A judge in New York has dismissed Donald Trump's $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones over its Jeffrey Epstein coverage — "with prejudice," meaning the case is dead and cannot be revived, according to Deadline.
"Dismissed with prejudice" is the legal equivalent of a posthumous trophy. The case is not paused, not resting, not "under review." It is dead, and the coroner already filed the paperwork.
The interesting number in this whole affair was never the verdict. It was the $10 billion. That is a tabloid headline, not a damages figure — a number engineered to make every subsequent news cycle lead with "Trump's $10 BILLION lawsuit." For the duration of the case, the lawsuit itself was the press release.
That is the mechanism: sue the paper, and every story about the lawsuit is free coverage of you. "Trump sues WSJ" is a headline with your name in the lead position. The legal process was the ad campaign, and the court fee was the media buy.
Now the machine's own invoice has been paid in full, with interest. The $10 billion figure gets one final cycle as "the $10 billion case that got dismissed" — which, to be fair, is also a headline with his name in the lead position. Even the coroner's report is a press release.
YOUR TURN: Is the $10 billion number a threat, or is it the bill?
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