President Donald Trump has refiled his $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal — and to bolster his case, he’s leaning on a key witness interview conducted by Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, the president’s own former personal attorney.
In an amended complaint filed Tuesday in federal court in Miami, Trump’s lawyers cited a July 2025 interview with Ghislaine Maxwell as evidence that the Journal’s reporting was false. What the filing doesn’t mention is that the interview was conducted by Blanche who was serving as Deputy Attorney General at the time and has since been elevated to Acting Attorney General — and who granted Maxwell limited immunity to participate.
The lawsuit centers on a July 2025 Wall Street Journal story reporting that a bawdy birthday letter bearing Trump’s name was included in a 2003 album Maxwell compiled to celebrate Jeffrey Epstein’s 50th birthday. The letter, the Journal reported, featured a typewritten note framed by a hand-drawn outline of a naked woman, with a signature mimicking pubic hair. Trump has denied writing it.
The amended complaint argues Maxwell’s statements to federal investigators undercut the Journal’s reporting. “Maxwell has stated, subject to penalty of perjury for lying to a federal officer, that she did not remember President Trump submitting a letter for Epstein’s 50th birthday,” the filing reads.
But when Blanche asked Maxwell directly during the two-day July interview, her answer was notably narrow. “Do you remember President Trump submitting a letter or a card or a note?” Blanche asked. “I don’t,” Maxwell replied. Asked again, she said, “I do not remember.”
Her statement came in an interview which came with a limited immunity agreement, after which Maxwell was transferred to a minimum-security prison in Texas — a facility that typically does not house sex offenders.
When later pressed on whether Maxwell was a credible witness, Blanche told CNN it was “an impossible question to answer.”
The original lawsuit was dismissed in April by U.S. District Judge Darrin Gayles, who ruled Trump’s complaint came “nowhere close” to the actual malice standard required of public figures in defamation cases. The amended complaint attempts to clear that bar by arguing the Journal ignored Maxwell’s lack of recollection, buried Trump’s denials, and published without ever producing the letter itself.
Dow Jones, which owns the Journal, said at the time of the original filing that it would vigorously defend against the suit.
“We have full confidence in the rigor and accuracy of our reporting,” a spokesperson said.
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