Donald Trump ordered the New York Times to pay nearly $400,000 in legal fees

The former American president filed a complaint against the daily in 2021 following an investigation into how the billionaire inherited a fortune through tax evasion.

Published on January 12, 2024 11:42 p.m

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Former President of the United States Donald Trump in New York, January 11, 2024. (JOHN LAMPARSKI / AFP)

New legal setback for the real estate mogul. Former US President Donald Trump was ordered to pay $392,638 in court costs to The New York Times and the newspaper's journalists after his charges against them were dismissed on Friday, January 12.

Donald Trump filed a complaint against the American newspaper in September 2021, accusing three of its journalists of an “insidious conspiracy” to obtain his tax records. In 2018, they published a prestigious Pulitzer Prize-winning investigation that told how the former promoter, who claims he did it himself, built his fortune. She asserted that Donald Trump actually received the current equivalent of $413 million from his father over several years, some of which was transferred through a shell company in order to avoid taxes.

Republican primary favorite

In May 2023, a judge on the Commerce Division of the New York State Supreme Court fired the real estate mogul and ordered him to reimburse the daily's legal fees. In a new ruling on Friday, this judge found the amount of legal fees estimated by The New York Times to be “reasonable” and ordered Donald Trump to reimburse them in full at that amount.

Donald Trump is the heavy favorite in the Republican primary for the November presidential election, which begins on January 15 in Iowa. The billionaire is trying by all means to postpone his various criminal proceedings as late as possible and predicted “chaos in the country” if the American justice system did not drop the charges against him.