, News Corp chief executive Robert Thomson and chairman emeritus Rupert Murdoch, and two of the paper’s reporters in July 2025, seeking at least $10 billion in damages. He denied writing the letter, calling the story false, malicious and defamatory.
Gayles had already dismissed the original complaint in April, ruling that its assertions of malice were “formulaic” and came “nowhere close” to the legal standard for a public figure, but gave Trump the chance to file an amended complaint. In Saturday’s ruling, the judge found the revised version still fell short, writing that the allegations of malice were “conclusory, vague, sometimes inconsistent with the article and often irrelevant” to whether the defendants knew or should have known the statements were false.
The judge also rejected Trump’s argument that the Journal should have withheld the story once he denied writing the letter, saying such a requirement would violate the First Amendment. “Were that the law, any time a public figure or his team denies an accusation, journalists would be immediately blocked from publishing negative or contradictory press,” he wrote.
The ruling is a significant defeat in Trump’s broader campaign of litigation against news organisations, and it is notable for its target: Murdoch, one of the president’s most prominent media allies, was among the defendants. Before publication, Trump had personally contacted Murdoch in an effort to stop the story running.
The court ruling does not settle whether Trump wrote the letter; it decides only that his complaint failed to meet the demanding legal test for defamation by a public figure, which requires proof of knowing falsity or reckless disregard for the truth.
Note on sourcing: this report is based on the court ruling as reported by CNN, The Wall Street Journal and The Times on 31 October 2026. The full text of the ruling has not been independently reviewed for this article, so quotations from it are as reported by those outlets.
Sources: CNN, “Judge tosses Trump’s lawsuit against Wall Street Journal again, this time for good”, 31 October 2026, https://www.cnn.com/2026/10/31/media/trump-wall-street-journal-murdoch-lawsuit-dismissed ; The Wall Street Journal, “Judge Dismisses Trump’s Lawsuit Against Wall Street Journal Publisher Again”, 31 October 2026, https://www.wsj.com/us-news/law/judge-dismisses-trumps-lawsuit-against-wall-street-journal-publisher-again-709f7ebf ; The Times, “Trump’s lawsuit against Wall Street Journal over Epstein letter dismissed”, 31 October 2026, https://www.thetimes.com/us/news-today/article/trump-lawsuit-wsj-epstein-birthday-letter-dismissed-bq7twqd35
