One of Donald Trump’s personal lawyers demanded on Thursday that a publisher cancel next Tuesday’s release of an explosive book about the president and his White House. Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon has emerged as the villain in the new year’s first seismic political quake, drawing condemnation and a separate lawsuit threat from the president’s legal orbit.
But Thursday morning’s letter from California attorney Charles J. Harder, known for representing pro wrestler Hulk Hogan and presidential son-in-law Jared Kushner, puts ‘Fire and Fury’ – columnist Michael Wolff’s book about the Trump White House – under an even sharper magnifying glass. Harder demanded publisher Henry Holt and Co. ‘immediately cease and desist from any further publication, release or dissemination of the book,’ including excerpts and summaries.
‘Your publication of false/baseless statements about Mr. Trump gives rise to, among other claims, defamation by libel per se, false light invasion of privacy, tortious interference with contractual relations, and inducement of breach of contract,’ he wrote. Representing the Trump Organization, the president’s private company, harder has already accused Bannon of breaching a confidentiality agreement, saying legal action was ‘imminent.’
‘You have breached the Agreement by, among other things, communicating with author Michael Wolff about Mr. Trump, his family members, and the Company, disclosing Confidential Information to Mr. Wolff, and making disparaging statements and in some cases outright defamatory statements to Mr. Wolff about Mr. Trump, his family members, and the Company,” read Harder’s letter to Bannon.
In a brutal statement Wednesday, Trump denounced his former campaign CEO as a self-promoting political faker who was exposed as a fraud when he was fired last year. ‘Steve Bannon has nothing to do with me or my Presidency,’ the statement said. ‘When he was fired, he not only lost his job, he lost his mind.’ The White House also released a statement from first lady Melania Trump’s office slamming the Wolff book as a ‘bargain fiction’ offering.
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