Former President Donald Trump speaks in Casper, Wyoming, May 28, 2022. The rally is being held to support Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney’s primary challenger, Harriet Hedgeman.
Chet Strange | Getty Images
former president donald trump It sued prominent journalist Bob Woodward on Monday over the release of an audio recording of an interview with Trump.
Woodward, publisher Simon & Schuster, and its parent company, Paramount Global, are trying to “illegal” Trump’s copyright and other rights by publishing an audiobook containing hours of “live” audio. robbed by the Woodward’s many interviews Trump and the lawsuit argue.
The lawsuit is based on estimates that the audiobook “The Trump Tapes” sold more than 2 million copies for $24.99 apiece, and seeks more than $50 million.
The 31-page complaint, filed in federal court in Pensacola, Fla., alleges that Trump “agreed to be recorded for the sole purpose of allowing Woodward to write a book in the presence of others.” I have repeatedly told Woodward,” he said. .”
That book, 2021’s Rage, failed to replicate the success of Woodward’s previous book on Trump’s White House, according to the lawsuit. By releasing it in book form, we have decided to use, steal and use President Trump’s voice,” the complaint alleges.
Simon & Schuster did not immediately comment on the lawsuit.
According to the lawsuit, Woodward met with Trump 19 times by phone and in person between December 2019 and August 2020. Woodward and his publisher collected more than eight hours of audio from those interviews for an audiobook released last October “without President Trump’s permission,” plus another audio from 2016. was collected.
According to the complaint, Trump “has made Mr. Woodward more than once aware of the restricted license nature of any recording, whether on or off record, and therefore retains the commercialization of the narration and all other rights.” “It has been with.
The complaint also alleges that Trump and his attorneys previously “confronted” the defendants over the controversy, but that they “brazenly refused to recognize President Trump’s copyright and contractual rights.” .
The lawsuit notes that the audio was also processed into CD, paperback and e-book formats, “all at the expense of President Trump and without his explanation.”
The lawsuit accused the three defendants of unfair advantage, and the author himself was accused of breach of contract and of “implied covenants of good faith and fair dealing.”
Trump has sued Woodward, one half of the legendary reporting duo that broke the Nixon-era Watergate scandal, in stepping up his 2024 presidential campaign.Weeks before he launched his current White House bid, a federal judge dismissed Trump’s sprawling lawsuit He spoke out against Democratic presidential rival Hillary Clinton and former officials, denouncing it as a “political manifesto.”
